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Sheffield Poverty Update No.21 April 2012

Church Action on Poverty is a national ecumenical Christian social justice charity, committed to tackling poverty in the UK. We work in partnership with churches and with people in poverty themselves to find solutions to poverty, locally, nationally and globally 1 JOHN 3:16-18 New International Version (NIV)
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This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our lives for our brothers and sisters. 17 If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person? 18 Dear children, let us not love with words or speech but with actions and in truth

Make your Pledge to Close the Gap between rich and poor. Give, Act and Pray with us to build a more equal society go to http://www.church-poverty.org.uk/
Sheffield Church Action on Poverty can provide a speaker to deliver a presentation on this campaign to Church groups please contact our secretary

There is little sign that narrowing the gap between rich and poor is a priority within our culture, and therefore little sign of increased fulfilment for people on both sides of the gap. There are good pragmatic reasons for working to close the gap. For Christians there is something more. The gap is an affront to God who made all human beings of equal worth. The full publication can be downloaded from Church Action on Poverty web site. The publication includes articles by 11 prominent Christians of different denominations. They explore different gaps or examples of inequality, including the Tax Gap, the Pay Gap, the Price Gap, the Power Gap, and others

Fairness Commission Sheffield City Council has set up a Fairness Commission to look at the nature, extent, causes and impact of inequalities in the City and to make recommendations for tackling them. The Commission has asked individuals and organisations with an interest in Sheffield to submit written evidence to help with its inquiry. Sheffield Church Action On Poverty have made a submission, a summary is given below. The churches and Christian based projects already provide extensive support to those who are poor and vulnerable in the city; through meals, food banks, day centres care for the elderly and lunch clubs, furniture stores, debt advice and hostels. The churches will not walk by on the other side as poverty increases but will not be able to replace the extensive services suffering cuts. . We expect that over the next few years unemployment, poverty and inequality will increase in Sheffield as the cuts and welfare reform take full effect. There will be a need for major action funded at national level to stimulate enterprise and/or to develop employment and training schemes if a disastrous period of large scale long term unemployment is to be avoided. Even so, much poverty and inequality will remain. National action affecting the tax system and introducing pay ratios within organisations would be needed to tackle this. Given our concern to protect the vulnerable, we recommend the following three priorities at city level: Maintain strong advice services in the city a vital protection for vulnerable people affected by benefit changes and unemployment. Encourage the introduction of the living wage as widely as possible in local organisations as a protection for the lower-paid. Adopt a strategy for bridging the gap of understanding between the two cities* both at school level and among adults

*the wealthy south west and the poorer north and eas tOnly national action can arrest the current trend towards rising unemployment, poverty and inequality but it

is worthwhile to look at city level action as well.

Sheffield Church Action On Poverty AGM Thursday 10 May at the Quaker Meeting House,
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at 7pm (refreshments from 6.15) All welcome

Capitalism, Jesus and the Coalition Speaker Revd. Noel Irwin from Victoria Hall
And a chance to view a clip from Channel 4s film Poor Kids. Independent analysis by the Institute for Fiscal Studies has suggested that child poverty will rise by 400,000 children in the current parliament, and a further 400,000 children in the next parliament, under the governments current distribution of measures for deficit reduction

Poverty and Homelessness Week Several Churches held services and Sheffield Church on Poverty held its service at the Anglican Cathedral. The theme of the week was to look at the barriers that divide us and lead to marginalisation of groups in society. Three projects talked to us about their work at our meeting hosted by St. Wilfrids Centre.
The Furnival Iain Cloke and Ben Harper spoke on the Stereotyping of young people and the wasted potential. The Project works with young people who have disengaged with the educational system, they already feel failure as far as education is concerned and both they and their families mistrust professionals. The work is to to increase their, confidence, social skills, literacy, numeracy ( which is poor because of past poor school attendance) and work with parents. The Furnival tries to make a long-term commitment. believing long-term commitment and support is very important; and builds success in small steps. Avanti Amy Whitell spoke on this project which is a Microfinance project that gives money and finance to help disadvantaged set up in business. The Microfinance idea originally came from the third world. Those with a criminal record, poor literacy etc cannot get bank loans so Avanti give Start up finance with a 1000 donation. The project also offers training courses for prisoners and ex-offenders who are potential entrepreneurs Referrals are made by Probation services and the maximum loan is 2000 over 2 years, interest is at the rate of inflation. St Wilfrids Kevin Bradley spoke on the project St Wifridss is a day centre for vulnerable people including homeless, asylum seekers, those with mental health issues, learning difficulties and those who are vulnerable. In Kevins opinion, most homeless people have a mental health problem. St Wilfrids are planning a 52 bed residential centre for people with a 2 year contract with support . Kevin believes we should treat everyone with respect -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Prayer from Church Urban Fund: Almighty God, You who are faithful, true and righteous in all your ways; Teach us to choose what is right, and stand against that which is evil. Teach us to love justice and mercy, and stand against oppression and exploitation. Show us where we are indifferent to injustice Sheffield CAP- Civic Breakfast on 21 March 2012, Revd Philip Bee of the Churches Regional Commission for Yorkshire and the Humber spoke on welfare reform .He drew comparisons with a tsunami in that what we have seen in natural disaster is a weight of water that simply keeps on coming devouring all in its path and leaves much misery behind and this could be the same in reductions in welfare. For example, one estimate is that nationally between 360,000 and 750,000 claimants for Disability Living Allowance will not receive the new benefit that will replace it. Another estimate is that claimant numbers for incapacity benefit will be cut by one million by 2014, because of more stringent assessment on migration to employment and support allowance and because a 12 month time limit on benefit receipt will apply in many cases. After many years on benefit, people will have to seek work in a sluggish jobs market. Universal credit should reduce some disincentives to work and create a complex pattern of winners and losers and no doubt teething problems as massive new computer systems are introduced. Monthly rather than fortnightly or weekly payment could exacerbate debt problems. Philip concluded that the cuts are being borne disproportionately by those who are financially vulnerable In his final remarks he said that we have the cuts and welfare reform but we have not had the moral argument whether the cuts are right or wrong Jane Perry continued the theme and said there was a challenge here and was the Church not only able to respond but was it ready. Nick Waterfield of Parson Cross Iniative gave an example of one young woman who needed some baby milk but was being denied by the benefit system. Councilor Julie Dore reminded the breakfast that it is not only people on benefits who are in poverty but working people on low income Frances Potter of Sharrow CAB brought the changes in working tax credit (wtc) to the attention of the meeting Mentioning that those currently receiving wtc when working for 16 hours a week will lose the wtc unless they work for 24 hours a week meaning that many part time low earners will lose a significant amount of income.

CHURCH ACTION ON POVERTY AND OCCUPY SHEFFIELD On 23 February members of Church Action on Poverty in Sheffield met representatives of Occupy Sheffield at the Quaker Meeting House in order to see how much common ground there was between the two movements. The meeting took place twelve days after the occupation of the Cathedral forecourt had ceased. In this article David Price of our CAP Committee describes some of the points that arose.

This was a friendly and frank discussion. It was clear that the aims of the two movements had much in common. Both movements were profoundly disturbed by current trends in global capitalism, exemplified in the banking crisis. Both deplored the growing inequality in our society and sought to change the climate of public opinion on this issue. CAP and Occupy differed however both in their methods of campaigning and in their organisational structure. Occupys method of camping without permission on strategically placed property owned by someone else in this case Sheffield Cathedral had some advantages. It generated publicity and offered a prominent platform. Moreover, in Occupy there is a much greater sense that people from anywhere, often with no experience of politics, can join in and be part of the change. This was a remarkable feature of the whole movement. There were however disadvantages. For one thing, they had greatly upset the Cathedral, leading to legal action which used up much of the energy that should have been going into campaigning. Moreover, maintaining a camp on a hard surface through the winter months was extremely demanding. Many supporters were working and could only stay overnight intermittently. Also the camp became a magnet for those sleeping rough in the City and, while this fitted well with Occupys idea of providing a model of compassionate living, there were also practical problems related to alcohol addiction. As regards organisational structure, CAP, both at national and local level, has conventional constitutions and committee structures and is guided by the views of the majority on a committee. Occupy on the other hand believes in consensus decision making, with the discussion going on until everyone accepts a particular line. There are apparently techniques for making this process effective. However, as there is no concept of a committee representing a defined membership, anyone can join in the GAs or General Assemblies which decide what to do. This can create problems of consistency, since different people may turn up at a GA on successive days. We in CAP had to concede that, although our movement was founded 30 years ago, our profile was much lower than that of Occupy which had only existed for some 30 weeks. Occupy can draw wide attention to points we have been making for years, with too few listening. As a group we are not drawn to direct action but we may be able to learn from other aspects of Occupys approach, particularly its success in engaging with a wider audience. We and Occupy hope to maintain contact and support each others campaigns wherever we can

Enquiries about the Sheffield group to: Chair: Canon Nicholas P A Jowett (njowett@sapl.ecclesallmethodist.org) Secretary: Sarah Baker 0114 2309552 sarahbaker17@live.co.uk
Members! Supporters! As always we rely on you to advise us on where we should be directing our efforts and on helping us to do this. Please contact us if you wish to have more details about any of the items in this newsletter, or have suggestions about what we should be doing, or can offer any help Please also share this newsletter with your contacts.