'I'd go stealing without this school' This seaside primary school washes pupils' clothes, cuts their hair and has a food bank [Tap to expand]
Head teacher Debbie Whiting set up a food bank to support families in poverty
And it was. Within a few weeks of that visit Mrs Whiting had set up a food bank at North Denes primary in Great Yarmouth. When this proved invaluable to struggling families, the school offered to run a clothes washing service for those of them living in bed and breakfast accommodation. Now the school's librarian has turned hairdresser, cutting the locks of some pupils and de-licing children when required.
That visit to the girl's home was in December 2018. Mrs Whiting wanted to discuss the note with her mother, who insisted her daughter should not have said anything because"she had a couple of potatoes the neighbour had given her to eat that night". Mrs Whiting knows the parents struggling to pay their bills, the children fleeing domestic violence, the families at risk of eviction, and those who will today ask her for food to feed their children. She compares them - and the school she leads - to a swan gliding across a lake"but paddling along really hard underneath".
In the past three years the family's monthly income has dropped from about £2,200 a month to £1,600, including rent paid directly to his landlord. But a house move in October stretched finances further, forcing him to ask for help from the food bank at North Denes, where his nine-year-old daughter Tina is a pupil.
At its site on the northern fringes of the town, behind a derelict pub and beside a caravan park, the challenges facing modern coastal communities are being played out. Like many seaside towns, Great Yarmouth has suffered from the loss of jobs in traditional industries, which have been replaced with seasonal, insecure work in sectors such as tourism and food production.
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