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Dear Sir,
I have been listening to your speech and to an analysis of what you have been saying. Now I have something to say to you. I firmly believe that you are unaware of how poor people exist and I am the person to enlighten you because I am poor.
I am a married woman but separated from my husband and have custody of our one child, a boy of 12. I am fortunate, I actually receive my maintenance, but it is taxed at 8/3 in the £. I work full time and am taxed as a single person. I am still on emergency code although I have worked at the same company since May 1970. Deductions from my pay are 15/- national insurance, 1/2 graduated pension, 16/- tax. My total income is £12 12s 10d per week. £4 of this I must NOT spend, it pays my rent £2 10s, rates 10/- and the other £ I save for my electricity bill. So we are left with £8 12s 10d. My other expenses which have to be met are as follows:-
£ s d per week
14 9 coal
8 0 milk
4 2 papers
10 0 private insurance
10 0 TV
£2 6 11
For food, cleaning materials, i.e. toothpaste, soap, soap powder, vim, floor polish, shoe polish and clothes I am left with the vast sum of £6 5s 1d per week. First food, coffee has gone up from 4/1 to 5/10, sugar from 1/4 to 1/6 for 2 lb, flour between 1/7 to 2/1 for 3 lb, tea between 2/6 to 3/1. The cheapest butter has gone up from 1/5 to 1/7 for ½lb.
Are you letting the price of food go up so that when we creep into the Common Market you can say there now, they aren't so much higher are they? But we are feeling the pinch now, you aren't fooling anybody with this ruse. I have applied for a rent rebate and at the time of writing am awaiting a decision. I have also applied for and received a grant for school clothes, free meals and one pair of shoes for my son. The clothes grant was for £10. I was informed that I could buy two pairs of trousers, two shirts, one pullover, one school tie, one blazer and a duffle coat. In actual fact I bought one pair of long trousers, two shirts and two pullovers - that came to £9 15s. They are not top quality and I bought them plenty big enough so he can grow into them.
In York alone there are an estimated 800 women who are widows, divorced or separated. Do you expect them to struggle on for ever? Have you ever stood at the meat counter of a large store (where I might add the meat is the cheapest) and watched an old age pensioner pick up the cheapest joint she can find, look at the price, put it down and turn away? You want to weep as you wonder what she will have for her Sunday lunch. I can't afford a joint either. Since when did you have sausages for your Sunday lunch? The firm I work for do not supply luncheon vouchers as many do in London. I don't know of any firm that does supply them in York. I take sandwiches. Don't suggest I get a better job, it took from November 1969 to May 1970 to find this one. All my clothes are hand me downs from kind friends, my shoes are birthday or Christmas presents. I haven't been in a store to buy a coat or dress for years. I am sick and tired of the eternal struggle to make ends meet. If I hear another report where someone says the housewife will have to bear the cost I'll scream. Another phrase that makes me contemplate murder is 'pockets of poverty'. Believe me, this is a myth. There are old age pensioners, mentally handicapped, physically handicapped, one-parent families, low-income families, just to mention a few. There are blankets, huge blankets of poverty. Stop this propaganda where people think there are just a few here and there.
Has it ever occurred to you what would happen if the entire working population of women went on strike for equal pay or for better social benefits for
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people in desperate need? I know men smile at the thought of women on strike but the idea is spreading, believe me. We could bring the entire country to a stop. Just think for a moment of all the places where women are employed today, from doctors and lawyers to char ladies.
So the Tories have got what they want, POWER, what are you doing with it? Helping the rich get richer and the poor get poorer? If so, the one thing that I value above all else on this earth I will have to give up, my son will have to go into care. He will lose the parent he has left, to be looked after by people who don't know him or love him. Because I can't struggle on for much longer.
So the next time you open your fridge door, switch on your central heating, hear the noise of a vacuum cleaner or washing machine, just think of all the people who haven't got these so-called necessities, and for God's sake help us.
Reprinted from 'SCARLET WOMAN', journal of York Women's Liberation Group.