Labour councillors and the Peterborough Labour Party have been donating, collecting, and wrapping children’s books to be distributed as gifts to families in Peterborough who might otherwise struggle to afford presents for their children this Christmas. The local party has called on the public to support their efforts and add to the donations made by Labour councillors and members. They aim to start distributing these to families who signed up on their website by 20 December.
Labour Group Leader, Shaz Nawaz, said:
“In Iceland, there is a wonderful Christmas tradition known as jolabokaflod, which translates to ‘Christmas book flood’, which involves the exchange of books among friends and family on Christmas Eve. The love of reading is deeply instilled in that country which publishes and consumes more books per capita than any other.
It is a terrible shame that here in Peterborough, we have the highest levels of child poverty in the region and one of the largest educational disadvantage gaps in the country with children from deprived backgrounds falling as far as two years behind their peers.
The pandemic and confused government response to it has left many families in our city in an even more precarious position.
I know that giving a free book to a child won’t solve the disadvantages that hold them back at school, just as I knew when my fellow Labour councillors and I distributed free lunches during the half-term that it wouldn’t solve poverty-related hunger. Those are both huge challenges that we can only begin to tackle with a drastic change in local and national policy.
By giving a child the gift of a book this Christmas we hope that it will not only introduce them to a fulfilling pastime but also to spark a lifelong love of reading that will help them to learn and grow.”
In October this year, it was revealed that Peterborough suffers from the highest rates of child poverty in the East of England according to research from the End Child Poverty Coalition. This follows last year’s report by the Education Policy Institute (EPI) which found that school pupils in Peterborough from lower-income households are, on average, around two years behind their peers in educational attainment by the time they leave secondary school. The report refers to this as the ‘disadvantage gap’ and in Peterborough, this was among the worst in England. In May 2020, another report by the EPI stated the average nationwide gap was around one and a half years and predicted this would widen due to COVID.
The link between poverty and educational disadvantage is well-known and means that thousands of families in Peterborough were already in a particularly precarious situation when COVID hit. Added to this, the Conservative-run city council’s failure to address the city’s housing crisis has meant that soaring rents have forced thousands of families into overpriced, and often overcrowded, accommodation which has impacted struggling families even harder.
Labour Group Deputy Leader Aasiyah Joseph, said:
“Families have had to face extra pressure during the pandemic. This is on top of all the challenges and worries people were facing before coronavirus started. Peterborough has a low-wage economy, and many families are living hand-to-mouth. We want to share the joy of reading and giving gifts with families in solidarity. We will not judge anyone, and neither should anyone feel embarrassed. We want children to enjoy Christmas. If we can help with that then that would be an honour and nothing less”
Please use the following link to add your name to the list of recipients or to donate a book: