I may not be donating to Comic Relief this year.

Certainly an important one worth support j08, but some people cannot even put their loose change into a collecting tin without feeling that they have done something amazingly special. But as I say, so what?

As a nation we provide enormous amounts of aid to India and Africa . If dear old Mugabe can spend £400k on his birthday party and India has one of the most vigorous economies I will continue to donate to the Sally Army whom I trust to spend the money wisely and save the children who I believe have people in place to ensure the money goes to the right place not politicians pockets

I think it does matter that big appeals pander to smug and self satisfied donors. Many small less fashionable, less popular charities suffer because they are not photogenic enough to attract money from these big funds and I think the big appeals lack the moral fibre to bring to their donors attention that there is more to giving than pretty/suffering children here and abroad.

I'm all for the Salvation Army.

A lot of the charities are seeing their donations drop due to the fact that people in this country now have less disposable income than they once had. Rich people can continue to give as they will get tax relief on their donations. Unfortunately "normal" people are struggling to make ends meet so cannot always afford to give to charity.

Also the big charity machines seem to spend thousands on tv advertising, and the sad part is, as one person has already said, the situation never seems to change in the countries the fundraising is aimed at, mainly due to corrupt governments.

Yes slywright and it is also true that those who have the least to give in charitable time or money are often those who give the most.

A percentage – I'm not sure how big – of donations to the Sally Army is for evangelism.

Charities that employ chuggers have to generate vast sums to get past the administration fees before the charity itself starts to benefit. I address cheques to the head office of the charity and do not donate by form filling. Last year I made donations via my mobile but won't do it again because they kept ringing me at awkward times asking me to up my donation.

I'm a SA supporter as well

We all have the opportunity to donate to our chosen charities and I for one prefer people to donkeys or dogs {sorry}.

I think the nationwide participation of Comic Relief helps to raise the profile of people in dire circumstances in Africa and the UK. It serves an educational purpose as well as a much needed financial one.

Most British children will be participating in one way or another. At DGS school he is dressing in red and baking a cake to sell. We will be talking about why he is doing this so that he thinks about what he is doing.

Children do need to learn to be aware of their responsibilities in the World. When I was teaching we always supported Comic Relief and linked it to RE and Geography.

Sadly we do have children and adults living in terrible situations in UK and not all are helped by Children in Need. The squalor is not as extreme as in parts of Africa, but dreadful never the less.

I am particularly impressed by the projects that CR set up in order to make people self reliant. That is the only route to pride and equality. So keep up the good work Comic Relief and all others striving in this field .

Yes. That is very true LullyDully. It is good the way it get the children involved.

I've no doubt I will fork out something on the night!

FlicketyB Maybe some people do feel smug and self-satisfied when they make a donation, but I think many others just feel they want to do something and feel guilty that they can't do more. That's how I feel anyway, and I think it's better than the actions of someone I know who just says "I can't watch this, it upsets me too much, turn it over" (and gives nothing).

I agree that the attitude "charity begins at home" isn't very - well - charitable, and with *gracesmum"'s point that Comic Relief was originally aimed at helping developing countries and that stressing the percentage that goes to the UK, panders to a very "us and them" view of the world. But my feeling is that if some of the money goes to children in the UK and some to children in Africa, that's better than nothing going to anyone.

I watched the programme Mary and Martha and was so moved and upset by this play I could not get it off my mind. I watched Comic relief dancing the other night also and pledged £15 pounds three calls on my mobile, but I still felt so guilty. Then I thought to myself what are these third world countries contribiting towards care of these poor children. The so called leaders of these countries are so well fed, live in big houses and live an elborate lifestyle, while people like us give and give all the time, there is something wrong somewhere. When they mentioned that a percentage of the money donated was for under privaliged kids here I was pleased. Now we havehad to open food banks in 2013 to feed certain families, this a bloody disgrace in a country that has fought and won two world wars.

I think our politicians and ministers, people in the House of Lords, etc., are still doing very nicely thank you, and some of their associations with big business are very questionable. Meanwhile there are thousands of children living in poverty here. There's corruption in many places - not just in developing countries.

I had hoped that Ian Duncan Smith spending so much time living with the real poor would have affected the government. No such luck there.

The Liberal Democrates are trying but not doing as well as hoped.

We did have dreams that the 60s would lead to equality but we have gone backwards in intention.

It seems that the rich still have no idea of how the poor live. There are indeed many poor here still who need support to break out.

None of us, I think, have any idea of how the poor live (apart from our varied past histories) in this country to anywhere in the world. But, as I've said before, those in need, and those starving and suffering need our help, regardless of politics, creed or nationality. Their leaders may be corrupt, but the people, and the. Hidden in particular, still suffer.

In this world today, a child dies every 5 seconds from hunger, every 20 seconds from water borne diseases, and the list continues. They are our responsibility.

Ariadne well said.

Should have read "children"!!

Ariadne well said