Channel 5, On benefits: 100 stone and on the Dole.

I find it intriguing that the massive popularity of cookery programmes coincides with an equally massive increase in ready-meal consumption, takeaways and eating out.

Because they make cooking look so difficult, fiddly and time consuming.

We can preach and pontificate as long as we choose but I suggest that you visit Stockport where I live and Rhyl where I used to spend a lot of time to see the young women, in groups, pushing buggies with babies munching on crisps and sausage rolls, totally ignored by their mums who are either talking amongst themselves or on their I+phones to realise just how deep the social crisis is. As I facetiously suggested in a previous post , just give them a taste of what life was like for previous generations who produced children with no parental or governmental support and see how they feel about that.
It is easy to say it is the child we must support, those young men and women have conceived those children without love or care for their future or welfare.
A very old fashioned and entrenched view but still very relevant today

What's wrong with sausage rolls? Sausage and pastry are not junk food and they're quite easy to make at home.

I had a Greggs sausage roll recently, cold. It was really good.

Sorry to digress a bit from the OP. I'm just sick of it being implied or said of perfectly decent food that it is junk. Meat and something to wrap it in like a bap or pastry is not junk food even if the meat is at the cheap end of the market.

Cheap cut meat like sausage is what poorer people have always eaten, long before obesity and its related health issues became a problem.

When I was at school, sausage rolls in your packed lunch would be a bit of a luxury. Cheese sandwiches were the cheaper option.

Now I would think it's the other way round.

annsixty so you'd like to return to the good old days when children had rickets and malnutrition ,or when they were forcibly removed from their mothers and put in cruel childrens homes or sent abroad as cheap labour...well I dont,I would hate to live anywhere where people were treated so appallingly.Just watch the programmes where mother and children are desperatley trying to find their birth family and how it has affected their whole lives .All heart aren't you!!Thank god there are people in this god forsaken UK who DONT think like you>

Ann60 is in fact a very kind person paddyann and she made it quite clear that she was making a 'facetious' remark. These kind of scroungers do make people cross, there's no doubt about that but what really annoys me is when people jump in to support their chosen lifestyle, forgetting that every pound given to those who deliberately choose this lifestyle is money that ought to be spent on those who have no choice in the matter.

So less of the virtue signalling that you are of course 'all heart' perhaps?

Yes, Ann60 is a kind person as Any says.
paddynan refers to living "in this god forsaken UK" - hang on a minute, we are so fortunate to live here. Yes, we have some social problems amongst a small group of the population. Look at those Hogarth prints from the 17th century and see history repeating itself, if in a slightly different form, with the drug of choice not always being gin.
There have always been neglectful and abusive parents. Many of those parents experienced neglectful/abusive parenting themselves, mental health/substance misuse issues. Not all parents who have a tough childhood go on to repeat that with their own children and some children who have a loving childhood go on to neglect or abuse their own children.
There are a small number of people who exploit the benefit system. That doesn't mean society should demonise the vast majority who would like to work, or worse, do work but earn so little they have the 'benefit' of tax credits.

Thank you both for supporting me I must say I was very upset by those remarks.

Thatbags I also like a Greggs sausage roll.
H and I sometimes have one warm at lunchtime with a small salad (bought frozen from Iceland) but I don't think it is suitable food for toddlers when they may,just may, have one several times a week.
Just reviewed before posting and I do,of course, mean the sausage rolls are frozen not the salad.
I have slapped myself on the wrist for my poor English.

Another supporter of annsixty here. She is well known to be kind and caring and no stranger to difficult times herself.
I'm very struck by how children are losing parental attention and care due to various electronic devices. I bet we've all felt sorry for little children strapped into buggies and desperately trying to communicate with a mum totally absorbed in her phone.
Alternatively, using i-phones/tablets to distract children. It was called electronic heroin in a recent article I read. 2 hours a day of this can seriously impair children's concentration for learning apparently.

'God forsaken UK' I don't think so paddyann. There is lots of beauty in the UK and lots of acts of kindness going on every day. We are so blessed to live here.

I am in a minority where I live as I do not like Gregg's sausage rolls, pasties or pies. They used to do very acceptable salad baguettes which was my choice of fast food.

Brave to stick your head above the parapet Harrigran in the ne. I share your dislike of Gregg's but then I had a friend whose daughter worked there. I also found their pastry very fatty but I'm now on Omneprozole so possibly a warning sign. I used to,love a cookery programme where people brought in random foods and two chefs cooked against the clock. I can't remember it's name but feel like that in my kitchen with what DH has forgotten from the list.

I enjoy a Greggs sausage roll and often have one (or two). However, I also weigh under 10 stone and exercise regularly. If someone is very overweight and unable to exercise due to health issues it just makes sense to avoid puddings and pies or you will just get even bigger and have more health/mobility problems. The woman on this programme did not even try to help herself.

I have also noticed that you rarely see an overweight child with slim parents.

I think paddyann's comments about annsixty were quite out of court. She chose to misunderstand and manipulate everything annsixty said.

Thank you all. I really am not as heartless as that

Out of order, downright unjustified and totally unfair attack on annsixty , paddyann!

All heart aren't you!!Thank god there are people in this god forsaken UK who DONT think like you
Talk about "holier than thou"!
All I can say is.
Thank God there are people in this god forsaken world who despite being tied to a DH with severe dementia will take the trouble and time to visit another GN member in hospital with serious heart troubles.
Who do you think you are to accuse someone of being heartless? What DO you know? How deliberately hurtful can you be?

The powers that be wouldn't print what I think of your comments, paddyann
I leave it to your twisted imagination.

Annsixty writes common sense. Although I haven't lived in the UK for some years it seems there's still a big social divide. A new class system, like it or not.
As most of us know planning shopping and cooking a decent meal takes time and effort, not necessarily money. It's quite hard work, too hard for many people.

I used to like the Greggs stuff, but I think it's gone off. The only decent thing is the cheese and onion in puff pastry ( fatttening though)

Since they've moved the venue where I work, I can no longer nip to Greggs next door. I've taken to taking a bento box with me. Suits me well as I'm more of a grazer anyway

Where we live the children in pushchairs are usually clutching bags of crisps and bars of chocolate. A sausage roll would be an improvement. What I do notice is that the families eating in the street do tend to be the fat ones.