1000 Mothers March
On the 13th April 2013 a coalition of protest groups, including; the Haringey Trades Council, Unison, the local Anglican, Methodist, Roman Catholic and United Reformed Churches, Single Mothers Self-Defence, WinVisible (women with visible and invisible disabilities) and other North London organisations, hope that 1000 mothers will march against the current spate of benefit cuts. The march will begin at the Tottenham town hall, progressing up Tottenham Highroad to Northumberland Park School for a public speak out.
This protest is based on the belief that mother’s will be one of the groups who will be the hardest hit by the cuts in welfare payments. They say;
“Mothers are at the heart of the campaign because they carry a double burden, for themselves and for their children, of the financial hardship imposed by the coalition . I have learnt from over 20 years of helping people with their utility debts, council tax and rent arrears that it is the mothers claiming benefits who face the daily stress of feeding their children or keeping them warm, paying the rent or paying for a bus trip, coping with the council tax bailiffs fees or paying for a school trip, or being evicted as the caps, cuts, council tax and rising prices and rents take their toll of already inadequate benefits, or coping with debts to doorstep lenders and visiting food banks.”
These groups of individuals are utilizing a very old form of protest in their struggle against the current crop of benefit cuts. In England we can trace its routes back to the Jarrow March (October 1936), in which 200 men Marched from Jarrow to London to protest the hardships of living in Depression Britain. This particular form of march gains inspiration from The United States of America. In particular, it seems to gain its inspiration from the a million man march, which was organised by several organisations supporting African American men to protest against the discrimination faced by this group. This in turn gained its inspiration from Martin Luther King JR’s March on Washington, This type of Protest is still popular. But, does it still work? Does it still have a place in a world dominated by social media, virtual protest campaigns and the current political climate?
Links for 1000 Mothers March.
http://www.taxpayersagainstpoverty.org.uk/the-1000-mothers-march-for-justice/
http://blacktalkradionetwork.com/video/1000-mothers-march-for-justice-april-2013
http://www.taxpayersagainstpoverty.org.uk/the-1000-mothers-march-for-justice/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Million_Man_March
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/March_on_Washington_for_Jobs_and_Freedom
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Million_Man_March
