Protesters gathered outside a Cumbrian MP’s office today – on his birthday – to highlight food poverty in his constituency.
The Unite union held the peaceful protest outside Mark Jenkinson’s Maryport office to highlight recent research it and firm Survation carried out, which found that 17 per cent of people living in the Workington constituency (16,337 people) were living with food insecurity.
It said 21,142 residents (22 per cent) had either gone into debt or increased their levels of debt in order to meet the increased cost of grocery items.
Campaigners had with them an inflatable birthday cake and posted a birthday card through the office door.
Unite senior organiser Joe Rollin said: “The level of food poverty in Workington is scandalous. Mark Jenkinson should be mortified for allowing hunger on this scale to grip the community on his watch.
“We have a birthday message for the MP for Workington – the community are taking matters into their own hands. Unite intends to build power in our workplaces and simultaneously organise in our communities.
“Unite has established permanent bases on the ground in Workington to work with workers within their communities to deliver an economy that works for them.”
Following the protest, Mr Jenkinson posted on Twitter: “It continues to disappoint me that the unions use the plight of real people, some of whom they purport to represent, as pawns in their political games. As a former member of Unite, it was stunts like this – while they continued to sell me and my colleagues down the river in pay negotiations – that led me to leave.
“The ‘protest’ was attended by a high proportion of Labour councillors, candidates and activists, alongside union barons who like to play politician without standing for election. Yet those same activists are silent on Labours proposed 6.9 per cent council tax increase in Cumberland, or their 12.4 per cent increase in Workington.
“That Unite’s priority is to stand with a banner outside my office is a nothing short of a betrayal of their members.”
