Helen and Mark Mullins took their lives after trying to get by on charity handouts and living in a single room of their house because they couldn't pay for fuel.
In the video, filmed shortly before their deaths, Mark explains the distressing problems Helen had faced in trying to have her benefits established and negotiating the unsparing appeals process.
They had been walking twelve miles to get emergency food from a Salvation Army kitchen.
Two desperate souls who, punished and ignored by the benefits system, decided, in the end, that they literally couldn't afford to live.
While bankers enjoy billions in state welfare and dreamy bonuses, lost and abandoned people are simply giving up.
This is the fear society, a society of chronic insecurity and mercenary market rules, a society of poverty and want while Sainsbury's, Tescos and the other grocers of greed make astronomical profits.
Tragedies due to benefit insecurity and stress are becoming increasingly widespread.
Some more examples of suicide and death prompted by government cuts and the punitive benefits system:
Depressed 'Jobseeker' commits suicide - http://www.thisishampshire.net...
Cuts Kill: the story of a sister driven to suicide - http://www.dpac.uk.net/2011/05...
Man dies of kidney cancer after being told fit for work - http://www.guardian.co.uk/poli...
Woman's depressed brother commits suicide after benefits being stopped , at 3;40 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...
Two die while waiting for appeals to be heard - http://www.eveningtimes.co.uk/...
Man dies of heart attack after being told by Atos 'fit for work' - http://blogs.mirror.co.uk/inve...
Author's suicide 'due to slash in benefits' july 2010 - http://www.scotsman.com/news/a...
3 die in West Dunbartonshire after being told fit for work, area also has one of the highest unemployment rates with 40 people chasing every vacancy - http://intensiveactivity.wordp...
Devastated Salford mum killed herself over redundancy blow - http://menmedia.co.uk/salforda...
Southfields dad committed suicide after housing benefit cut - http://labourinwandsworth.word...
Body found in River Wear is Leanne Chambers - http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk...
Christelle and her baby died at the hands of a callous state - http://www.guardian.co.uk/comm...
Woman who drowned in drain was upset about health check – http://www.thisishullandeastri...
Pregnant Mum leaps to Death after her benefits are stopped – http://www.thefreelibrary.com/...
Stress of Tory benefits tests killed our dad, family claims – http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/t...
John
3 comments:
As a person receiving disability benefits; although I cannot afford to live without them. At they same time, they are not anywhere near enough to cover expenditures beyond groceries.
In our current system, with lack of employment for my husband, we too are living on the edge. Like many others in debt, lost their homes; and live day-to-day.
I grew up believing in the system with hope for a prosperous future. However, I learned that all it takes is an illness to end a career. And, our current market to destroy your spouse's career.
One can relate to the desperation of the Helen and Mark's of this current Western World Crisis.
God bless them and may the rest in the peace our system would not extend to them.
Sadly, this neo-Thatcherism is accepted by the 85% who don't do too badly, as yet, and can see that "There Is No Alternative". In particular, the young are generally quite unconcerned as they scratch around to survive and, maybe, do quite well. We have lost a huge amount of our humanity, thanks to the old Thatcherites and there is, let's face it, very little sign of any consistent, organised alternative, possibly even less in this class-ridden country than in most other similar countries.
Thank you both for those kind and thoughtful comments.
So many people are, indeed, living lives of harsh insecurity and fear. All part of a ruthless market system keeping us anguished and enslaved.
And, yes, it does often seem that there is no alternative (Thatcher's infamous 'TINA' mantra) to the current neoliberal assault.
Yet, one can still take heart from the resilient humanity many people feel for victims like Helen and Mark.
With massive parts of the population now afflicted by austerity and economic stress, we can also take some comfort in the gathering, collective resistance of the 99%.
John
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