All the times Marcus Rashford did the government’s job for them

Earlier this week, Marcus Rashford topped the Sunday Times giving list due to his donations to food poverty and community charities.
In conjunction with FareShare, he has donated £20m – more than his own wealth of £16m. He is the youngest person ever to top the list.
This adds to a year of work advocating and pressuring the government to provide free school meals for disadvantaged children.
Here’s a look back at all the times Rashford pushed to help kids when the government didn’t.
I salute @MarcusRashford not just his advocacy but also for his personal generosity. It’s an extraordinary example from such a young man. He is a tremendous role model and a tribute to our nation. https://t.co/RGmFIGVyJU
Read on...
Support us and go ad-free— David Lammy (@DavidLammy) May 22, 2021
Marcus Rashford. A man with more humanity, empathy, foresight, and integrity than the entire British government. https://t.co/8ditK4FlCv
— Writing Support (@WritingSupport2) May 25, 2021
Free school meals
Rashford first campaigned for free school meals to be extended over summer 2020 to help struggling families.
His campaign eventually forced the government to make a U-turn and announce a £120m fund to provide meals for 1.3 million children.
This is your reminder that while Boris Johnson was happy to spend £800 per week on takeaways it took a public backlash and tireless campaigning by Marcus Rashford to get him to extend free school meals for hungry kids.
— Katy (@KatyJayne101) May 24, 2021
Ending child food poverty
Rashford did not leave it there – he formed the Child Food Poverty Task Force in September 2020. In conjunction with several charities, he lobbied the government for long-term action on food poverty.
He then started a petition calling for the government to end child food poverty. The petition asked for free school meals to be provided during all holidays to all households on Universal Credit. It also asked for voucher values to be increased.
These were all recommendations from the National Food Strategy (NFS), an independent review of food policy commissioned by the government.
More than one million people signed.
Labour called for free school meals to be extended in parliament, but Conservative MPs voted the motion down 322 to 261.
I think Marcus Rashford has done a fantastic thing , bringing the attention that children in the UK are hungry then persuading the government to change there policies.
He is a shining light to the world and a great ambassador for child poverty.— steve j (@steveaj1961) May 25, 2021
Rallying the community
Instead, venues across the country stepped in to support Rashford’s campaign. Saying they ‘didn’t stand with the 322’, cafes, pubs, and restaurants pledged to provide food for children in need.
Again, the campaign led to a government U-turn. Boris Johnson ended up personally phoning Rashford to tell him the government would provide a £396m package for free school meals during the Christmas, Easter, and summer holidays.
The campaign is still calling for the government to provide free school meals to all families where parents are receiving benefits.
Meanwhile
Marcus Rashford has donated £20 million to food, poverty and community charities (partnered with FareShare) – a sum greater than his personal wealth.https://t.co/7ewmuiXjnz
— Louis 🇬🇧 🇪🇺 〓〓 💙 Defend the right to vote (@LouisHenwood) May 25, 2021
Food parcels
In January, several families posted photographs of their food hampers, many of which were small and insufficient.
Rashford immediately called out the parcels as “not good enough“, saying kids and parents would still go hungry.
The Department for Education later promised to investigate the contents of the parcels.
Marcus Rashford. He has Single handedly done more for this country since 2020 than the entire government has done in years https://t.co/441Lpq1w3A
— Sempre Vive Hun 🌈 me/me (@SanguineNW) May 25, 2021
Access to reading
Rashford has now launched a book club to get disadvantaged children into reading. It kicked off in April with the donation of 50,000 books to primary schools.
The club is targeted at the estimated 383,000 UK children who have never owned a book.
From 2010-2019, cuts to local authority funding caused more than 800 public libraries in the UK to close.
Getting results
As MPs began debating Rashford’s petition yesterday, he tweeted:
It’s confusing that we are debating the implementation of government-commissioned findings. Gov did the research. Gov gathered the data. And solutions were formed from that (NFS). I endorsed them…so what’s to debate? Let’s discuss the findings and discuss the solutions.
— Marcus Rashford MBE (@MarcusRashford) May 24, 2021
Rashford’s campaigning makes it clear it’s possible for the government to take action on food poverty – but it shouldn’t take so much work to get them there.
Featured image via YouTube/BBC News
We need your help to keep speaking the truth
Every story that you have come to us with; each injustice you have asked us to investigate; every campaign we have fought; each of your unheard voices we amplified; we do this for you. We are making a difference on your behalf.
Our fight is your fight. You’ve supported our collective struggle every time you gave us a like; and every time you shared our work across social media. Now we need you to support us with a monthly donation.
We have published nearly 2,000 articles and over 50 films in 2021. And we want to do this and more in 2022 but we don’t have enough money to go on at this pace. So, if you value our work and want us to continue then please join us and be part of The Canary family.
In return, you get:
* Advert free reading experience
* Quarterly group video call with the Editor-in-Chief
* Behind the scenes monthly e-newsletter
* 20% discount in our shop
Almost all of our spending goes to the people who make The Canary’s content. So your contribution directly supports our writers and enables us to continue to do what we do: speaking truth, powered by you. We have weathered many attempts to shut us down and silence our vital opposition to an increasingly fascist government and right-wing mainstream media.
With your help we can continue:
* Holding political and state power to account
* Advocating for the people the system marginalises
* Being a media outlet that upholds the highest standards
* Campaigning on the issues others won’t
* Putting your lives central to everything we do
We are a drop of truth in an ocean of deceit. But we can’t do this without your support. So please, can you help us continue the fight?
-
Show Comments
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to leave a comment.Join the conversationPlease read our comment moderation policy here.
An excellent footballer and he’s also a better politician than 99% of the dimwits posing as one…….
The ideology of the Establishment is that the Poor are not real humans.
Classism and Racism are intertwined.
Curiously, the well pampered middle class women who appear on TV to bemoan sexism or racism never seem to have any time for the poor.