Page 45 - Imam News Today

Key to getting kids off county lines is understanding how and why theyre recruited in the first place. for nicole, it was a yearning for something different — an escape from a chaotic home life, from poverty and hunger. youd get offered absolutely everything. i was offered — they were going to buy me a new bed, they were going to get me some clothes to take home. they were going to help my mam with the bills. they were absolutely great. they were my lifesavers at the time. and just never wor...

They deliver pain and misery. just ask nicole. theres not words for them. i dont wish... i couldnt think of anything worse ill wish on them people, to be fair. because its so self—centred of them to know that theyre young, naive kids that dont — genuinely, at that age, dont know any better. i still, to this day, dont understand how an 11—year—old girl got on the trains unnoticed, and not seen, not found, not asked why i wasnt at school, not asked why i wasnt with a mam or a dad or anythi...

Have to be like that. sorry. key to getting kids off county lines is understanding how and why theyre recruited in the first place. for nicole, it was a yearning for something different — an escape from a chaotic home life, from poverty and hunger. youd get offered absolutely everything. i was offered — they were going to buy me a new bed, they were going to get me some clothes to take home. they were going to help my mam with the bills. they were absolutely great. they were my lifesavers at...

Who doesnt care about you. literally doesnt care i whether you live or die. the gangs promise so much. they deliver pain and misery. just ask nicole. theres not words for them. i dont wish... i couldnt think of anything worse ill wish on them people, to be fair. because its so self—centred of them to know that theyre young, naive kids that dont — genuinely, at that age, dont know any better. i still, to this day, dont understand how an 11—year—old girl got on the trains unnoticed, and no...

And chased the lads who abandoned the car at the railway line and — and ran along. and we, yeah, were burgled on a number of occasions. we reported it. my mam stood up to the people who were responsible for it, the people that live locally, and we got our windows put in more than once as a result. what, because you�*d made a stand? because we took a stand against it. because, you know, my mam wasn�*t prepared to tolerate our community experiencing that kind of terrible behaviour. it affect...

It was often we were the only single—parent family and we were just as much a family as anybody else, and that�*s what really made me angry about it all. and my mam couldn�*t work when i was younger and that was in part because there was no access to childcare, that — which is, sadly, you know, becoming increasingly a problem and is a real priority for me because if we want to make sure that people can play their full contribution in society, then i think that�*s where government has a...

Labour party meetings when i was from being very little because, you know, she didn�*t get to go unless i went along with her. i was pretty hardworking at school, took things quite seriously. i was always just quite — quite focused on what i wanted to do. how young were you when you decided you wanted to be an mp? 12,13? was it already forming in your head? i had lots of ideas about what i wanted to do at that point. everything from i wanted to be a journalist at one point, actually. terribl...

There were fewer single parent families then than there are now and this was also the time, of course, when there was big tory rhetoric around single—parent families. around the idea of being on benefits, wasn�*t it? yeah. and the suggestion somehow that maybe you�*d got pregnant in order to get benefits. yeah. that peter lilley speech — you know, i remember all of that and it made me so angry that that kind ofjudgement was being made about our family when i knew how hard my mam was work...

Were nurses in the nhs. they�*d come overfrom ireland and had trained and worked in the north east latterly. so, they were really passionate about public services and about the role that they were doing, but we would have, particularly with my granddad, you�*d have a massive stack of papers. we�*d always argue hammer and tongs about what was going on in the world. he just liked to debate and discuss and to challenge. and then my grandma would, you know, get fed up and disappear off upstair...

And this was also the time, of course, when there was big tory rhetoric around single parent families. around the idea of being on benefits, wasnt it? yeah. and the suggestion somehow that maybe youd got pregnant in order to get benefits. yeah. that peter lilley speech, you know i remember all of that and it made me so angry that that kind ofjudgement was being made about our family when i knew how hard my mam was working. remind us of the speech because therell be plenty of people wholl forget....