Safety net
Sir: I find Alexandra Artley's impassioned plea (`Household words, government sums', 7 November) strangely argued.
I was brought up to believe that adults, by taking the decision to have children, implicitly took upon themselves the re- sponsibility for caring, feeding and clothing such children. Indisputably there are un- fortunates who for reasons of illness, un- employment and other problems are un- able to do so in a fitting manner and to whom benefits, grants etc should be and are available.
I find it the worst of bad housekeeping to have to rely upon the odd £7 handout to balance the books. How much in real terms does £7 buy that seems (to many of Alexan- dra Artley's correspondents that she quotes) to make the difference between comfort and downright starvation and suf- fering?
To those who are living beyond their means, self-employed (`with maximum mortgage and up-dating a desirable house' as explained by `Another Poor Caroline, London SW20') I would suggest that they look to their housekeeping and less at their possible `social status'.
Surely Child Benefit was to be a safety net (to be paid directly to mothers in case father drank it all away) and not some sort of 16-year-long prize for having had a child.
Poverty is an ever-present threat to be deplored and fought; frugality, reasonably applied, would seem to be a virtue that many `Poor Carolines' of today have not learnt at their mother's knee.
Omar Ali-Shah
Springwood House, Godalming, Surrey
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