Summary
Patricia Leatham moved back into the council house where she grew up when her mother became ill in 2017, to look after her as a full-time caregiver. When her mother died in 2019, Patricia and her then 14-year-old son, “Clarence,” were evicted into homelessness as her name was not on her mother’s tenancy contract. She applied for support from London’s Waltham Forest Council, which placed her in temporary accommodation where they lived for just under two years.
Summary
Before the Covid-19 pandemic, countries around the globe had made remarkable progress in reducing child labor. According to the International Labour Organization (ILO), the number of children in child labor decreased by approximately 94 million between 2000 and 2016, representing a drop of 38 percent. But as the pandemic caused massive school closures and unprecedented loss of jobs and income for millions of families, many children have entered the workforce to help their families survive, while others have been forced to work longer hours or enter more precarious and exploitative situations. Some have become their families’ primary breadwinners after losing a caregiver to Covid-19. Some despair of ever going back to school.