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The slogan beloved of politicians from Bill Clinton to Boris Johnson is all too often a cover for crony capitalism
A food bank in Burnley, north-west England, December 2020. Photograph: Jon Super/Rex/Shutterstock
A food bank in Burnley, north-west England, December 2020. Photograph: Jon Super/Rex/Shutterstock
Tue 22 Dec 2020 02.00 EST
Last modified on Tue 22 Dec 2020 13.06 EST
In December 2006, two years after the Indian Ocean tsunami had brought terrible destruction and loss of life to large parts of south-east Asia, the UN published a report titled Key Propositions for Building Back Better.
The author of this document, the UN secretary general’s special envoy for tsunami recovery, former US president Bill Clinton, wrote that “while a disaster can actually create opportunities to shift development patterns – to build back better – recovery can also perpetuate pre-existing patterns of vulnerability and disadvantage”.
By Martin Kerin
AS I write, news has come in that, for the first time in history, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) will help feed children in the UK. For the first time in its 70 year history, UNICEF will respond to a UK ‘domestic emergency.’ Given recent events and following the Food Foundation’s findings that 2.4 million (17%) children are living in ‘food insecure households’, it was only a matter of time before an international agency was forced to step in.
2020 will down as a terrible year for our country and for the world. The pandemic has had an impact on all of our lives, but it has impacted the poorest of our society disproportionately worse. The simple reason for this is that rising poverty and inequality was already a major issue before the pandemic. The pandemic has simply turned the crisis of poverty and inequality into a catastrophe.