Dear MP, let me introduce you to your Police Cadets

In the second of the series  where I help my MP to get to know his constituents, today we are going to talk about the Police Cadets.

Dear MP

I suspect that you are very proud of the local Police Cadets,. I know that I certainly am. 

The Police cadets were my volunteers.  Three nights a week they gave up their time to rifle through the bins at Lidl,  separating the good fruit and veg from the rotting, slimy and smelly.  The next day they delivered it to my food sharing Hut where scores of people queued every day  for a loaf of bread, some fruit and veg or, if they were lucky, a box of washing powder or some loo rolls.

Then I found out that some of the cadets were going hungry.  They were sorting food and filling the Hut to help the poor and then going home to no food in their own cupboards. 

I’ll don’t know about you but whilst I feel very proud of those cadets I feel an intense shame at what I have let this country become.

Thanks again for taking the time to read this.
All the best
Gill x
PS I had a call this week to say that a dear friend of mine has just passed out as a Metropolitan Police officer.  She is serving in the rapid response team which, as we all know, means she is putting her life on the line every day in order to protect others.
I was astonished to hear that she had to pay for her 290 hours of work to complete her ‘Certificate of Knowledge of Police’. In fact, she had to pay over £1000 for this and if she hadn’t passed she wouldn’t get her money back. She also had to pay for her own travel to get to the training centre for 6.30am every morning which left her exhausted and impoverished after working all week and all weekends for 7 weeks.

“It’s because of austerity” she said “There’s nothing can be done about it.  We have to pay”.