“We think we are heading towards malnutrition here in the UK.”

Colette Marshall, Save the Children

The lead stories on Save the Children’s website today are predictable enough. There is an appeal for children in Gaza and another for children in Kenya where it is estimated that 10 million people won’t have enough to eat this year. On Monday the organisation is launching a a crisis grant for families in Britain which have been affected by food price increases of 18% over the last year.

Tony Blair had promised to eradicate child poverty by 2010. With that passion for the poor and disadvantaged  which is New Labour’s hallmark they’ve postponed it until 2020. Save the Children estimates that it would cost £3 billion to meet the target of having child poverty by next year. Join the dots about banks and children not having enough to eat.

Labour firebrand Stephen Timms defended the government claims that there will be “extra help” on child benefit and state pensions. Most people would probably rather have more money to buy food than simpering platitudes about help. The Grocer magazine – and they should know – reports that a typical basket of 33 items of food that cost £48 a year ago now costs £57.50. Rice has gone up 81% over the past year, pork sausages are up 51%, mince 22% dearer and milk 14% more expensive.

Chances are that this story will get much less press coverage than Jade Goody’s funeral. However it illustrates starkly the extent to which Labour has become a neo-liberal party oblivious to the needs of the poorest members of the working class.

Oh,  and on the subject of how vile Labour is, how about this from lovable Everyman health secretary, Alan Johnson?  Earlier this week a court ruled that failed asylum seekers with chronic illnesses were not entitled to free health care on the NHS. The case had been brought by the family of a man with chronic liver disease who was initially refused free treatment. He was unable to return to the West Bank because of Israeli travel restrictions but the hospital had refused to treat him for free because of the Department of Health guidance. He died. Johnson, who took the case to the appeal court, welcomed the decision. He said that his department accepted the lack of clarity in the official guidance for hospitals. “We will ensure that the guidance is amended.”

Families reduced to charity handouts to feed children and asylum seekers sentenced to death by the refusal of medical treatment. That’s Labour in the 21st century.