Schools providing Sanitary protection

GlasweJen

phryne wrote: »

She can't reasonably expect a school to be able to help with those kind of menstrual medical problems, which are by and large irrelevant to a thread about schools providing sanitary protection. Ditto the post about the upheavals and dramas in her home life.

The point is at a young age I didn't know when it was going to happen, it would have been nice for the school to have some sort of system where I could:
- access a toilet on time without being penalised by teachers
- had access to sanitary protection in an emergency (we didn't have any facilities at all to buy or borrow it from the school)
- have my medical problem acknowledged by the school before the point where I was blue lighted out of a classroom in a pool of blood because some man decided I couldn't possible need out twice during a double period even though I had a medical card issued by the school saying that actually I did.

We were a breadline family, I had the exact money for my lunch on my person, the day the canteen raised their prices by 5p an item was a disaster for us, myself and my siblings didn't have the extra and ended up having to skip a drink to buy lunch (no there wasn't a water fountain, just an irn-bru vending machine).

Yes I did skip classes sometimes to walk into the local village and use the toilets in the library because it was so difficult to get one in school and the consequences of being late to certain teachers lessons just weren't worth it.

4 out of 5 of my family now work for the U.K. my sister works for the nhs, brother is a social worker and my other brother is in the army, currently deployed in a war zone. My oldest sister has 2 disabled children so doesn't work but she does volunteer for the school and the local autism youth group. We are not a scummy family, we just went through a time where we struggled and could have used a bit of help. Even just not having to pay VAT on my items would have helped a lot.

culpepper

Wasnt it the case that one could obtain free condoms from the family planning clinics quite a while back (I dont know if it still is the case) but that didnt cause every male in England to rush to the clinic for their packets of johnnies did it?
It didnt cause the condom industry to die overnight .
Neither did it stop every unwanted pregnancy despite it probably helped prevent a good many .

Well why not?

Because it is embarrassing to admit that there is a need for them and a lack of money to obtain them and to have to specifically go and ask for them.

dotchas

Heavens, this thread makes me so grateful for my loving parents. My mum would never have let me go without suitable sanitary protection and I went through loads every month. I sympathise with folks on unexpected benefit sanctions etc. But do wonder if some parents just have their priorities wrong. Ideally we would deal with that scenario but how you would tackle it I don't know. I have no problem with schools providing sanpro for those in real need or in emergency situations, but maybe not for every menstruating female.

In some ways it makes me think of self parking cars.....soon we will have a generation of drivers who don't know how to park. Just as we will have parents who no longer feel the need to provide for their children.
I am genuinely interested in why people need to use food banks, I have no problem with their use but wonder if education on budgeting and even benefits at school would help those who use them long term rather than as an emergency stop gap.
And as for sanitary towels not costing more than £3 a month:rotfl:

Comms69

culpepper wrote: »

Wasnt it the case that one could obtain free condoms from the family planning clinics quite a while back (I dont know if it still is the case) but that didnt cause every male in England to rush to the clinic for their packets of johnnies did it?
It didnt cause the condom industry to die overnight .
Neither did it stop every unwanted pregnancy despite it probably helped prevent a good many .

Well why not?

Because it is embarrassing to admit that there is a need for them and a lack of money to obtain them and to have to specifically go and ask for them.

Because birth control is largely for the benefit of women. Young men have, on the whole, no pressure in terms of parenthood.

annandale

“
It’s irrelevant if I have experience of it or not. I’m also not homeless, or drug dependent. My point was about empathising with people.

Clearly not all women take drugs..?! I think you missed the point entirely.

As I said, why are they struggling?

Even with a single working parent- a FT minimum wage jobs is around £1300 a month.
Child benefit £34 a week
And £600 tax credits a month
- I suspect there’s also a housing benefit payment but working that out is a right pain.

It’s not about a little help; there’s quite a lot of help there!
Originally posted by Comms69

You think someone would get housing benefit on 1300 in a wage and 600 working tax credits?

Help with their rent when they have 1900 pounds a month coming into the home? Working tax credits (which are actually being replaced with uc) are assessed as income. I would never have got housing benefit on that kind of salary. You also do not know what people's outgoings are, their childcare costs (which you get 85 per cent back on UC, but some people have had massive issues because their assessment period does not match with the times they pay their childcare, so they've had far less refunded than 85 per cent).

Apart from working tax credits (which you only get if you are working a certain amount of hours) or UC what is there for single parents? Your post also seems to assume that people will be working that full time min wage job. What if they aren't on full time hours?

Someone who isn't and is working less than 35 hours x nmw will claim universal credit. On UC if you have kids you keep 192 of your wages and then the UC taper is applied, so for every pound earned the DWP reduce your UC by 67p. Single women with kids can also fall foul of the benefit cap on UC as well.

And some single parents will not be working. I think that is important to remember.
People are also generalising about what other people spend on protection. As I said before. I personally had to use super tampax and towels and night towels. Much more than 23p a month.

There are people living in poverty. For every post someone quotes saying that a woman working full time on min wage gets working tax credits, there are people using foodbanks. Lots of them. There are people living well below the poverty line in the UK including people who work.

And it is not always about people not being able to afford. Its the times when your period starts unexpectedly, when you don't have a tampon or towel in your bag. A study out yesterday said that over 14 million people are living below the line in the UK. There are 9 per cent of the population in poverty where both adults work full time and 68 per cent of people who are unemployed live in poverty.

There will be teenagers living in refuges, in supported housing projects. There are people who live on the breadline. For every person working full time min wage there will be someone working zero hours.
Have a look at the appeals for food from foodbanks all over the UK. Including appeals for people to hand in sanitary products and toiletries. It might be a surprise to some people that there are those out there that can't afford to eat properly never mind buy sanitary products but there are.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/dec/19/british-girls-period-poverty-menstruation-sanitary-products

Id rather see free sanitary products in schools than kids missing school because their parents cant afford them. And this does happen

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/dec/19/british-girls-period-poverty-menstruation-sanitary-products

Heres what Danielle Rowley had to say. She suffers from heavy bleeding, she spent 25 pounds in a week.

https://www.elle.com/uk/life-and-culture/a21997544/danielle-rowley-period-house-of-commons/

Red-Squirrel_2

dotchas wrote: »

Heavens, this thread makes me so grateful for my loving parents. My mum would never have let me go without suitable sanitary protection and I went through loads every month. I sympathise with folks on unexpected benefit sanctions etc. But do wonder if some parents just have their priorities wrong. Ideally we would deal with that scenario but how you would tackle it I don't know. I have no problem with schools providing sanpro for those in real need or in emergency situations, but maybe not for every menstruating female.

In some ways it makes me think of self parking cars.....soon we will have a generation of drivers who don't know how to park. Just as we will have parents who no longer feel the need to provide for their children.
I am genuinely interested in why people need to use food banks, I have no problem with their use but wonder if education on budgeting and even benefits at school would help those who use them long term rather than as an emergency stop gap.
And as for sanitary towels not costing more than £3 a month:rotfl:

Nobody uses food banks long term, that’s not how the system works.

Red-Squirrel_2

Comms69 wrote: »

Because birth control is largely for the benefit of women. Young men have, on the whole, no pressure in terms of parenthood.

Holy ****!!!

Starting to wonder if you’re actually just a very good troll now.

phryne

GlasweJen wrote: »

Even just not having to pay VAT on my items would have helped a lot.

Oh now that's a whole nother discussion and I agree with you there. I believe the VAT on sanitary items has been decreased, but there's a strong argument for removing it completely.

That is different from saying schools should provide pupils' toiletries for them, gratis.

annandale

18th Sep 18, 1:47 PM
Heavens, this thread makes me so grateful for my loving parents. My mum would never have let me go without suitable sanitary protection and I went through loads every month. I sympathise with folks on unexpected benefit sanctions etc. But do wonder if some parents just have their priorities wrong.

This happens too often. The assumption that people in poverty are !!!!less and are spending money on other things. Of course some people struggle with budgeting. I saw a post on another thread that poor people cannot afford to buy food because they spend it all on fags, iphones and scratchcards.

It is not just about sanctions although they are an issue. It is the fact that on some benefits you wait 6 weeks to be paid. Universal credit. Its now five but I waited six. You can now get 100 per cent of the first payment as an advance. I got 50. I got 246 for my first payment of UC. My rent (which my landlord wanted me to pay in advance was 243).

There will be people who have kids and who get child element as its called on Uc who have to wait five weeks for their first payment. The advance has to be repaid. Mine was repaid over 6 months, should have been 12 but it was 6 due to a mess up the DWP paid.

So, people who are on UC if they are not working are in poverty. They are in poverty by the time they get their first payment, they have to repay an advance and they still have the same outgoings to deal with.

And yes, people can and do get sanctioned for ridiculous reasons. Ive been threatened with a sanction for my work coach not liking my CV. I was threatened with one for not jobsearching enough when my mum had an aggressive cancer. I was referred to a decision maker for being 12 mins late for an appointment and I will be referred again as Ive just had my work contract terminated as Ive been off work with work related stress thanks to bullying in the workplace.

I don't have kids, but I do know what its like to wait 6 weeks for a payment of UC and have half of your first monthly payment as a loan to tide you over when you still have rent and bills to pay (on UC rent no longer goes direct to your landlord as housing benefit did, at least in England) and you are given the money to pay them direct.) And some people are getting into more debt because they have used the money given for their rent to pay bills

Some people are struggling financially, if this lets a child go to school who for whatever reason was struggling for sanitary protection, good. Its hard enough being poor.

phryne

annandale wrote: »

Heres what Danielle Rowley had to say. She suffers from heavy bleeding, she spent 25 pounds in a week.

That is a ridiculous amount of money. Most girls and women don't spend anything like that, and it's wrong to imply that they do.

Ms Rowley is speaking as though millenials are the first people ever to have periods! Though they may well be the first to make a very public fuss about it.