"Easter, Christmas and summer holidays were not enjoyable"

'Holiday hunger' was a subject that came up as an important issue. To get a true feeling and understanding of how and why change was needed we knew from our HIIC course that the power of participation was important and so we talked to our community. We went to already established groups for single parents, carers, peer support and other similar groups and asked if they would share their views and opinions on issues affecting them.

We discovered that low income and school holidays was the most talked about issue which caused poverty within their home lives. The extra days of school holidays to cover with no change to income was financially having a negative impact on families. Easter, Christmas and summer holidays were not enjoyable and even the in-service days at school added more pressure which in turn caused families to struggle. This was because parents providing additional experiences for children found that they were proving too much to be able to afford them. For example the added cost of gas, electric, bus fares for outings, clothing if not in school uniform, activities, childcare if parents had to work or go to appointments etc., but mostly the additional cost of food. The local community provided some quotes which we used in our presentation:

• I juggle my benefit every week and it strains the purse strings when they are off school

• Being a parent of 3 children, I struggle during the holiday periods especially during the summer as I can't afford to do a lot of the activities

• Sometimes as a parent I dread the summer holidays when these are the times we should cherish the extra times with our children.