‘THEY THINK IT’S ALL GREEN WELLIES AND BARBOURS’

Jul 16 2008 by Brian Daniel, The Journal

LIVING in the countryside causes severe financial difficulties and is not all about “green wellies and Barbour” jackets, a rural expert claimed last night.

Rachel Turnbull, social policy development officer for Northumberland’s Citizens Advice Bureaux, spoke out after the Commission for Rural Communities published its State of the Countryside 2008 report.

She said the report’s findings that some parts of the North East are among the country’s most deprived rang true with her own experience of dealing with people and their problems across Northumberland.

Mrs Turnbull has worked with a single mother who has no car, and who takes the day’s only bus to get her young child to nursery. She must then wait two and a half hours before walking the five miles home, due to lack of public transport.

She has also dealt with an ill elderly woman with an income of £57.50 per week, £35 of which she must spend on fuel. There is also a family of four, with the father a fisherman whose work is sporadic. His wife is ill but because he earns just over the relevant threshold, he cannot get her free prescriptions.

Another family of four spends a third of its income on food, a third on coal and a third on petrol to get to work and school. The children cannot afford treats or to go to leisure activities or on school trips.

Mrs Turnbull said: “So many people are not aware what it is like to live in the countryside. They think it is all green wellies and Barbours but it costs a lot of money.”