Taste of frugality for the family surviving on a quid a day

Like most parents, they’d rather feel a bit hungry themselves than see the little ones going without. Still, it must be difficult to answer a child’s plea for a bag of crisps or a chocolate biscuit with a solitary digestive...

Mike, Church of England vicar at St Mary’s Riddlesden, and St Luke’s Morton, Keighley, decided a while ago to take part in the Live Below the Line challenge, to raise money for the Christian Aid. The challenge lay in living for five days spending only £1 a day per person on food and drink. Elspeth joined in and before long all of their children were also tasting frugality for a good cause. Mike had signed up after a Christian Aid worker had come to talk to a church youth club about poverty and hunger in the Third World.

“He told us that there are 1.4 billion people in the world living on less than £1 a day and many on much less than that,” he says.

“This inspired me and it seemed a good way to raise awareness and money as well as appreciating a little of the pain felt by the hungry people of the world.”

The Cansdales became even more focused when a friend visiting Sierra Leone sent photographs of painfully thin children begging in the streets.

Vicars and their families live on a stipend that hardly allows for luxuries, but Elspeth would normally spend £100 at the supermarket each week, and top up fruit and vegetables in between. But last weekend she and Mike firmly closed the doors of their food cupboards and Elspeth set off with only £30. The groceries she bought were put in a box that had to last week, and the chilled food they were allowed took up one small corner of the fridge. As they reach the penultimate day of the challenge today, Elspeth says only one of the children had got “a bit fed-up” by yesterday.

“I couldn’t buy much in the way of protein or fruit and veg, but I did manage a little bit of mince for a bolognese (still it was mostly tomatoes and onion), and a packet of basic sausages for the children for 57p. The way of making do is to go for lots of cheap carbohydrates – pasta, oats, flour for pancakes and scones, and a little bag of sugar. I got eggs and a small bag of cheese, so the kids didn’t miss out too much. “

Mike missed his usual bedtime snack of a bowl of cereal and milk or some toast. “It was hard for one of our sons, as he really a has sweet tooth and wanted chocolate. But generally the children have been fantastic about it. The problem is that the limitations on taste and variety were there, so the food has been quite ‘samey’. But I’m not complaining, because we are only experiencing for five days something that is an everyday reality for millions of people.”

Mike says that while his family doesn’t have a lot, it has all it needs. “This has underlined how lucky we are. I think we’ve learned a lot about what we really need, and how much we waste even though we try to be careful. I hope the experience will stay with us.”

Friends and parishioners are sponsoring the family, and the challenge has fired up discussion about world poverty and inequality within the community, he says. Elspeth says only one other mother in the neighbourhood has called the five days of frugality “ridiculous” – however even she pledged money. “A few people can’t get their heads around an exercise in empathy,” she says. She’s looking forward to eating chicken and a few grapes this weekend.

Live Below the Line is an initiative of the Global Poverty Project, which provides administration, PR, sponsorship sign-up pages and more for the charities taking part in the challenge.

LBTL started in the UK last year, with 1,200 people raising £180k including gift aid through sponsorship for 23 charities’ Third World projects. This year, despite the deep economic gloom, 3,000 people have signed up and their sponsors have already pledged £240k before gift aid. Fundraising for LBTL is expected to peak by the end of next week.

“There’s very little evidence that people are giving less to charity despite the economy,” says UK campaign manager Stephen Brown. “Where less money is coming from is the Government, so charities are having to rely a lot more on donations. And, as a percentage income, working class people give more than anyone else.”