'Seeing is Believing - Poverty in the UK' is a collaboration betweenchildren, young people and parents from across the country who useBarnardo's services, with photography, film, installations and writtenwords revealing their experiences.
Contributors include young people leaving care and families living onrun-down estates.
One example is Mirium, 29, an asylum seeker from Kenya, who with herthree-year-old son David lives on 88 per week. The exhibitionsays, 'This is not a happy place to live. The only place for David toplay is on the balcony, which is on the 12th floor and not properlyprotected. There is no play area nearby. This is no place to bring up achild.'
Barnardo's chief executive Martin Narey said, 'We wanted to challengepeople's perceptions about child poverty. It isn't just about a lack ofcash, it's about poverty of aspiration, poor education, poorhealth.'
The launch came as children's minister Ed Balls re-affirmed his supportfor the Government's child poverty reduction targets at a Campaign toEnd Child Poverty event in London on 10 December. In the keynote addresshe said he was committed to eradicating child poverty by 2020 and added,'I want to be clear that we're not going to abandon these goals justbecause the going has got tough.'
'Seeing is Believing' is on show at the Bargehouse Gallery on London'sSouth Bank until 30 December.
