Let's Start Again, Mr Cameron

Dear Mr Cameron,

My name is Jenny Dobson. I am 14 years old and live just outside Bolton with my parents and my brother.

I am writing this letter to you because my mum and dad are in trouble and I am scared that they will be put in jail.

I love my parents very much and I know they try their best to keep out of trouble but it’s now got so bad that I can’t sleep at night.

My teacher said that I was very clever for my age last year but I’ve missed a lot of days since then and she’s left now. Our new teacher is very strict and thinks he’s clever, but no one can understand him and he can’t even spell!

My dad lost his job two years ago and is not coping with being unemployed. He was always fine when he was working and we always had food and clothes and holidays, but now he’s totally changed.

He has started drinking and when my mum gets angry with him for being lazy, he storms out of the house and doesn’t come back for days. While he is away, I stop myself from eating thinking it will make him come back quicker if he’s worrying about me and I have lost a lot of weight.

After he lost his job, dad kept telling me that he was doing well ‘ducking and diving’ but then the police caught him selling supermarket food in the pubs.
The food wasn't past the sell-by date and it had been thrown away but because dad took it from the supermarket bins, the police said it was stealing. The supermarket wanted to prosecute him but the police decided to only give him a caution but he’s angry because it still shows up when he applies for jobs.

Dad was never racist before he lost his job and had lots of foreign friends but now he says he hates all foreigners when he’s drunk and I’ve stopped going out to the shops with him because he shouts at them. I know it’s not my real dad because he was always so kind and courteous to absolutely everyone when he was working.

Mum says that it won’t be long before he’s reported but he doesn’t seem to care. We go hungry most days and the electricity will be turned off unless we pay the bill, which mum says is way over what we paid last year.

Jason (my big brother) and I haven’t had any new clothes since dad lost his job and my school uniform doesn’t fit anymore, which is the main reason I don’t like going much.

The biggest problem is that the TV was bought on mum’s old credit card and she hasn’t paid for the license this year. The TV licensing people keep writing red letters that say they might put her in jail, but she won’t do anything about it. I don’t watch TV anymore because I’m scared they’ll catch me and put mum in jail. I prefer reading anyway.

She has started taking pills and spends a lot of time in bed now.

Jason gets in trouble with the police most weeks, usually for stealing, smashing things up and fighting. He was thrown out of school last year for truancy and spends most his time smoking dope and drinking with his friends. Mum and dad think he’ll be put in jail before long.

Although I love my brother very much, we don’t get along now because he keeps telling me he wants to be my pimp and knows a lot of men who fancy me. I hate it when he says that they like skinny white girls because I’m not that skinny.

I know everyone in our street and there’s only one family whose dad still works but he never talks to anyone any more. Dad reckons he'll lose his job soon because the council are thinking of closing down the old people's home where he cooks. There are three dads in jail but there are lots of others that have left home. Two of our street's mothers do part-time work at the sweatshop but mum says they only got the job to keep the equal rights people happy.
‘One big happy family,’ she calls it.

The last time I went outside with dad, he was a bit drunk and he took me to a street where the Asians live. There were nice cars and the children were all dressed well and when dad told me that all the dads had jobs and that all the children were doing well at school, he burst into tears. I didn’t see him for days after that and when he came back, he had a broken nose and three broken ribs.

That was when I told him that I don’t eat when he goes away but he still does it. He says he can’t stand being useless and is ashamed of himself, and I think he goes off to drink to stop himself from causing trouble with mum.

Please, Mr Cameron, help to find my dad a job. He’s not a bad man and works very hard. All he needs is a chance to start again. It’s all he talks about when he’s not drinking and I know that he means it with all his heart. His previous job was as a street cleaner where he worked for nineteen years and the only reason he lost his job was because the company that bought the business from the council needed to cut down the staff.

He only has one conviction (for affray) but that was only because of his drinking which he has now promised to give up. He has a clean driving license and is prepared to work for the minimum wage anywhere in the country as long as it’s full-time.

When he was employed, we didn’t have a lot but we never ever got in trouble and I always went to school.

I don’t want to do prostitution. There are two girls I don't see any more and I know what happened to them.

Please help me.

Yours truly,

Jenny Dobson.