Marcus Rashford criticises Conservative MP for comments on child hunger
Footballer Marcus Rashford has criticised a Conservative MP for his comments on child hunger.
Kevin Hollinrake, MP for Thirsk and Malton, was praising the Government's Eat Out to Help Out scheme when he replied to a comment, saying: "Where they can, it's a parents' job to feed their children."
Mr Rashford explained that the comment could prevent families from asking for help.
Extraordinary success of #EatOutToHelpOut – simultaneously helped boost the economy, encouraged staycations and got us all used to venturing out once again pic.twitter.com/KunZwrNUzJ
— Kevin Hollinrake MP (@kevinhollinrake) September 5, 2020
"I would urge you to talk to families before tweeting. To this day I haven't met one parent who hasn't wanted or felt the responsibility to feed their children," Mr Rashford said.
"Put to the side that this comment came from an MP. It's comments like this that prevent people from speaking their truth and asking for help. We need to start uplifting each other."
Where they can, it's a parents job to feed their children
— Kevin Hollinrake MP (@kevinhollinrake) September 6, 2020
Mr Hollinrake has not yet publicly replied to Mr Rashford's comment.
I would urge you to talk to families before tweeting. To this day I haven't met one parent who hasn't wanted or felt the responsibility to feed their children... https://t.co/J72VyRazbF
— Marcus Rashford (@MarcusRashford) September 6, 2020
The Manchester United and England striker was successful in campaigning for free school meal vouchers to be provided to pupils over the summer period.
He has now teamed up with Aldi, Asda, Co-op, Deliveroo, FareShare, Food Foundation, Iceland, Kellogg's, Lidl, Sainsbury's, Tesco and Waitrose to form the Child Food Poverty Task Force, which is endorsing three national policy recommendations.
