Rosie's Story - Part 1

Rosie lives in Blandford, she has 2 teenage sons one of whom still lives with her - at the moment she is not in a relationship. Rosie has some problems with her health, which is why she was receiving disability living allowance/sick benefit. 


However Rosie's benefits were completely stopped because of an administrative misunderstanding as to whether she qualified to stay on disability living allowance - so Rosie had to have a medical examination to assess if she was too sick to work - it was determined that Rosie isn't too ill to work, though she appealed this decision which resulted in all of her benefits being stopped for a month including housing benefit and council tax benefit. 

Rosie lost her appeal so she now receives job seekers allowance, at the moment after deductions including an over payment of tax credits, she is left with round about £55 to live on each week. Rosie is actively seeking work, one of her neighbors who knows she's having a hard time, lets her use his computer every day so she can look online for a job. Rosie despite having dyslexia and not receiving any assistance from the job centre to read and fill out application forms has applied for several jobs but dishearteningly hasn't 
heard back yet from any potential employer.

Rosie can't afford to heat the home she lives in and even on Christmas day she went without heating and ate beans on toast instead of a Christmas dinner and she has now taken to eating porridge every day and to try and stay healthy but to keep costs down, Rosie buys her fruit and veg from Stokes in Blandford - unfortunately this woman, like many others in the UK has had to chose between heat or eat?    

In Part 2 - The state is failing but the big society is working, a nurse at Blandford Hospital went and bought Rosie food !