Jack Monroe

Jack Monroe is a 25 year old single mother from Southend on Sea, who started writing an online blog (www.agirlcalledjack.com) when she was unemployed and looking for work. She charted the realities of life on the breadline, and the difficulty of finding work as a single parent in an economic downturn.

After being referred to a food bank last year, she cooks budget meals for herself and her three year old son for less than £10 a week, and recently spoke to a group of MPs in Parliament about food poverty and food banks in Britain.
She is a passionate, if accidental, spokeswoman for the realities of poverty, and has raised £3,500 for Oxfam this year by participating in the Live Below The Line challenge.
She also campaigns on behalf of Child Poverty Action Group, and will represent the IF campaign at the G8 summit this weekend.
She says: "Poverty is not just having not enough food, or turning off your heating, or unscrewing the light bulbs.

"Poverty is the sinking, choking feeling when your son finishes his one weetabix, and says: More mummy? More bread and jam?... As you're wondering how to carry the TV and the guitar to the pawn shop, and how to tell him that there is no bread and jam."