Battling against the odds

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Battling against the odds

3News NZ

For the last couple of weeks Campbell Live has been looking at the issue of child poverty. We've spoken to experts, we've shown you children, we've shown how little some of them have to eat.

It seems incredible some people still deny that New Zealand has a problem, and a common reply is that children living in poverty still have the same opportunities as everyone else. They don't.

The truth is that children living in poverty face an uphill battle. They are more likely to suffer ill health, lower educational achievement, higher unemployment, physical and sexual abuse, drug and alcohol abuse.

Of course that's not the case for every child living in poverty - far from it. But the system is stacked against them from the start. In fact, as Lachlan Forsyth reports, it's a battle they face before they are even born.

Tonight we visit one community where changing outcomes for children is about more than putting food on the table.

Watch the video to see his report.

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Comments

27/09/2012 10:15:21 a.m.

Aaron mclean wrote:

Not strictly hunger my comment is another way our children get deprived ,my 3 children are deprived of me there father not because of anything I have done but there mother has stopped me being in there life for no logical reason she has admitted to hitting my 9 yr old son yet she has full day to day care and has taken them,from nth Canterbury to nelson according to face book but even then I don't know were they are or if they are ok only that they will be missing me as I miss them she has done this before at my mother's funeral when she brought them to me with no shoes and filthy clothes.most people wouldn't dream of doing what she has and still is doing to my children and to denie a father who wants to be a part of there lives ... Words can't explain how poorly I feel our legal system is working with families and letting some parents use the system to there own evil intentions I have been fighting for 5 years to see my kids to no avail I get a parenting order she wants to change it a week after we leave the court. So it frustrates me when there are families out there who can't feed there children but help seems to be there for them yet my struggle is in yielding and I need help my lawyer is hopeless I have had 4 within there firm and 1 from another .what is hard about it I have 2 children who want to see me desperately and 1 who I don't know due to there mother useing breast feeding as an excuse for two and a half year and a further 6 months later I start trying to bond but still havnt been able to due to extended breast feeding her front teeth rotted out.family first didn't want to help children's lawyer seems to hate men why is it so one sided men aren't on the back foot were are in the fetal position getting the stuffing kicked out us can someone please help me before I end up on tv in 20 years with my kid getting someone to find me to find that there father did love them and couldn't do anything to be in there life Mr Cambell can you help please Help Aaron