:00:07. > :00:12.Welcome to Inside Out North West. This week, I am in Cumbria where we
:00:12. > :00:22.will meet an artist who swapped the tranquillity of the Lakes for the
:00:22. > :00:23.
:00:23. > :00:27.front line in Afghanistan. To night, why more and more people
:00:27. > :00:33.in the North West are relying on food handout to survive.
:00:33. > :00:38.People cannot feed their families. Following Robert Black's conviction
:00:38. > :00:42.last Thursday, we follow a Manchester father's quest to find
:00:42. > :00:48.out what happened to his daughter of 33 years ago.
:00:48. > :00:52.I would ask him, did you do it? Did you kill my daughter?
:00:52. > :00:57.And soldiers tell their moving stories from the frontline in
:00:57. > :01:07.Afghanistan. A these are raw, almost tales that
:01:07. > :01:18.
:01:19. > :01:23.clearly these soldiers are carrying Food is something most of us take
:01:23. > :01:27.for granted and even in these times, you do not expect to find people
:01:27. > :01:32.starving here in the North West. Tonight we can reveal that every
:01:32. > :01:42.day hundreds of people have to rely on food handouts and food banks
:01:42. > :01:42.
:01:42. > :01:45.simply to eat. This man says he has not eaten for 48 hours. This
:01:45. > :01:51.disabled father relies on three food given to him by a charity
:01:51. > :01:54.every week to help feed his six children. -- free food. If I have a
:01:54. > :01:59.choice of making them a full meal, and I will not get much, I will
:01:59. > :02:03.give it all to them. It is the only way I live. I couldn't live that
:02:03. > :02:06.myself if I let them go without. This woman says she regularly goes
:02:06. > :02:14.without food to pay her bills. I haven't had a proper meal since
:02:14. > :02:19.after Christmas. These are just some of the hundreds of people
:02:19. > :02:22.across the north-west relying on food handouts. An investigation
:02:22. > :02:26.into the effects of food poverty here reveals a region on the edge,
:02:26. > :02:34.as part of its community find they no longer have the means to buy
:02:34. > :02:37.food. One of the things we have been finding from parents we talk
:02:37. > :02:41.to is they often sacrifice their own needs for the sake of their
:02:41. > :02:44.children. The parent is not having a hot meal so the kids can. The
:02:44. > :02:51.heating goes off as soon as the kids go to bed. The parents are
:02:51. > :02:54.really sacrificing their own needs for the sake of their kids.
:02:54. > :02:59.It is heartbreaking to know that people's cupboards are bare and
:02:59. > :03:09.they cannot feed their families. This man used to be a quantity
:03:09. > :03:10.
:03:10. > :03:13.surveyor. Now he feeds his family. He is the manager of this food bank.
:03:13. > :03:17.We start today at the beginning of April for just six months and we
:03:17. > :03:22.have fed so many people. Most of those when the last three
:03:22. > :03:26.months. So there is a huge demand?
:03:26. > :03:31.It is increasing. I foresee that the demand will become massive in
:03:31. > :03:37.the next years. Food banks operate by giving help
:03:37. > :03:41.and support and suppliers of food to people who are referred by
:03:41. > :03:48.agencies like social services or the Citizens Advice Bureau. This
:03:48. > :03:53.ensures that the food goes to people who need it most.
:03:53. > :03:59.There is a food bank in the South of Liverpool that opened two years
:03:59. > :04:04.ago. We opened six months ago. Now, I believe there is one in the North
:04:04. > :04:09.of Liverpool. There is one in an area called Kirby. And another on
:04:09. > :04:12.the Wirral. They are all opening around now. It is brilliant. I
:04:12. > :04:22.think another one in Warrington as well.
:04:22. > :04:24.
:04:24. > :04:27.It shows the demand there is. At huge need. Yes.
:04:27. > :04:32.It is Friday afternoon and the team are worried about the condition of
:04:32. > :04:42.one man who has just arrived. He tells them his name is Karl.
:04:42. > :04:47.Who you are. When was the last time you eight. Are you enjoying that?
:04:47. > :04:53.Carl, 41, came to Liverpool from his home town of Wolverhampton 13
:04:53. > :04:58.years ago. He tells the team he has run out of money and has had no
:04:58. > :05:02.food for 48 hours. He said he lost his job as a kitchen porter at a
:05:02. > :05:06.Liverpool hotel six months ago and has failed to find another one. He
:05:06. > :05:13.has no money because of a problem with his benefit payments. He is
:05:13. > :05:18.given enough food to last for three days. We went with Carl to his flat.
:05:18. > :05:22.He was keen to show us his empty cupboard. For a nothing else there,
:05:22. > :05:24.as you can see. There is no food in the French
:05:24. > :05:28.rider. That is all I have.
:05:28. > :05:32.There is a growing fear that what we are seeing here is the beginning
:05:32. > :05:37.of a real crisis. Can I give you one of these and ask
:05:37. > :05:44.you to consider buying one or two items to give to the World Food
:05:44. > :05:47.bank. If you do now is on the way out, we would really appreciate it.
:05:47. > :05:51.A group of volunteers who are asking people to buy extra food
:05:51. > :05:56.with their weekly shop to help those going hungry. It is to help
:05:56. > :06:02.with a new food bank opening in Birkenhead soon.
:06:02. > :06:05.I think there is a massive need on world.
:06:05. > :06:10.I am a minister on religion and I think every minister on Merseyside
:06:10. > :06:15.would tell you that there are constantly being contacted by
:06:15. > :06:19.families who say, we are struggling to cope, can you help? It is all
:06:19. > :06:24.around us in our society and it will get worse, I think.
:06:24. > :06:30.The collection is going well and people are giving generously. But
:06:30. > :06:35.why are so many people finding the need to turn to food banks?
:06:35. > :06:41.19%, Gas has gone up, 20% electricity, the petrol in your car,
:06:41. > :06:46.every family is affected. I think when you have plenty of money, it
:06:46. > :06:56.is fine, but as a family living on the edge anyway, when these things
:06:56. > :07:01.
:07:01. > :07:04.hit you, you are in a great crisis. Across in Birkenhead, the Wirral-
:07:04. > :07:06.based Bread Of Life project is making its weekly drop of fresh
:07:06. > :07:09.food to Ted Griffiths. He's a single parent to six children,
:07:09. > :07:12.crippled with osteoarthritis, and he relies on the food for his
:07:12. > :07:16.family to survive. He says he often goes without food to feed the
:07:16. > :07:21.children. If I have the choice of making them a full meal, and I will
:07:21. > :07:24.not get my share, I will give it to them. It is the only way I know. I
:07:24. > :07:28.could not live with myself if I let them go without. Do you think that
:07:28. > :07:33.people in the wider world realise that people like you exist and are
:07:33. > :07:37.having to struggle like you do? I think a lot of people don't realise.
:07:37. > :07:40.They just see people get on with it and do not realise what goes on
:07:40. > :07:47.behind it. I think people should realise that sometimes it can be
:07:47. > :07:49.hard for families, like ourselves. Earlier this year, Save the
:07:49. > :07:56.Children revealed 25,000 children in Manchester are growing up in
:07:56. > :08:00.severe poverty and many are suffering from a lack of food. It
:08:00. > :08:02.is a huge issue because families are facing the perfect storm with a
:08:02. > :08:12.VAT increase, rising living costs, food going up, welfare cuts, lack
:08:12. > :08:12.
:08:12. > :08:16.of jobs in their local area. There is a perfect storm. This man wrote
:08:16. > :08:20.the Save the Children report. He says that for many families in the
:08:20. > :08:23.North West, food is the first casualty.
:08:23. > :08:26.2011 has been a hard year for families and we are worried that
:08:26. > :08:34.25,000 children living in severe poverty in Manchester has gone up
:08:34. > :08:38.this year, and that is our real problem.
:08:38. > :08:44.It is expected that food banks will begin opening in Manchester Lanette
:08:44. > :08:47.-- next year. When they are never have thought she would be coming
:08:47. > :08:51.here. She went without food to pay her bills because her benefits were
:08:51. > :08:56.being cut. She says she used to work for Liverpool Council and was
:08:56. > :09:02.a full-time carer for her husband, who died in January.
:09:02. > :09:12.My life has spiralled ever since. I cannot pay the bills, I cannot
:09:12. > :09:16.afford to eat. I have not had a proper meal since Christmas.
:09:16. > :09:24.This time last year, I would never have dreamt that I would be in this
:09:24. > :09:31.position. I just would not have dreamt it. Miss fortune can strike
:09:32. > :09:41.anybody. But it is very demoralising to think that,
:09:42. > :09:49.
:09:49. > :09:54.sometimes, I just think, am I going Coming up, have a Cumbrian artist
:09:54. > :10:03.helped troops in Afghanistan express their true feelings.
:10:03. > :10:07.Trained as if you will live forever. -- dream.
:10:07. > :10:12.Remember the story of Genette Tay, the little girl who went missing
:10:12. > :10:16.while delivering newspapers 30 years ago? And recent court case
:10:16. > :10:23.has given her father hope that he might finally be able to put her
:10:23. > :10:26.memories to rest. Last week, child killer Robert
:10:26. > :10:32.Black was convicted in Northern Ireland of the up dead son and
:10:32. > :10:37.murder of Jennifer Cadi, his fourth known victim. Was Genette Tay
:10:37. > :10:42.another one? The story of Robert Black does not
:10:42. > :10:47.end with this verdict. There are lines of inquiry that we are still
:10:47. > :10:51.looking at. Is there more to do abound of Robert Black? I think
:10:51. > :10:55.there probably is. Now Ginette's Seriously ill father
:10:55. > :10:59.is pleading with black to come clean.
:10:59. > :11:06.Please will you put us out of our misery and tell us what happened
:11:06. > :11:10.and where? It was on 19th August, 1978, that
:11:10. > :11:14.she does appear. I was panicking, going everywhere
:11:14. > :11:19.all at once. John has terminal cancer. He is
:11:19. > :11:23.going to make what could be his last trip from his home in
:11:24. > :11:28.Manchester to the place that his daughter was last seen. Our last
:11:28. > :11:37.known movements were reconstructed by police at the time. The 13-year-
:11:37. > :11:41.old was doing her paper round and had stopped to talk to friends. Ten
:11:41. > :11:46.minutes later, they found her bike with the papers scattered around
:11:46. > :11:56.and no sign of Genette. I had no idea what might have
:11:56. > :11:59.
:11:59. > :12:04.happened. I did not accept that she Ponds and wells within a 50 mile
:12:04. > :12:09.radius have been drenched. It was the biggest missing person enquiry
:12:09. > :12:15.Devon and Cornwall police had ever mounted. The investigation remains
:12:15. > :12:21.open. The evidence is still held at police headquarters in Exeter.
:12:21. > :12:26.Ginnette went missing about 3:20pm. In the hours and days that followed
:12:26. > :12:31.it became quite quickly apparent that she had been abducted, because
:12:31. > :12:39.there was a huge amount of inquiries undertaken. The case
:12:39. > :12:45.shocked not just the local community but a whole country.
:12:45. > :12:55.ask for volunteers to search a particular Common, and loads of
:12:55. > :13:03.people turned out. More than we anticipated. The 7,000 people who
:13:03. > :13:09.joined the search party in it -- became known as the welly army. But
:13:09. > :13:16.the efforts were in vain. As the years have gone on, the family and
:13:16. > :13:25.ourselves have had to accept that she was murdered. Even now, John
:13:25. > :13:31.finds it hard to comprehend. I did not give up hope for a long time, I
:13:31. > :13:38.do not think I have 100 % given it up. 30 years later. There is still
:13:38. > :13:45.a tiny bit of me that hopes she is alive somewhere. John himself was
:13:45. > :13:52.questioned by police. We were told, quite rightly so, that everybody
:13:52. > :13:57.gets investigated. As it was explained to me, I accepted that it
:13:57. > :14:02.was going to happen. He was quickly ruled out as a suspect, but even
:14:02. > :14:10.now, John feels tainted by suspicion and Internet rumours that
:14:10. > :14:20.persist. We try to get one particular Internet entry taken off,
:14:20. > :14:21.
:14:21. > :14:28.but you cannot do it. I found it very distressing. For years, the
:14:28. > :14:32.police investigation went nowhere. Then in 1990, paedophile Robert
:14:32. > :14:38.Black was investigated. He has now been convicted of abducting and
:14:38. > :14:42.killing four girls in the 1980s and is serving life in prison. He
:14:42. > :14:46.always denied responsibility for her disappearance. His conviction
:14:46. > :14:53.last week may have provided a breakthrough for Devon and Cornwall
:14:53. > :14:57.police. As a result of the conviction against Robert Black in
:14:57. > :15:02.Northern Ireland we will look at the evidence put forward to the
:15:02. > :15:06.court in Northern Ireland and see if it influences this investigation.
:15:06. > :15:13.Police have released an interview with Robert Black where he talks
:15:13. > :15:23.about his fantasies. Similarities with this case are chilling. It was
:15:23. > :15:24.
:15:24. > :15:30.just a narrow road, going downhill, driving along, I saw a young girl.
:15:30. > :15:33.Talk to her, persuade her to get into the van. John believes Robert
:15:33. > :15:42.Black has the answers to the questions that have plagued him
:15:42. > :15:48.have his life, so he is writing to him. Dear Robert Black, would you
:15:48. > :15:58.make the necessary arrangements to talk to you? I think I do not have
:15:58. > :15:59.
:15:59. > :16:08.long to go, and I would like to get this out of the way before I die.
:16:08. > :16:15.That is what I was thinking. I would like to give him a situation
:16:15. > :16:19.where he could get forgiveness for what he has done. John begins the
:16:19. > :16:29.long journey from Manchester where he leads down to the west country
:16:29. > :16:30.
:16:30. > :16:34.lane where his daughter disappear. -- disappeared. 33 years to the day
:16:34. > :16:42.of his daughter's abduction, he is at the place where she was last
:16:42. > :16:50.seen. How do you feel coming back? It is a difficult question, I
:16:50. > :17:00.wonder myself, but just to see if there is something we have missed.
:17:00. > :17:03.
:17:03. > :17:07.She delivers you to these cottages. -- delivered here. The normal route
:17:07. > :17:17.for the newspaper would have been the next field. This is the spot it
:17:17. > :17:21.
:17:21. > :17:30.Like it was yesterday, almost. Nothing has altered in my mind.
:17:30. > :17:40.Difficult. I have questions going in my head all the time. I would
:17:40. > :17:50.like to have closer to it. Shall we go on to the village? -- closure. I
:17:50. > :17:50.
:17:50. > :17:59.want to go to the churchyard, it is not far from here. In the
:17:59. > :18:09.churchyard, there is a memorial. is basically to have a place to be
:18:09. > :18:13.
:18:13. > :18:19.quiet and think. That is what I use it for any way. Just be at peace.
:18:19. > :18:23.Robert Black did not answer John's letter. Should they ever meet, John
:18:23. > :18:31.knows what he would say. I would ask him if he did it, if he killed
:18:31. > :18:41.her, and if so can you put as a out of our misery and tell us what
:18:41. > :18:42.
:18:42. > :18:52.happened and where? I want him to admit. If he had not done it, let
:18:52. > :19:00.
:19:01. > :19:05.us know, so we can continue It is 10 years since the start of
:19:05. > :19:09.the war in Afghanistan. An artist from the Lake District has just
:19:09. > :19:14.opened a unique exhibition in which servicemen and servicewomen tell
:19:14. > :19:19.their own stories in their own words. He is a former paratrooper
:19:19. > :19:29.who spend a month on the front line in Helmand Province, helping to get
:19:29. > :19:33.
:19:33. > :19:40.their handwritten accounts. There are two wars being fought, one
:19:40. > :19:50.which is publicised and one which is quite. This could be a beautiful
:19:50. > :19:58.
:19:58. > :20:08.walk, a forgotten world, but then reality hits you. Dream as if you
:20:08. > :20:11.will live forever, live as if you'll die tomorrow. Derek Eland
:20:11. > :20:14.from Penrith walks in the footsteps of war artists who've risked their
:20:14. > :20:16.lives on the front line, capturing photographs, poetry and paintings.
:20:16. > :20:19.In the history of war art, predominantly it's dominated by
:20:19. > :20:25.painters and people who draw. And I wasn't sure that I could bring
:20:25. > :20:28.something unique to peoples' perceptions of that conflict.
:20:28. > :20:31.what Derek could bring was experience. He's a former
:20:31. > :20:34.paratrooper, serving five years in the 16th Air Assault Brigade as a
:20:34. > :20:39.Captain. I joined in '84 and everyone in my
:20:39. > :20:43.platoon, the members of my platoon, had all been in the Falklands. And
:20:43. > :20:46.I turned up from university without any experience, really. So it took
:20:46. > :20:56.a while to get into that and to win their respect. It was critical to
:20:56. > :21:01.
:21:01. > :21:03.do that. But after doing so it was a brilliant time, really enjoyed it.
:21:03. > :21:07.Having swapped his parachute for a paintbrush, Derek became a
:21:07. > :21:12.professional artist concentrating on the beauty of the Lakes.
:21:12. > :21:15.I'm not a literal painter, I'm not a traditional landscape painter. I
:21:15. > :21:20.interpret it and that interpretation forms the basis for
:21:20. > :21:25.an abstraction of the landscape. And the use of black emphasises the
:21:25. > :21:31.lines in the landscape and the impact we make on it.
:21:31. > :21:35.Inevitably, he turned his attention to the art of war. He didn't want
:21:35. > :21:41.to simply represent the conflict in drawings or paintings. Instead, he
:21:41. > :21:43.wanted the soldiers to tell their own stories in handwritten notes.
:21:43. > :21:46.So having got involved in what we call socially-engaged art,
:21:46. > :21:49.particularly using text and getting people to write their responses on
:21:49. > :21:59.cards and Post-it notes, I thought that maybe that was the thing I
:21:59. > :22:10.
:22:10. > :22:15.could take to Afghanistan. It's Sunday, or is it Monday? Gosh,
:22:15. > :22:18.I think it's Monday, and here I am in Camp Bastion. This is my little
:22:18. > :22:24.place here and very comfortable it was too, had about six or seven
:22:24. > :22:28.hours sleep, which was good. And got a few things to sort out this
:22:28. > :22:36.morning, like get some better body armour. Got to get some masking
:22:36. > :22:39.tape for the war story notes. And then I think at 1500 this afternoon,
:22:39. > :22:49.fly out, helicopter out to Lashkar Gah to see James and Brigade
:22:49. > :22:55.
:22:55. > :22:58.Headquarters and then from there find out what the general plan is.
:22:59. > :23:03.Men have been to war before last. It is easy to think they were
:23:03. > :23:06.warriors afraid of nothing, but they were men just like us.
:23:06. > :23:08.Soldiers are very, you know, they're down to earth, gritty.
:23:08. > :23:11.They're human beings. And they are faced with extreme conditions -
:23:11. > :23:14.cold, heat, being soaked to the skin, being shot at, being bombed,
:23:14. > :23:24.being hungry. And those things came out, but more as experiences I
:23:24. > :23:34.
:23:34. > :23:38.think rather than, this is hideous get me out of here.
:23:38. > :23:46.I am here to appreciate all the things I have taken for granted all
:23:46. > :23:50.these years. The soliders mostly thought I was still a painter and
:23:50. > :24:00.they asked me where are my paints, where is my easel, and I said, well
:24:00. > :24:00.
:24:00. > :24:04.actually all I've got are hundreds Well, certainly lying in bed last
:24:04. > :24:07.night worrying about it. Just running it through my head just how
:24:07. > :24:11.it's going to work on the ground and how easy it is, or difficult
:24:11. > :24:20.it's going to be to persuade the soldiers to write down their war
:24:20. > :24:25.stories. Derek feared these battle-hardened
:24:25. > :24:28.front line troops would be sceptical about his art project. He
:24:28. > :24:34.knew that revealing emotions, fears and hopes could be seen as a
:24:34. > :24:44.weakness. Would they put down their guns, and pick up their pens? He
:24:44. > :24:44.
:24:44. > :24:54.was about to find out. I'm just going to take a look
:24:54. > :24:57.inside, at this shipping container. It's pretty good actually. Had a
:24:57. > :25:00.good few stories, some images, some drawing, some poetry. I reckon
:25:00. > :25:10.we've got about 115 different stories and we've got about 150-odd
:25:10. > :25:20.
:25:20. > :25:24.individual pieces of paper. And I think they very quickly got it,
:25:24. > :25:26.that was the key thing. So the commanders, senior NCOs and
:25:26. > :25:31.sergeants and people like this, they immediately got what I was
:25:31. > :25:41.trying to do. And when I talked to soldiers on the ground, they also
:25:41. > :25:41.
:25:41. > :25:46.very quickly got it. And then they just wrote away.
:25:46. > :25:53.As the end of the two approaches, fear of being injured plays on your
:25:53. > :25:59.mind. When my mate got blown up it really brought it home. I had to
:25:59. > :26:01.clear up the blast site and pick up bits and pieces. It's not a thing
:26:01. > :26:04.they would talk about between themselves. In their letters home
:26:04. > :26:07.to their families they play down the dangers and incidents and they
:26:07. > :26:10.talk about the fact they do do that. They normalise everything. These
:26:10. > :26:20.are raw, honest accounts, that clearly these soldiers are carrying
:26:20. > :26:23.
:26:23. > :26:32.around in their heads. Saying goodbye hurts, but saying goodbye
:26:32. > :26:36.and not knowing if you're coming home is one million times worse.
:26:36. > :26:39.think in reality I got further forward than I thought I would. I
:26:39. > :26:49.was in an Ops meeting one night and someone came in and shouted,
:26:49. > :26:58.
:26:58. > :27:01.contact. GUNFIRE. Whilst everyone else went and grabbed their weapons
:27:01. > :27:04.and got on with things, I switched on my camcorder and filmed for
:27:04. > :27:07.about 15 or 20 minutes this contact going on. I filmed these soldiers
:27:07. > :27:17.who had written these stories doing their job. And the shouts and
:27:17. > :27:21.
:27:21. > :27:26.commands in the darkness was very impressive actually. I have been
:27:26. > :27:32.shot at loads of time but only seen the Taliban with a weapon once.
:27:32. > :27:42.They are like ghosts. The sniper with a man in his sights. Can I
:27:42. > :27:47.
:27:47. > :27:54.fire? Derek spent a month on the front line. Once he is home he is
:27:54. > :28:00.able to reflect on the content of his stories. Tragedy is throughout
:28:00. > :28:05.this project. Soldiers who rode cards and put their names to those
:28:06. > :28:13.cards went on to be endured, shot or blown up. In some cases, they
:28:13. > :28:22.were killed. The exhibition will run for nine months as part of the
:28:22. > :28:32.war correspondents using it in Manchester. -- correspondence
:28:32. > :28:32.
:28:33. > :28:42.season. It is the honesty of the stories that makes it important.
:28:43. > :28:48.