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Our webinar series started in June 2020, and explores the practical, ethical, and methodological challenges of researching during the pandemic. Four webinars took place - you can find the recordings and details below.

Kayleigh Garthwaite avatar
Kayleigh Garthwaite
University of Birmingham

Online book launch, Wednesday 19th October, 7.30pm - 8.30pm

Between 2020 and 2022, over 100 parents and carers living on a low came together online, sharing experiences in diaries, and working together to develop a manifesto for change.

A Year Like No Other: Life on a Low Income during COVID-19 is a book that emerged from this collaboration. Co-written with parents and carers, the book provides a compelling account of lives during a national crisis, within the context of the everyday crisis that poverty brings.

Please join us online as we launch this book, celebrating the work of parents and carers involved in Covid Realities, and discussing why change is now needed more than ever.

The launch will feature participants reading from the book, as well as responses from Kerry Hudson (author), Professor Kate Pickett (University of York) and John Harris (The Guardian). The launch will be co-chaired by Alison Garnham (CPAG) and Ruth Patrick.

Participants

Shirley: Disabled Lone Parent, Carer, Activist, Expert by Experience & Covid Realities Participant

Mahabuba lives in Tower Hamlets with her family and joined Covid Realites during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Caroline: I am a mum first, that is my most important job in life, and a childcare provider. I am a fighter and a strong believer in a society that values and respects everyone. I am a strong advocate for speaking up and teaching our young children how to question things and to look at the world with empathy and consideration. We never know what is going on in anyone else’s life and mind

Faith: Divorced, loved daughter and Mum of two. Never look back, your future is waiting for you!!

Mel is a married mother of three who has experienced life on a low income since childhood.

Emma: I am 28 years old, happily married with three children, I have always worked up until some unfortunate events landed me on benefits.

Emdad: I am a dad of 3 children who enjoys spending time with them, visiting local attractions and helping them with their homework, as well as teaching them the etiquette and manners to live in a diverse community. I believe that this life is short and whatever you get in your life, try to stay happy and help others who need it. This is the way we can give something back to our communities where we were raised and grown up.

Kim: I’m a mother to 4 sons and married, life was settled until covid stole my husbands job. I hope that reading our stories helps you to understand our plight and encourages you to do your own research.

Tayyaba: My name is Tayyaba, I live in London. I am a single parent of a lovely 11 year old boy. I started working in the NHS during the first wave of Covid. It was very hard as there was no child care support available; during this time me and my son supported each other.  The Covid Realities project was a platform to have a voice to hopefully make  policy makers to think about people as a human not as a number; and how to support them not only for now but to find a permanent solution to keep  people going without being in stress, and able to live a happy life; so people can see their kids thrive and a good future for their children.

Ella: Media Spokesperson and Ambassador, gentle mother to twin daughters Bella and Ruby, age 3. Love travelling, boxing and football.

Aurora: Desperately hoping for change. Struggling, solo parent of two children.

Joseph: I am 46, disabled with a wife and 3 children, my eldest who is Autistic. I am on legacy benefits. I am working part time with my housing provider and volunteer nationally and locally with regard to housing rights and what we want to see from the government. I feel passionate about change for the better.

Stacey: 34 year old widowed parent of 2 young children.

Brian: I am a single parent father living on a low income with my daughter of school age. I am not asking for change solely for my own benefit. I ask for change as many people do, so our children can grow up in a caring and equal society so they have the best possible chance to make the best of their future lives and reach their full potential without feeling disadvantaged and not as appreciated as others in better financial and stable positions.

Tayeba: Hi my name is Tayeba and I am a mother of three children from Leeds.

The first 10 people to sign up to attend our launch will receive a free copy of the book.

Sign up to attend the launch here.

You can order A year like no other here. Attendees at the launch will be provided with a discount code for the book, or you can also get 25% off by joining the publisher’s mailing list.



You can order the book online here.

Families living on a low income are profoundly disadvantaged and Covid-19 has only made this worse. Since April 2020, the Covid Realities research programme has documented the everyday experiences of families on a low income with children during the pandemic. What these experiences show is that our social security system and wider public services are failing to provide families on low incomes with adequate support.

In this webinar, we launch our final report and present key findings from Covid Realities, emphasising how the collaborative approach we have taken means our recommendations reflect and are grounded in the needs of families living on a low income.

After an introduction from Alex Beer (Programme Head, Welfare, Nuffield Foundation) we hear from participants Caroline and Jo, and researchers from Covid Realities (Jim Kaufman, Rosalie Warnock, and Kayleigh Garthwaite), with responses from Donna Ward (Director of Children, Families and Disadvantage, DWP), and Hannah Aldridge (Head of Policy, Child Poverty Action Group).

The webinar was chaired by Anela Anwar, Chief Executive of Z2K.

Families living on a low income are profoundly disadvantaged and Covid-19 has only made this worse. Since April 2020, the Covid Realities research programme has documented the everyday experiences of families on a low income with children during the pandemic. What these experiences show is that our social security system and wider public services are failing to provide families on low incomes with adequate support.

In this webinar, we launch our final report and present key findings from Covid Realities, emphasising how the collaborative approach we have taken means our recommendations reflect and are grounded in the needs of families living on a low income.

After an introduction from Alex Beer (Programme Head, Welfare, Nuffield Foundation) we hear from participants Caroline and Jo, and researchers from Covid Realities (Jim Kaufman, Rosalie Warnock, and Kayleigh Garthwaite), with responses from Donna Ward (Director of Children, Families and Disadvantage, DWP), and Hannah Aldridge (Head of Policy, Child Poverty Action Group).

The webinar was chaired by Anela Anwar, Chief Executive of Z2K.

The social security system entered the pandemic ill-equipped (Garnham, 2020). Successive rounds of ‘welfare reform’ and cuts to entitlement had left it unable to provide decent support to families already in poverty and to those pushed into poverty by the pandemic itself. The £20 uplift to Universal Credit, introduced in April 2020, and extended for a further six months in March 2021, was itself a tacit acceptance that we went into the pandemic with benefit levels too low.

We all know that the pandemic has exposed and extended existing inequalities, while also showing the possibilities for the government to intervene on a massive scale, when the political will and public demand is there.

This Covid Realities webinar will explore the possibilities for an improved, perhaps radically different, social security system to emerge from the pandemic. It will consider what the alternatives are, and the prospect of seeing long-lasting change take place. We heard from:

  • Aurora and Catherine, participants in Covid Realities
  • Kimberley McIntosh, senior policy and research officer, Child Poverty Action Group
  • Kerry Hudson, award winning author of ‘Lowborn : Growing Up, Getting Away and Returning to Britain’s Poorest Towns’
  • Kitty Stewart, Associate Professor of Social Policy and Associate Director of the Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion (CASE), London School of Economics

The webinar was chaired by Jackie Long, social affairs editor and presenter for Channel 4 News.

As researchers, we have now been working in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic for 12 months. Through the Covid Realities project, we have provided a forum to think through how (and whether) to carry out research during the pandemic. This has involved thinking about the ethical, practical, methodological, and emotional challenges around this through our blog series, webinars, and resources page on our website.

In this webinar, we brought speakers together to reflect on the past year and how their research has responded to and been affected by the pandemic.

We heard from:

  • Helen Lomax (University of Huddersfield) discusses the process of working on the Corona Chronicles longitudinal research project with children aged 9-11, where children living in some of the most disadvantaged wards in the UK chronicled their everyday lives, education and relationships during the pandemic;
  • Kayleigh Garthwaite (University of Birmingham) who will outline the research synthesis that has been a central element of the Covid Realities research programme, working with 14 research projects across the UK as part of the 'COVID-19 and low-income families: Researching together' Special Interest Group.

Presentations will be kept short to allow time for discussion.

The webinar was chaired by Professor Kate Pickett, University of York, who is Co-Principal Investigator on the ‘Born in Bradford’ research project and a member of the 'COVID-19 and low-income families: Researching together' Special Interest Group.

Over the past six months, qualitative researchers have had little choice but to try to change and adapt our usual methods; switching new and existing research projects to often completely different ways of working. This is particularly relevant when we consider how best to conduct and manage qualitative research on poverty during the time of COVID-19.

In this webinar, we heard from:

  • Anna Tarrant, Linzi Ladlow and Laura Way (University of Lincoln)discuss the process of moving to online methods in the Following Young Fathers Further study. In particular, they reflect on conducting interviews via phone call and Zoom, a and share reflections about how young fathers found the process.
  • David Robertshaw (University of Leeds) will consider the emotional and ethical challenges of remote interviewing in the context of the pandemic for the Welfare at a (Social) Distance project, and how these are being navigated.
  • Aimi King (University of Huddersfield) will reflect on carrying out her PhD research on the Christian ethos in parent and toddler groups in churches during the pandemic, and why she has preferred to stick with a face to face approach, despite the pandemic.

The webinar was chaired by Professor Jane Millar, University of Bath, who is Principal Investigator on the ‘Couples balancing work, money and care: exploring the shifting landscape under Universal Credit’ project, which has also shifted to virtual interviews over recent months.

Now, more than ever, it’s important that those who are experiencing the unequal impact of COVID-19 are able to share their expertise and experiences directly with social security and related policy makers. In this context, participatory research is vital. But this context also makes participatory research difficult and creates new challenges: how do participatory workshops operate in online spaces; and how are inclusive and safe spaces created for collaboration?

  • Tracey Herrington (Thrive Teesside and Poverty2Solutions) reflects upon what participatory research should actually look like, drawing on her experience of grassroots activism and lived experience.
  • Shahid Islam (Bradford Institute for Health Research) discusses some of the challenges of doing participatory work in the pandemic, and how he is navigating these in his own work.
  • Finally, Maddy Power and Ruth Patrick reflect upon the methodological approach underpinning the participatory element of the Covid Realities project, which involves work with parents and carers living on a low income to share their everyday experiences of the pandemic. The webinar was chaired by Professor Maggie O’Neill, Professor in Sociology at University College Cork.

Discussing some key learnings and challenges around how we can conduct research on poverty ethically at a time of global crisis, bringing together perspectives from academia, charitable organisations and from the frontline.

Following a two-year in-depth inquiry run by an international working group, the Nuffield Council on Bioethics’ report ‘Research in global health emergencies: ethical issues’ was published in January 2020, a matter of weeks before we began to see the impact of COVID-19 in the UK. The report – with prescient timeliness – offers an ethical compass and valuable reflections for those of us who are now attempting to carry out research that is suitable and sensitive to these new times.

Co-author of the report, Katharine Wright, Assistant Director for the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, reflects on lessons from this project in terms of an ‘ethical compass’ to help guide policy approaches, which can be used to reflect on the COVID-19 pandemic in a UK setting. Professor Lisa Scullion, University of Salford, draws on her experiences of setting up a new UKRI funded project on Welfare at a (social) distance, and think through the ethical issues involved in light of COVID-19. Finally, Azmina Siddique, Policy and Research Manager, The Children’s Society, discusses new evidence from ongoing practice in a rapidly changing time, thinking through how the voluntary sector is seeking to deliver impactful evidence to inform policy responses at a time of rapid change. Presentations will be kept short to allow time for discussion.

The webinar was chaired by Professor Karen Rowlingson, University of Birmingham, Chair of the Social Policy Association.

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