Prize-winning poverty book’s authors donate prize money to charity
Howard Lake | 26 July 2013 | News
Two Teesside University professors, whose book on poverty in the UK has won an award, have donated their £2,000 prize to a charity helping people living in poverty.
Professors Rob MacDonald and Tracy Shildrick were awarded the British Academy Peter Townsend Policy Press Prize for their book 'Poverty and Insecurity: Life in Low-pay, No-pay Britain', which exposed the myth of the 'benefits scrounger'.
The book was based on research with people from Middlesbrough who were caught up in the 'low-pay, no-pay' cycle. It demonstrated that people living in poverty are not like the "prejudiced portraits of benefit scroungers" as depicted in popular culture. Instead it found a lasting work commitment and a hatred of claiming benefits among those living in, or close to, poverty.
Advertisement
The authors donated the £2,000 prize money to Thrive, a charity based in Thornaby which combines research, campaigns and projects to help the most excluded households in the region.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.