Stereotype conceals genuine poverty and distress.
Emergency payments and food banks are now facts of life in Reigate & Banstead.
Our experience at Citizens Advice and information from Surrey Local Assistance Scheme (LAS) show not everyone is well-off in our prosperous county – in fact quite the reverse.
Every week from October to December 2015 our advisers helped on average 15 clients who would have gone hungry without access to a food bank.
And an LAS league table shows Reigate & Banstead the top source of applications for emergency help in April to December.
Meanwhile Inequality in Elmbridge, a detailed exploration of the misleading stereotype, was published late last year*. It says a lot about the gap between the borough’s best and worst paid workers.
One resident is quoted: Surrey is supposed to be a very wealthy area – that’s what it is recognised as and that’s what everybody thinks. Poverty is covered up…you have those people within the small corners all tucked away.
In the LAS league table Elmbridge is in second place after Reigate & Banstead.