- They kept food in plastic bags
- in the shed;
- the cold night air.
- They couldn’t afford a fridge,
- couldn’t afford to heat their house.
- They lived in one room.
- Every Sunday they walked
- six miles each way
- to a soup kitchen
- to have something to eat
- and pick up food bags,
- free vegetables
- to cook into a broth
- on a camping stove.
- It’s not as if nobody knew.
- A year ago,
- they appeared in a film
- about living below
- the breadline.
- She had learning difficulties
- and needed support from her husband,
- an army veteran.
- He was her full-time carer.
- The Jobcentre decided she couldn’t sign on;
- she wasn’t fit
- for work.
- Her benefits were stopped.
- He worked in the army
- as a PE instructor,
- but fell on hard times
- after the service.
- Struggled to cope with
- civvy street.
- Their 12-year-old daughter
- was taken into care.
- He fought to get a carer’s allowance
- but they wouldn’t recognise his wife’s disabilities.
- He was told he could not claim
- until she had been fully diagnosed:
- month after
- month after
- month of specialists, living
- hand
- to mouth.
- They were terrified she was about to be sectioned.
- They stayed with relatives and friends
- to avoid the authorities.
- They walked everywhere
- hand-in-hand
- like young lovers.
- Neighbours raised the alarm.
- They had not been seen for several weeks.
- This is where despair ends.
- They were found
- lying side by side
- on the settee.
- A police spokesman said
- post-mortem examinations
- had been carried out.
- The deaths are being treated
- as unexplained.
[The Daily Mirror, 11/11/2011, The tragic story of suicides Mark and Helen Mullins is a tale our politicians should pay attention to; Coventry Telegraph, 08/11/2011, Bedworth ‘suicide pact’ couple found lying side-by-side; Coventry Telegraph, 11/05/2021, Death of Warwickshire couple included in review into serious harms of people claiming benefits; Channel 4 News, 09/11/2011, Police investigate death of couple; BBC News, 09/11/2011, Inquiry call over Mark and Helen Mullins deaths; Metro, 08/11/2011, Married couple driven to commit suicide by utter poverty; Mail Online, 09/11/2011, Army veteran and his wife die in tragic ‘suicide pact’ after becoming ‘too poor to live through the winter’]