Within just a couple of years after leaving the army, I found myself homeless and the reason was firmly a lack of education about personal finances.
If you, like me, grew up in a household suffering deep poverty, where your parents struggled to get your school uniform or even put food on the table – you likely were blissfully unaware of the reasons for it. Parents in poverty usually keep it from their children, often due to embarrassment or shame, sometimes due to simply wanting their kids to not have to feel the stress of adult problems.
Meanwhile at school, personal financial education is not taught at all. Not even the basics. Not in the late 1990s when I needed it, not now in the mid 2020s – almost 30 years later.
From this fairly common scenario, I joined the army, aged 18. During my time serving, I was taught a lot; how to be a soldier, how to fire weapons, how to drive – but something not taught, was personal finances. In fact it’s worse than that, you’re kind of cushioned from them. As a single person, you had a bedspace in an accommodation block. Your bills, including food, were all paid before your wages hit your bank account.
This all led to me, having just left the army and having to fend for myself for the first time, aged 23, completely lacking the knowledge and skills needed to manage my finances, especially as I didn’t have enough income to cover everything. On top of this, I genuinely had never even heard of ‘council tax’, so simply hadn’t paid it. For two years.
Education is the key
When the council tax bill caught up with me, punishable with prison, panic set in. I started juggling the money I did have, but unsuccessfully, meaning rent wasn’t being paid, finally leading to me being evicted from my housing association home, with no money and no hope. I was at my lowest point ever, looking at the possibility of having my two children taken from me because I was unable to provide them with a home. I’ve spoken to many ex-forces personnel who have ended up where I was – the ones who made it.
Luckily, I got out of the hole, just. I learnt the hard way all about personal and household finances since. I’m making sure I teach both my kids all about it as they’re growing up.
But there is an obvious solution to ensure nobody has to go through the hardship I did – that is to teach this in schools, from an early age and throughout the school years. It’s more important, I think, that anything else taught in schools. It will not only deem well for the future of our country’s economy but will also teach people how to avoid poverty in the first place.
I can’t understand why it’s not already taught. Unless it really is the upper and political classes keeping the majority down and in their place. Whatever the reason, it’s time for us to stand up, and demand change for personal household finances to be taught in schools immediately. If we don’t, we are letting our children fall into the same hole.
