COVER STORY
THE POWER OF
The People How a young footballer used his celebrity to change government policy By Maarten Hoffmann
I
It was not long ago that it would have taken a titanic battle, months of high level networking and a contact book from heaven to change government policy. Times have changed and now all it takes is a social media campaign, fronted by a popular figure and hey presto, policy is changed.
plement what his mum could provide. She was the head of a single-parent family of five children, working fulltime on the minimum wage.
It was on March 19th that Marcus Rashford first went on social media to highlight his fears about the impact that shutting schools would have on disadvantaged children.
When Boris Johnson stood before the nation on the evening of March 18th to tell the country schools had to help combat the spread of Covid-19, Rashford immediately knew what that would mean. While most parents wondered how they were going to manage childcare, Rashford wondered how kids growing up as he had would get fed.
He may be a high-profile Premier League footballer now, but it is only 11 years since the Manchester United and England striker needed breakfast clubs and free school meals to sup-
"Guys, across the UK there are over 32,000 schools. Tomorrow all of these will close. Many of the children attending these schools rely on free meals, so I've spent the last few days talking
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to organisations to understand how this deficit is going to be filled," he wrote. The start of the six-post thread received 42,500 likes on Twitter. Just under 13 weeks later, Rashford posted again. A rather simpler message. "I don't even know what to say." It received 709,000 likes. In between, Rashford had helped supply the equivalent of three million meals. He had highlighted the damage caused by the 'invisible issue of food insecurity'. He had received messages of support from Liverpool and Manchester City. He had changed government policy. As Rashford returns to his day job, it
