The storyline in Coronation Street about Chesney’s son, Joseph, getting bullied at school for coming from a poor home is a good way to bring to viewers ‘ attention a problem which has been around for a long time. Children are picked on because they don’t have expensive branded trainers, school bags or posh label outdoor jackets amongst other things.
My son is middle aged and this was going on when he was at school: in those days it was all about expensive trainers as branded sportswear became a must have. I did my best to resist buying them but then I discovered he was being called ‘cuffy’ - a west midland slang term for someone poor. ( In Coronation Street Joseph is being called a ‘Povo’ ). We weren’t poor, just sensible, but the bullies won in the end and I gave in. The school was no help at all.
Sad to see it is still going on.

Bullies in school will pick on other children for absolutely everything and anything,whether it be their height,age,colour or their skin, their nationality, their personal home life,
When our son was at school, no designer clothes,shoes,bags etc was allowed on school premises, I totally agree with this,because everyone was being treated equally,

It's not just children from a poor home that are bullied. Children from a poor home can actually do the bullying themselves.

A case in point was a lad in my junior school. Came from a poor family and wasn't fed properly at home so he would go round all those who brought in a packed lunch and pinched their food.

Yes, a friend of mine who taught in a junior school a poor area had complaints from children in her class that their bags were being raided and food stolen. A suspect was named. To investigate this and see who might be the culprit the teacher invented a maths lesson around lunch box contents. She asked her class to open their lunch boxes in order to discover the most popular food items “How many of you have sandwiches ? How many of you have an apple? How many of you have a bag of crisps…” The items were listed on the board.
One poor little girl had just one slice of bread and margarine cut into quarters in her box.
A chat with the child later revealed that she had been stealing food from lunchboxes because she was hungry. Social services were contacted.