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Father Peter Walters founded the UK registered charity Let The Children Live! following his 1982 trip to Colombia and the capital of violence, Bogota. Let The Children Live! provides funding for crucial services for street children. Misused and treated like vermin, Colombia’s street children often fall prey to the death squads paid to snuff out their fragile lives. Now more hardships are on the way, this time due to the world’s worsening economy.

Due to problems with income, service providers are struggling to maintain their commitments. When lifelines are removed, the street children they serve are indeed left alone. A history of violence has conspired against them, making them particularly and acutely vulnerable today.

In Colombia, a ravaged society has in effect endured over 30 years of civil war. This war, which is funded by the Rich World, has swept away the nuts and bolts of society. Everything from meaningful social investment to effective people and political opposition is gone. The UK is the second largest donor of military aid to Colombia after the US. Much of the violence is tactically concentrated in rural areas, freeing up strategic lands for foreign investment.

Imprecise aerial fumigation over rural Colombia ruins local agricultural business. US chemical companies are commissioned for the production of the harmful defoliants used, and US contractors carry out the fumigation. Aerial fumigation is a proven failure in its officially stated aims, putting the lie to counter-narcotics claims.

Coupled with the routine slaughter of civilians, the campaign of violence and intimidation ensures the exodus of rural people to urban areas. The paramilitary carries out atrocities unhampered. Indeed the links and communication between the paramilitary and US trained military are irrefutable. Cities bulge at the seams with the dispossessed masses. The street children - from as young as six years through to teenagers - cling to whatever help they can find. Glue sniffing is cheap and popular. Casa Walsingham, the Let The Children Live! funded centre, is invaluable.

This year, Casa Walsingham closed for three weeks over the mid-year holidays. The centre’s community programme - which usually serves 200 children and 60 families in the shantytowns - was terminated.

If it’s hard to fully appreciate what the closing of one small centre for a few weeks might mean, it’s a reflection of the disparity between our lives and theirs. The children who eat at Casa Walsingham every weekday would have had to survive off a diet of rice and sugar-water. Of course hunger may have drove them to the streets in search of a more substantial meal through begging, stealing, or prostitution. All the while Casa Walsingham stood idle, suddenly a bricks and mortar place without the children who make its heart beat.

Father Peter Walters wrote, “On reflection, the present silence is actually preferable to what we have been hearing for the last few days: the sound of children and adults crying as we have said good-bye to them.”

The cause of this new hardship, says Father Peter Walters, is the collapsing value of the pound and dollar against the Colombian peso. In July 2006, one pound was equal to 5,030 pesos. By June 2008, the value of the pound had depreciated by nearly 33% and was worth only 3,337 pesos. Taking into account inflation, the purchasing power of the pound in Colombia dropped more than 45% in 23 months, with the sharpest drop occurring in the first half of 2008.

Let The Children Live! has not been able to keep pace with this prolonged and increasingly rapid decline in the value of the currencies in which almost all its financial support is received. Father Peter Walters and his co-workers have contingency plans in place for further cuts in services. To compensate for global economic problems, the charity needs to increase its monthly income by at least £15,000 or $30,000. For a small charity, this presents an enormous challenge, and, with economic trends continuing in the same direction, the challenge looks set to get bigger.

We should remember while the current economic downturn really is a worldwide problem, its effects are not felt equally everywhere. Let The Children Live! needs help to continue in its work with some of the world’s most needy children. All donations are welcome, but small charities like Let The Children Live! rely on large, sustainable increases in income from regular standing orders. These donations can be applied on the ground according to need.

Substantial injections of capital can transform situations overnight: Facilities and services can be opened up to more children, new initiatives can reach new clients, and cash reserves can enable valuable services to weather times of crisis. Let nobody doubt this is a time of crisis.

Let The Children Live! (Registered Charity No. 1013634) continues to send money to Colombia each month, to support and save the lives of more than 600 children. For details, and information about enhancing your donation through the Gift Aid Scheme, you can visit their website - www.letthechildrenlive.org - or write to their Walsingham address:

Let The Children Live!
P.O. Box 11
Walsingham
Norfolk
NR22 6EH

Or you can email Let The Children Live! at letthechildrenlive@mac.com, or call 01302 858 369.

Father Peter Walters is quoted as having said: “Because the gamines [street children] have no one, they really belong to us all.”