It is in this context that Rosen and Oxenbury have united to create Pax: A Festive Tale, published exclusively in the pages of this week\u2019s Big Issue.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n The story \u2013 the duo\u2019s third ever collaboration \u2013 features a family living on the breadline whose cat Pax ventures out into the cold after they\u2019re unable to afford food for him.<\/p>\n \u201cI think if you write about the world as it is, as opposed to the world that you hope it to be, then one of the things about the world as it is some people are finding it very, very difficult to get from day to day and have enough money and enough food,\u201d Rosen said.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd in this story, well, the cat is less important than the child, so there\u2019s beans for the child, but not enough food for the cat. And those are the kinds of decisions that people are making, and they\u2019re very sad to make them.\u201d<\/p>\n According to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation<\/a>, rates of destitution<\/a> in the UK have more than doubled since 2017. They predict more than one million children will be experiencing destitution this Christmas.<\/p>\n Oxenbury, twice-winner of the Kate Greenaway Medal for Illustration, echoed Rosen\u2019s frustration at these figures.<\/p>\n \u201cOne feels extremely frustrated that you can\u2019t you know what to do,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd I do feel so sorry for these people that are homeless<\/a>. I don\u2019t think they would survive even a night in those conditions, with on a hard, cold pavement and quite dangerous too.\u201d<\/p>\n The story of the pair\u2019s Big Issue exclusive story was celebrated in more than 100 national and regional papers, as well as on various TV channels. Rosen said he was very pleased with the reception: \u201cI mean, if you\u2019re a writer, then you know you\u2019d like people to read what you write,\u201d he said. \u201cYou can\u2019t always guarantee it. So it\u2019s lovely, and if people are responding to it and the story works, then that\u2019s very exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n You can read\u00a0Pax: A Festive Tale\u00a0by Michael Rosen and Helen Oxenbury exclusively in this week\u2019s Big Issue, out now. Oh Dear, Look What I\u2019ve Got!\u00a0by Michael Rosen and Helen Oxenbury is on sale now, Walker Books \u00a312.99 hardback.<\/p>\n Do you have a story to tell or opinions to share about this?\u00a0Get in touch and tell us more<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Change a vendor\u2019s life this Christmas.<\/p>\n Buy from your local Big Issue vendor every week \u2013 or support online with a\u00a0vendor support kit<\/a>\u00a0or a\u00a0subscription<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 and help people work their way out of poverty with dignity.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Read more: Some 31% of kids still live in poverty, the same proportion who did so in 1989.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":174057,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[102605,1089,13745,146,40074,27570,85,46,95006,20915],"class_list":{"0":"post-174056","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-entertainment","8":"tag-child-poverty","9":"tag-children","10":"tag-childrens-books","11":"tag-entertainment","12":"tag-from-the-magazine","13":"tag-homelessness","14":"tag-il","15":"tag-israel","16":"tag-margaret-thatcher","17":"tag-poverty"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174056","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=174056"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/174056\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/174057"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=174056"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=174056"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=174056"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/article-CTA-Desktop-800x250-1.png\")
<\/p>\n