Clintons just lost as Christmas with this offensive card

A Council Estate Santa Claus Christmas card is no longer available on the Clintons website after customers branded it ‘vile’ and ‘beyond offensive’ on social media.

The £2 card listed ’10 reasons why Santa Claus must live on a council estate’, including ‘He has a serial record for breaking and entering!’ and ‘He only works once a year’.

On Twitter, @valbrown-valb labelled the card ‘seriously vile’, @MikeSegalov wrote ‘this is beyond offensive’ and @SusanABatchelor said it was ‘Vilifying and stigmatising the poor for corporate gain’.

At number four on the card’s list was ‘He’s never actually been seen doing any work in his whole life’ and number five read ‘He drinks alcohol during working hours’.

The description on the Clintons website said: ‘This funny card is great for sending at Christmas time.’

But customers on the greetings card retailer’s Facebook page did not see the humour.

Belle Sebastian wrote: ‘Disgraceful! I live on a council estate – never have I been in trouble with the police, I don’t drink, I worked full time for the council until I became very sick this year so I attend university whilst I recover.

I cannot believe that your company has allowed this vile prejudice – I’m sure a number of your employees live on estates since you only pay minimum wage…’

The company’s website lists job vacancies for Christmas temps in a number of locations with a salary of £4.96 to £6.50 per hour.

The Living Wage Foundation say the current UK living wage is £7.85 an hour.

The card is no longer available on the Clintons website. The URL instead brings up an error page saying ‘Whoops, our bad…’.

A spokesman for Clintons could not be reached for comment.