By Guy Adams When Mark Thomas and Rebecca Howe registered the birth of their daughter Casey at Birmingham’s City Hospital in Winson Green in 2011, they left the section for their occupations blank. Today, the information that was — or rather was not — on Casey’s outwardly unremarkable birth certificate is entirely relevant to a rapidly overheating national debate. Mr Thomas and Ms Howe, an unmarried couple, are now known to millions as ‘Mark and Becky’, the young, jobless couple whose lives and parenting skills dominated this week’s episode of the controversial Channel 4 show Benefits Street. Mark Thomas, 23 and Becky Howe, 23, pictured outside their house on James Turner Street
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Mark and Becky are a young, jobless couple on the controversial show
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They rely on the state to bring up their young daughter Casey
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Couple's grandparents all worked hard throughout their adult lives
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Their family say the couple both suffer from learning difficulties - a fact left out of the show
I know, because I know @placeholder, that he’s tried and tried to get a job.