two ha'pennies for a penny

Suggesting that somebody has so little money that they could not even exchange somebody's penny for two halfpennies.

• "I bet you he hasn't got two ha'pennies for a penny — they never have, these people."
• "A lot of rowdy-dowdies, poverty stricken — blunt but true, they haven't got two ha'pennies for a penny — dirty, no interest in their children."
• "In that condition he hasn't got a halfpenny to scratch himself with — an irreverent departure from the pious 'not a penny to bless himself'; or two ha'pennies for a penny, nor a brass farthing or a penny to his name."