At Prime Minister’s Questions yesterday, the Opposition touted food banks as evidence of Britain’s regression into a Dickensian era. With 128,000 visitors passing through the Trussell Trust’s doors last year, today was not the first Wednesday on which the Government has been blamed for more children going hungry and more families struggling to put food on the table. But why are food banks multiplying at a rate of three a week and are they really a workable solution?
One answer is that organisations such as the Trussell Trust can now place their leaflets in jobcentres. In addition, unlike under Labour, food banks can now receive referrals from a range of sources such as Community Nursery Nurses, Headteachers, and Health Visitors. But there are also structural reasons for a surge in food banks.
For decades, food and politics have been kept quite separate.
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