Food Bank Britain, by the Conservatives.

Food Bank Britain, by the Conservatives.

In 2010, 60,000 food bank packages were handed out in Britain. In 2021 it was 2.5 million.

In 2019 through its austerity policies, the Conservative government oversaw the intentional and ideological destruction of the social safety net. Benefits.

The government introduced Universal Credit (UC), a new benefits system supposedly intended to simplify things, but which in reality made the benefits system crueller, more punitive, and far less generous.

In 2019, a UN report into poverty in the UK summarised the situation, explaining that the government has ‘systematically and starkly eroded’ the social safety net. https://www.bristol.ac.uk/poverty-institute/news/2019/un-rapporteur-final-report.html

Disastrous reforms to the benefits system, alongside massive cuts to local government funding and social services, meant it was ‘deliberately removed and replaced with a harsh and uncaring ethos’.

All of this was done to save money and reduce the role of the state in providing welfare.

The Trussell Trust, the organisation that runs around two thirds of the food banks in the UK, went from giving out 61,468 food parcels in 2010/11, the first year of David Cameron’s government, (https://www.trusselltrust.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2015/06/BIGGEST-EVER-INCREASE-IN-UK-FOODBANK-USE.pdf)
to 2.54 million in 2020/21. (https://www.trusselltrust.org/news-and-blog/latest-stats/end-year-stats/)

Poverty is at a record high, affecting 14.5 million people, a rise of 1.5 million people since 2010/11.

In February 2021, New Economics Foundation estimated that £14 billion had been taken out of the welfare system since 2010/11, and that the poorest twenty percent of households were £750 per year worse off than in 2010. https://neweconomics.org/2021/02/social-security-2010-comparison

We need to see action from the new Prime Minister and her government, but they are too occupied with things happening outside of Britain. Our Current PM is also on holiday again.

While we should be thankful for the service that food banks provide.
We should also be fighting to create an economy in which they don’t exist. An essential part of this is recreating the social safety net destroyed by this Conservative government.

https://www.trusselltrust.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2015/06/BIGGEST-EVER-INCREASE-IN-UK-FOODBANK-USE.pdf