Food Prices and Food Poverty

Debbie Abrahams Excerpts

Monday 23rd January 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mary Creagh]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend and pay tribute to the church in his constituency. We are seeing a proliferation in the number of food banks around the country and one of our challenges to the Government is to ask them to map where those food banks are and what social and economic policies are needed to tackle the proliferation of them and hunger in our society.

The Trussell Trust states that it now has 163 food banks around the country, with one opening every week. Last year, its food banks fed 61,000 people, 20,000 of whom were children, and this year it expects that figure to double.

[Debbie Abrahams (Oldham East and Saddleworth) (Lab)]

Is my hon. Friend aware that in Oldham a food bank has been established for the first time? That was in the paper today. The vicar who set it up said that the banks are not just for homeless people but for hard-working families who are at crisis point. Reports by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation and other organisations show that such problems exist up and down the country. Does my hon. Friend agree that the cuts and austerity are not working?