Oral Answers to Questions
Ian Byrne Excerpts(7 months, 2 weeks ago)
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Steve Barclay
My right hon. Friend the Minister for Food, Farming and Fisheries is extremely well placed to speak about the quality of land and how it pays, given that he himself farms. We recognise that this is part of a wider debate about the clustering of solar sites on farm- land. We also recognise the importance of food security. My right hon. Friend the Member for Gainsborough (Sir Edward Leigh) can see the shift in focus to our environmental schemes that align with food security, because I believe that food security is instrumental to our national security, and that also affects our land use.
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
Steve Barclay
I am happy to look at the specific issue that the hon. Gentleman raises in relation to the UN, but we are clear about the importance of food production, food security and backing our farmers. It is left-wing councils around the country that are banning meat and acting contrary to the interests of many of our farmers.
Food Price Inflation and Food Banks
Ian Byrne Excerpts(1 year, 7 months ago)
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Beth Winter
Yes, I am very aware of those people. I work closely with food banks in my community, as I know other Members do, so I know that there has been a significant increase in the number of people in work who are accessing food banks, which is completely unacceptable. It is unacceptable for anybody to be using them.
Why are prices going up? We have to be clear that there are multiple causes. Droughts, climate disaster, fuel costs and the Ukraine war have all had an impact. However, as Unite the union has set out in real detail in its research on profiteering, which looks at the profits of companies in the FTSE 350, all of this has been made worse by profiteering along global supply chains, from agribusiness multinationals to high street supermarkets. It is not just Unite saying that. The European Central Bank recently said:
“Profit growth remained very strong, which suggested that the pass-through of higher costs to higher selling prices remained robust.”
The top eight UK food manufacturers made profits of £22.9 billion in 2021, with both profits and margins up 21% on 2019, with Nestlé, Mondelēz and Unilever all benefiting from double-digit growth in profit margins. In the supermarket sector, Tesco, Sainsbury’s and Asda—the top three UK supermarkets—nearly doubled their combined profits to £3.2 billion in 2021 compared with 2019.
Supermarkets are turning over hundreds of millions of pounds and handing dividend payments to wealthy investors, who are obviously not the people struggling to eat. In 2021-22, a total of £704 million was paid by Tesco in dividends and last July the company also paid shareholders £1 billion in its share buyback scheme.
The problem is that people who are reliant on low pay and social security are funding these exorbitant dividend payments and I really do not understand how the Government can justify that; I am interested to hear what the Minister has to say. People who cannot even afford to go to supermarkets are going to food banks. This is a crisis—a cost of living crisis—and it should not be allowed. We have taken action to control energy prices. When are we going to take action on the cost of food?
In Wales, where the Labour Government are in touch with ordinary people’s concerns, we are doing what we can, despite our underfunding by the UK Government. The Welsh Government are rolling out universal free school meals, which are now available in reception and years one and two, and they have a timetable to roll them out to all children in primary school. Think how much more quickly they would be rolled out in Wales if there was a fair, needs-based funding formula for central funds to the Welsh Government.
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend for the fantastic work that she does in her community on the issue. Does she agree that the Minister should follow Wales’s lead and introduce universal free school meals? The Government should introduce a free school breakfast and lunch for all children in state education and, alongside that, enshrine a right to food in law, so that all children and adults have enforceable food rights, and we tackle the scourge of hunger in our communities.
Beth Winter
I congratulate my hon. Friend on the sterling work that he does on the Right to Food campaign in Liverpool. I totally agree that the UK Government need to follow the Welsh Government’s lead and roll out universal free school meals to all children. I thank him for his intervention.
Universal free school meals could be rolled out across the UK if supermarkets and suppliers were not allowed to pay such enormous dividends to shareholders, and instead paid a windfall tax. Imagine that—food retailers taxed to provide free school meals. It is an obvious thing to so. Elsewhere around the world, other Governments are taking action. In France, the Government have announced an anti-inflation trimester, during which supermarkets are expected to make discounts on food that will cost them, according to the French Prime Minister, hundreds of millions of euros. That appears to be a voluntary scheme. Carrefour and Casino supermarkets have made cuts. We need more information on the scheme’s impact and the benefit for families, but I hope that the Government are watching and discussing the matter with their French counterparts. Will the Minister respond to that point? Another example is Switzerland, where food is subject to price regulation. Prices there grew at a rate of 4% in December last year, compared with nearly 12% in the US and nearly 17% in the United Kingdom. Have the Government considered how Switzerland regulates its food pricing?
Sadly, this Tory Government are not taking action. I looked at the outcomes of yesterday’s food summit, which was renamed the Farm to Fork summit—no reference whatsoever to food inflation or food poverty. I note that the union most heavily involved in the food sector and agriculture, Unite the union, and the Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union were not invited to the summit. Why?
The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee
“is to investigate how profitability and risks are shared through the food supply chain and the existing government system of monitoring and regulation of these.”
On Monday, the Competition and Markets Authority announced
“the stepping up of our work in the grocery sector to understand whether any failure in competition is contributing to grocery prices being higher than they would be in a well-functioning market.”
Will the Government commit to learning from those processes, and will they look at other Governments’ interventions in their food markets? The crisis is such that the Government must act now, even while those investigations go on.
What should the UK do? First, we must inflation-proof incomes. Many of us on the Opposition Benches have been calling for that for a long time. That means an end to the Tory low-pay agenda that cuts public sector workers’ pay in real terms. Secondly, the Government should adopt the Trussell Trust and Joseph Rowntree Foundation’s call for an essentials guarantee. That would mean an independent process to determine the level of that guarantee, ensure that universal credit meets that level, and ensure that deductions do not take it below that level.
Thirdly, we need a windfall tax on food profits for supermarkets and, where possible, suppliers. If we can have such a tax on fossil fuel suppliers, why not food suppliers? It is incumbent on the UK Government to engage with that proposal, for which they have set a precedent, given what they have done on oil and gas. The tax revenue could be used to expand the provision of free school meals, as my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, West Derby (Ian Byrne) just said. Fourthly, we need controls on food speculation, as the former shadow Chancellor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), said in a debate yesterday. Finally, have the Government explored any mechanisms for a price ceiling on a core basket of goods? People are struggling in this cost of living crisis, and this Government are standing by as they suffer.
I will finish with some personal commentary. Prior to entering this place, I volunteered at a local food bank for a long period. It will never leave me: when I looked into the eyes of the people coming into the food bank, I saw despair, but also a sense of embarrassment and shame at having to access a food bank in the fifth-richest nation in the world. It is an absolute disgrace. The answers are there; this is a political choice. It is extremely urgent that immediate action be taken by the UK Government to resolve this issue.
The Minister for Food, Farming and Fisheries (Mark Spencer)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mrs Harris. I thank the hon. Member for Cynon Valley (Beth Winter) for securing today’s important debate. I also pay tribute to her efforts in her constituency, and in her previous roles before joining this House.
We have seen food price inflation continue to rise. As the hon. Lady said, it was 19.2% in March 2023, up from 18.2% in February. That is the highest rate that we have seen in 45 years. I certainly recognise the impact that high food prices are having on household budgets and on tackling inflation, and this Government’s No. 1 priority is to lower—to halve—that inflationary rate this year. Yesterday, as she identified, the Prime Minister hosted the first UK Farm to Fork summit, which focused on how Government and industry can work together to bring great British food to the world, build resilience and transparency across the supply chain, strengthen sustainability and productivity, and support innovation and skills.
Ian Byrne
Can the Minister inform the House—my hon. Friend the Member for Cynon Valley (Beth Winter) touched on this—whether any trade union representatives were invited to the UK Farm to Fork summit held at Downing Street yesterday? I have tabled a written question on that, but the response was not very clear.
Mark Spencer
I am not privy to the whole guestlist, but of course there is a limit to the capacity in No. 10 Downing Street. There are lots of people who would have liked to be there whom we were not able to accommodate. However, it was important that we drew together industry leaders—retailers, processors, and primary producers—so that they could work together on delivering innovation in the sector, and so that they could try to lower food prices and not only make our great British food producers competitive across the world, but benefit our constituents.
Following that summit, we announced a package that includes a broad range of actions to strengthen the resilience of our farming sector and drive long-term sustainability. That includes a new set of principles to protect farmers’ interests in future trade deals, more funding to help producers export, plans to reduce red tape for farmers looking to diversify their income streams, and making it easier to build glasshouses in the UK.
Last week, the Chief Secretary to the Treasury met supermarkets to discuss the cost of food, and the Chancellor is meeting them again shortly to discuss how we ensure that consumers have access to a range of affordable food, in recognition of the pressures that people and producers are feeling. We have also provided significant support this year, worth an average of £3,500 per household. That includes direct cash payments to the most vulnerable households, as well as our uprating benefits and the state pension by 10% in April.
Food banks are a great example of the generosity of spirit of communities across the country. The Government do not have any role in the operation of food banks, as they are independent, charitable organisations that bring people in local communities together to support one another. However, recognising that good work, the Government will provide over £100 million of support for charities and community organisations in England. It will be targeted at supporting critical frontline services for the most vulnerable people—services that are struggling to meet increased demand.
Mark Spencer
I am grateful for the hon. Lady’s intervention. What I was saying was that I recognise the great work that those in food banks do. I recognise the work that the charitable sector does to support the most vulnerable. I am not saying that food banks should be the model for the future; I am saying that the great work they do should be recognised. The best way to get out of poverty should be through work and opportunities to earn a fair wage, so that people can afford to buy their own food.
Ian Byrne
On that point about wages, the Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union found that four in 10 food workers are forced to skip meals. Over 60% of respondents to its recent survey said that wages are not high enough for them to meet their basics needs. The people who produce food cannot afford to buy and eat it. What does the Minister say to that?
Mark Spencer
We are slightly straying into the area of the Department for Work and Pensions and the Treasury, as the hon. Member for Cynon Valley indicated at the beginning of the debate, so I hesitate to comment too much. What I would say is that that is why the No. 1 priority of the Government is to get inflation under control. As the hon. Gentleman identified, the people who are most vulnerable and who are struggling to make ends meet are the people who are damaged by high inflation. In ’21-22, 93% of UK households were food-secure; that is virtually unchanged from’20-21, when it was also 93%. In ’21-22, 3% of individuals, or 2.1 million people, lived in households that had used a food bank in the previous 12 months.
My Department is working across Government to ensure that we have the right support in place to address rising food price inflation. More than 8 million households are eligible for means-tested benefits. Some will receive additional cost of living payments totalling up to £900 in the ’23-24 financial year. Over 99% of the first cost of living payments this year have already been made. For those who require extra support, the Government are providing an extra £1 billion of funding, including Barnett impact, to enable a year-long extension of the household support fund in England from April. That is on top of what we have provided since October 2021, bringing total funding to £2.5 billion. From April 2023, we increased the national living wage by 9.7% to £10.42. That represents an increase of over £1,600 to the annual earnings of a full-time worker on the national living wage; estimates suggest that could help over 2 million low-paid workers.
I once again thank the hon. Member for Cynon Valley for introducing this debate. I reassure her that the Government take food prices seriously. We will continue to work across Government.
Poverty: Food Costs
Ian Byrne Excerpts(1 year, 9 months ago)
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Lee Anderson
I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. There is a myth in this country that if people are on universal credit, they are in poverty. I will dispel that myth right now. We have people—not just in my constituency, but all over the country—who are on universal credit, but have a household income of more than £40,000 a year. Now that is not poverty. If people in London on universal credit work a few hours, there is a loophole in the universal credit system meaning they can top up their wages by £30,000-odd a year. That is not poverty. Being on universal credit alone is not an indicator that a family are in poverty, so I totally dismiss that idea.
But I do admit that some families in this country are struggling, and they need our support. A few months back, I visited a school in Ashfield after concerned parents contacted me because the breakfast club had been stopped. The school had stopped providing free breakfasts because the private funding it had secured had run out. Those parents were concerned not about their own children, but about the more disadvantaged children from the poorer families in the area. So I contacted the school and asked what I thought was a reasonable question: “Why are you giving every single child a breakfast in the morning?” I did not get a breakfast, and my kids got a breakfast at home, so it is something new to me. The school told me that people were struggling to feed their own children at home.
I also asked if the school had asked for a donation from any of the families. The families I was speaking to wanted to make a donation to the school, but it said no. When I asked why, it could not answer me. Then I asked, “Why are some families unable to feed their children at breakfast? Why can’t they give them a slice of toast or whatever?” The school struggled to answer me. Eventually, it said, “Well, it’s the cost of living crisis, isn’t it?” I thought, “How much does Weetabix and a bowl of milk cost?” Not even the 30p that I’m famous for—it probably costs a lot less than that.
I wanted to help, so I went on to ask if I could meet the parents who were struggling, to give the whole holistic approach and see where they were going wrong, if we could help and if they had debt, budgeting or social problems. That was nearly four months ago, and I have still heard nothing back. Why have I got nothing back? I’ll tell you for why: there is a reluctance in certain parts of this country, now, about getting to the root of the problem. It is far too easy to say that there is a cost of living crisis. Yes, we know that people are struggling, that food prices are up and that energy prices are up. We know all that, but we cannot keep throwing taxpayers’ money at people. That is what it is: it is taxpayers’ money—our money, our constituents’ money.
Ian Byrne
We are talking about communities struggling. A report last week said that the minimum universal credit paid should be £120. We have got people receiving £85, so they are already down before we even factor in the rent. Does the hon. Gentleman understand the magnitude of the crisis that people are facing now regarding rent, food and the cost of everything? Is that coming through in his constituency? It is certainly coming through in mine, and it is certainly coming through in the national picture as well.
We have got to understand and quantify the magnitude of the problem. Also, how do we solve it politically? It is not by saying that someone should be able to afford a Weetabix and a pint of milk. How do we solve the problem of millions of people going hungry?
Lee Anderson
I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. Yes, I do live in the real world. When I talk about these things in this place, I am talking on behalf of my friends, family, neighbours and constituents. I will take no lectures from anybody in this place about living in a deprived area.
Lee Anderson
I thank the hon. Lady for her intervention. I might say that if her mother had had a first-class Conservative MP like myself, maybe she would have been more comfortable coming for that advice. [Interruption.] It’s true.
I speak as a former adviser for a citizens advice bureau; I worked there for about 10 years. If hon. Members want to know about poverty, come and have a chat with me, because I saw these people on a daily basis. The people I used to see came with all sorts of problems—social problems, debt problems, benefits problems—and a lot of them had to rely on food banks. The first thing we used to do was go through an income and expenditure sheet with the service users. In most cases, there were lots of savings to be made. These people had not had the best start in life, a lot of them, and they needed help—a bit of education and a bit of support—with their bills and debts. They were paying ridiculous Provident loans off at high interest rates. They needed support; what they did not need was money thrown at them. Ten years later—it took me 10 or 15 years to learn this—I was seeing the sons and daughters of those families, who were coming to see me with the same problems that mum and dad had had 10 years before. We were not actually breaking the cycle; we were not supporting people.
I did a bit of work with my local food bank last year, as hon. Members will probably be aware—it was reported in some newspapers. I was delivering meals from the food bank to vulnerable families with an award-winning local chef; he works at a really good restaurant. After a few days of delivering meals, he said to me, “This is totally wrong. These people need proper help. They need teaching how to budget and how to cook a meal from scratch.” What we learned at the food bank was that people could not make a meal from scratch. They were struggling to cook a vegetable properly—to batch cook, to freeze stuff. He gave me a challenge. He said to me, “I can feed a family of five for 50 quid a week.” I said, “No, that’s nonsense. That’s rubbish—you can’t do that.” He said, “I’ll challenge you.”
So we went to the food bank and got the people invited to the college. There were schoolchildren there, as well as four MPs, including me, and the chef, and there were also some TV people. The day before, I got £50 and went with some schoolchildren to the local Aldi with a shopping list from the chef. The next day, we went back to the college, batch cooked five different meals and put everything in little packs, which we put away and delivered later to vulnerable families. And it worked out at 30p per meal.
I am not saying that people can cook on that scale at home—that is ridiculous—but what we are trying to prove is that if you learn how to cook from scratch, you get the right ingredients and you batch cook, you can save a hell of a lot money and make nutritious meals on a budget. Obviously, after that I was tagged as “30p Lee”. I don’t mind, because every time it comes up, somebody asks me, “Why do they call you 30p Lee?” When I tell them, they completely understand—so keep firing away and calling me 30p Lee.
Funnily enough, after this exercise I wrote to every single Labour MP inviting them to my food bank and to take part in it. I got two or three dismissive responses, but nobody else bothered to reply. The challenge was there, but nobody bothered to come.
What upsets me—this gets to me a little bit—is that there is a culture in some deprived areas where people are so dependent on food banks that it is like a weekly shop for them. One particular family who I was really trying to help were going to the food bank two or three times a week to get their groceries, but then I would see them in McDonald’s two or three times a week. My goodness. I do not want to stop little children going for a treat once in a while, but this is all about priorities. If you are really struggling for money and are going to a food bank two or three times a week, you should not be going out for fast food and getting takeaways every week. I know people are going to start sighing and ah-ing and saying, “He’s wicked and he’s cruel,” but those are the facts.
I never went for a McDonald’s when I was a kid, and I come from poverty. My mum and dad really struggled to feed us. He was a coalminer who worked seven days a week, and my mother was a factory worker. At the weekends, my dad did his garden. We had vegetables in there from top to bottom, and it also had chickens, rabbits and ducks. That was our food bank. We had nowhere else to go—that is what we did. We provided for ourselves. We have lost that over the past 20, 30 and 40 years, but we need to remind ourselves of where we have come from and to have those traditional values that our parents had. Food banks are being abused; I know that, because constituents tell me every single day about people making it up, telling lies or whatever. Food banks are abused by people who do not need them. We should target the food banks.
Lee Anderson
Thank you, Mr Dowd, and I do apologise. I get passionate about this subject, which is very close to my heart.
Ashfield, Mansfield and Bolsover are deprived areas. Many of the red wall seats are very deprived. They are deprived for a reason—we all know why, but I am not going to go into that now. We are going to see more and more fast food outlets—McDonald’s, KFC and others—springing up everywhere. They are springing up every 10 minutes in my area alone. Why are they coming to these deprived areas? It is because they know that there is a market there. We say that poorer people tend to use these places, and I know that that is true.
Food bank use is increasing in places such as Ashfield, yet obesity is also increasing in the same poor areas. Why is that? What we need is a proper food strategy in this country; I do not think we have had one for years. We have not had one since the 1970s. [Interruption.] You can laugh, giggle and scoff, but that is true. Why was it that in the 1970s, in the schools that I went to and all over Nottinghamshire, there were no obese children and we were fit and healthy? We did not have much money, but we ate less junk food and had a better diet and healthier lifestyles.
Lee Anderson
Maybe it was a poor choice of words. What I meant was that we have not had that proper culture in this country for decades—that personal responsibility of feeding ourselves. I like to hark back to the days when I was growing up, because they are on my mind at this moment in time. We were a lot poorer; we had less money and less food, but we seemed to manage okay. I think we could all do a little bit more. [Interruption.] Whatever! You can chip away all you want, mate.
I hear this nonsense about junk food and processed food being cheaper than fresh food. It is not. The chefs who I speak to say that is absolute rubbish. You can still go and buy a big bag of veg for a couple of quid, and a bit of meat, and make wholesome, nutritious meals and batch cook. I have done that before. Parents have done that before. We can do it with a little bit of effort, education and training. People always bleat on about the Government.
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Dowd. I thank the hon. Member for Ashfield (Lee Anderson) for securing the debate, and for his certainly interesting take on tackling food poverty.
I want to make it clear at the outset that the catastrophe of hunger and poverty in our communities is the result of political choices made by this Government. If a Government cannot ensure that everyone has enough to eat—and not just to eat, but to thrive—they are a Government that is fundamentally broken. The time for sticking plasters is surely over. We need to legislate for a right to food and enforceable food rights, and to ensure that the Government of today are held accountable for the cost of food and ensuring nobody goes hungry.
I pay credit to Mayor Sadiq Khan. I am so happy that he is sorting out universal free school meals and introducing them in London for all primary school children, which is an essential part of the right to food. It is a fantastic move forwards, but it is clear that our communities are in crisis at the moment. I pay tribute to all the workers taking industrial action in defence of their communities, including the teaching staff in West Derby, who were out on the picket line yesterday. The 17% rise in the price of food is the biggest rise since 1977 and comes alongside the sharpest fall in wages since 1977. Food inflation up, wages down—do the maths.
It is really important to look across the piece at how people are being demonised. The demonisation of those in food poverty is an act of political cowardice by an Administration bereft of ideas to solve the problem, and lacking humanity toward the millions who are suffering and looking to the Government to lift them up and not punch them down. If reliance on charity alone was considered a sufficient guarantee for basic human needs in the UK, previous generations would not have legislated for universal state schooling and a national health service. The current horrific situation demonstrates that we need the same vision and ambition when it comes to food security. It cannot wait a moment longer.
Oral Answers to Questions
Ian Byrne Excerpts(1 year, 11 months ago)
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Rebecca Pow
I thank my hon. Friend for all the work he has been doing in his constituency. Since I have been the water Minister, he has done nothing but bend my ear about Shrewsbury and the flood situation. As I have said, flood barriers have been erected, and we are listening: Shrewsbury has already received money for various projects. I also thank my hon. Friend for his work in the River Severn caucus, which brings together Members of Parliament up and down that important region. The River Severn Partnership has already benefited from significant funding for the development of schemes and some very useful pilots, and we will be working closely with it.
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
The Minister for Food, Farming and Fisheries (Mark Spencer)
The independent panel of experts has already been established to look at the available data, and I expect a report from the panel later this month.
Ian Byrne
Following the environmental catastrophe of the mass die-off of marine life in the North sea off Teesside, will the Minister confirm whether capital dredging for the Teesside freeport project, and at other freeports including the planned freeport in Liverpool, will be paused while the Government await the hopefully independent panel’s findings about the causes of the disaster that has devastated the ecosystem and ruined livelihoods?
Mark Spencer
It is important that we get the facts as soon as possible, but I want to give the independent panel time to assess the facts. The hon. Gentleman and I have a shared ambition. We want to know the facts of what is causing the die-off in the north-east. We want the panel to look at that independently, without pressure. As soon as we have those facts, we can respond appropriately.
Cost of Living and Food Insecurity
Ian Byrne Excerpts(2 years, 10 months ago)
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Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
The fear currently being felt across this nation is palpable. Millions are worried that they will freeze or starve in their homes. In the fifth-richest country in the world, how has this injustice been allowed to happen? That is the position that so many face due to political choices taken in this House. Research by the Food Foundation in 2020 showed that 20% of adults in the UK—around 11 million—face food insecurity each year. A survey of food industry workers by the bakers union showed that more than a third went without to make sure that others in the house got a meal. They are the ones who produce the food in this country.
Food poverty leads to health and life expectancy inequality, malnutrition and obesity. Poverty destroys the life chances of future generations in our poorer communities. It affects children’s educational attainment and life chances. How can we accept in this House that we have more food banks than McDonald’s outlets? When do we collectively accept that the system is broken and is failing the people we are elected to represent? Hunger is a political choice; fuel poverty is a political choice. They are both choices made by the present Government, like the cut to universal credit, benefit sanctions and the erosion of workers’ rights, all alongside a decade of Conservative austerity, which has cut our vital services to the bone.
It is three years since the United Nations special rapporteur on extreme poverty issued his powerful report on the UK, in which he described the horrific impact of the Government’s dismantling of the social safety net and the political choices that have led to the injustice of where we find ourselves today. Nothing was done and his warnings were dismissed. The time for sticking plasters, such as a reliance on thousands of food bank and pantry volunteers and donors, is over. We need systemic change so that all our people might live with the opportunity of health, happiness and dignity. This is a humanitarian crisis that demands permanent solutions, not tinkering with a system that is broken.
If reliance on charity alone were considered a sufficient guarantee for basic human needs in the UK, previous generations would not have legislated for universal state schooling and the national health service—solutions to fundamental problems which have transformed this nation for the better. That is why we need to legislate for the right to food. We need enforceable food rights to ensure that the Government of the day are accountable for making sure that nobody goes hungry and are prevented from making decisions that lead to people being unable to afford to put a meal on the table. Ministers should be under a duty, when setting the minimum wage and any relevant social security benefit, to state how much of the prescribed sum has been calculated for food, because right now it is not enough. How can this be allowed?
We should also legislate for universal free school meals: a nutritious, free school breakfast and lunch for every child in compulsory education. If we accept the universal and compulsory requirement that all children up to the age of 16 should be in school, why do we break from that principle of universal care, nurturing and protection in relation to their meals during the day? What a difference that would make to the 4.5 million children going hungry today.
Things must change. With so many trade unions, councils and community campaigners across the UK calling for the right to food to be put into law, will the Minister listen to those voices from across the political spectrum and impress on the Chancellor that the buck stops with him? The richest man in Parliament must find a solution and include the right to food in his spring statement, because hunger is a political choice.
National Food Strategy and Public Health
Ian Byrne Excerpts(3 years ago)
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Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
It is a real honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Efford. I thank the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Jo Gideon) for securing this important debate.
The national food strategy was a real opportunity to take steps to tackle the horrific levels of food insecurity being experienced by upwards of 11 million people in the UK. The report highlighted the deep inequalities in access to nutritious food, and I welcome proposals such as widening the eligibility threshold for free school meals—including for children whose immigration status currently excludes them—a long-term scheme for holiday food provision for children who get free school meals, and an extension of the healthy start scheme. If adopted, they would all bring about real improvements in access to healthy food. The recommendations represent an important step towards the change that is needed.
I place on the record my thanks to Henry Dimbleby, Anna Taylor and the team for their work on the national food strategy and for the time they gave me on this issue. However, I believe that the report can be built on even further and strengthened. We should not be tinkering around the edges; it should have gone further—I want to place that on the record. I was proud to campaign alongside thousands of others for the legal right to food, which should have been included in the recommendations. We will now focus on campaigning for the right to food to be included in the Government’s White Paper and good food Bill.
Like austerity, food insecurity is a political choice by Governments, not a predetermined occurrence, and it cannot be fixed without concerted effort by the Government of the day to take clear responsibility. I am sorry, but it is immoral that this country has more food banks than McDonald’s outlets in 2021. Let us remember that this is the fifth-richest country in the world.
I want to mention some of the public health impacts that we are seeing as a result of the crisis of food insecurity. Malnutrition has tripled in the UK since the coalition Government came to power in 2010, and cases of scurvy and rickets have more than doubled. This coincides with soaring poverty caused by austerity, the removal of the social safety net and the enormous rise in the use of food banks, as I have outlined. In Liverpool, 32% of adults are food-insecure, whereby food is a source of worry, frustration and stress. That equates to a staggering 160,000 people in my great city. Only 12% of kids in Liverpool aged 11 to 18 have five portions of fruits and vegetables a day—again, that is an appalling statistic.
Around 14% of households in Liverpool experience fuel poverty, which is significantly higher than the average across England. Fuel poverty is a barrier to cooking, as highlighted by Professor Ian Sinha, who is a paediatrician at the fantastic Alder Hey Children’s Hospital in my constituency. He says:
“A big issue at the moment is the interplay between food and fuel poverty—eat or heat—in essence babies and infants in the coldest houses will spend their calories trying not to get hypothermia rather than utilising the energy to grow their body systems and lay the foundations for a healthy life course”.
Children’s rights are being eroded by this Government, and in international comparisons the UK does badly. The right to food is one of the most basic and fundamental necessities, and one that has often been violated by this Government, through austerity, welfare sanctions, the dismantling of the safety net and public services, and recently the disgraceful cuts to universal credit. The right to food needs to be enshrined in law, and I urge the Minister to consider that.
One of the key asks of the right to food campaign is for universal free school meals, which has been touched on, in essence, throughout the debate. A nutritious, free school breakfast and lunch for every child in compulsory education would build on the recommendations of the national food strategy, and on the evidence of the positive health impact it would have. There will be those who say we cannot afford to do this. I would say, “How can we afford not to do this?”. It is an investment in our country’s future. If we accept the universal and compulsory requirement that all children up to the age of 16 be in school, why do we break from that principle of universal care, nurture and protection in relation to children’s meals during the school day? We would think it absurd if children were not provided with adequate shelter, heating, drinking water and sanitation while in school, so why take a different approach to the equally essential elements of learning materials and food? The evidence of better concentration, behaviour and learning among properly nourished children is there for all to see, and universal free school meals would, further, avoid the bureaucracy and stigma of means-testing our school- age children. Portugal provides universal free school meals. All children sit down together and have a three- course meal—they break bread together. That is where we should be going, and what we should aim for as a society.
Around the country, the strong backing for the right to food to be enshrined in law is clear. Since we started the campaign 12 months ago, a motion has been passed at the TUC conference in September, with 5.5 million trade union members overwhelmingly voting for the right to food. Councils up and down the country have declared themselves right-to-food towns and cities: Liverpool, Manchester, Greater Manchester combined authority, Liverpool city region, Rotherham, Brighton and Hove, Haringey, St Helens, Preston, Lancaster, Durham, Newcastle, Portsmouth, Totnes, Coventry, Sheffield and Birmingham. Many more are considering declaring themselves right-to-food towns and cities. That is the strength of feeling across the country.
I hope we can build on the ambitions of the national food strategy. I ask the Minister to consider putting the right to food in a Government White Paper and good food Bill. If this is not achieved, the mantra of levelling up will be an empty slogan for so many currently living in food poverty.
Oral Answers to Questions
Ian Byrne Excerpts(3 years, 1 month ago)
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Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Victoria Prentis)
The food strategy will be published early next year. It is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to set out how we can create the food system that we want. It will identify ways to make our food healthier, more sustainable and, I hope, more accessible.
Ian Byrne
In April, the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee’s report on “Covid-19 and the issues of security in food supply” said that the Government should consult on a legal right to food and address that in their White Paper responding to the national food strategy, which was published in July. In the light of the horrific rise of food poverty in all our communities, with kids going hungry, as highlighted on Monday night in a harrowing “Dispatches” programme, will the Minister meet me to discuss the upcoming White Paper and the right to food?
Victoria Prentis
I would be delighted to meet the hon. Gentleman, as I have many times to discuss the important issue of food poverty. I take the opportunity to commend him for his work with Fans Supporting Foodbanks, which is a great initiative. I thank all those involved.
Oral Answers to Questions
Ian Byrne Excerpts(3 years, 5 months ago)
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George Eustice
We introduced a temporary six-month marketing authorisation that allowed EU seed potatoes to be marketed in England and Wales earlier this year. That has now expired, as agreed with the industry and the devolved Administrations. If any applications are received for marketing equivalence, the UK will consider whether seed potatoes have been produced under conditions equivalent to requirements in GB regulations. Of course, the sensible thing to happen is for the EU to apply its own rules and laws, and to assess the application that we have lodged with it.
Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)
The UK has a resilient food supply chain built on strong domestic production, open markets and an advanced logistics and retail sector. The impacts of the pandemic and labour shortages mean that it has been tested. We have been working with colleagues across Government to ensure that our food supply chain has the support that it needs. The Agriculture Act 2020 requires regular assessments of food security and the first of these will take place later this year.
Ian Byrne [V]
Department for Work and Pensions data has revealed the shocking fact that, pre-covid, 42% of households on universal credit were food insecure. With the planned removal of the £20 uplift to universal credit, what impact assessment has the Secretary of State’s Department completed on the impact of removing the uplift regarding the food security of the 6 million people on universal credit?
George Eustice
We regularly monitor household spending on food. It is important to note that last year household spending on food among the poorest 20% of households was the lowest on record, at about 14%. That said, we absolutely recognise that there are individual households that struggle to afford food. That is why the Government have brought forward a number of initiatives over the past 12 months to support them through groups such as FareShare, as well as the holiday activities and food scheme.
Food Supply: Covid-19
Ian Byrne Excerpts(4 years, 1 month ago)
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Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
It is lovely to see a friendly face from Merseyside sitting in the Chair, Ms Eagle. I thank the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Neil Parish). It is a great pleasure and an honour to serve under his chairmanship of the EFRA Committee—it is really enjoyable and one of the highlights of my week up here. I thank him very much for all that he has done to secure the debate and promote what is in the report.
The debate could not have come at a more important time, at the start of a second national lockdown, when access to food is so critical to people’s health and lives. My contribution will focus on the Government’s response to the Committee’s recommendations on food insecurity, and particularly the response to recommendations 9 to 13, which relate to the local authority emergency assistance grant, free school meals vouchers, food parcels for those who are clinically extremely vulnerable and, of course, putting the right to food into UK legislation.
The following point in the report underlines the unfolding disaster of food insecurity happening in all our communities right now:
“Use of food banks was increasing before the pandemic and has effectively doubled during the pandemic. It is likely that the situation will get worse before it gets better.”
Last night we received a report from the Trussell Trust that predicts significant increases in levels of destitution this winter: 670,000 additional people are forecasted to be classed as destitute, meaning that they cannot afford essentials such as housing, energy and food. Of course, that is on top of the millions already suffering food insecurity.
With that in mind, I will start with recommendation 9 of the report, which asks the Government to evaluate the impact of the £63 million provided to local authorities to assist those struggling to afford food, and to consider whether further support is necessary. That funding ran out in October, just ahead of the second lockdown, worryingly. There was rightly an outcry from council leaders when the Prime Minster suggested that they should use the grant, which had already run out, to pay for free school meals over half term. The Government’s own guidance stated that it should not be used to duplicate free school meals vouchers.
In their response to the report, the Government said that they expected the majority of that money to be spent within 12 weeks. They also said that they would evaluate its impact, so I hope the Minister can now commit to the grant being extended, as the Trussell Trust and many other reputable food organisations have called for. The Trussell Trust’s forecast for this winter is indeed shocking. It estimates a 61% increase in need compared with last winter, which is equivalent to an additional 300,000 emergency food parcels.
I know from first hand that the grant has had such a good impact in Liverpool. It has been an absolute lifeline. As a councillor in Everton, I have often used the local welfare assistance funds to target people in need. Local authorities can ensure that it makes a real difference to individuals. I pay tribute to Liverpool City Council, Mayor Joe Anderson, Councillor Jane Corbett and officers such as Martin Jungnitz, who, despite austerity cuts, are championing this scheme, having kept it afloat and allocated £18 million. Unfortunately, the money has run out, so I will ask again: can the emergency assistance grant for food and essential supplies be urgently extended over the winter to support councils in their efforts to ensure that nobody goes hungry?
Recommendations 11 and 12 made it clear how important free school meals vouchers are, noting that the number of children dependent on them is likely to go up significantly as people shift into the benefits system. In their response, the Government claimed that they had:
“taken unprecedented and substantial action to ensure that no child should go hungry as we take measures to tackle coronavirus, including in relation to free school meals.”
That simply does not reflect reality. The Government have not ensured that no child will go hungry—hence there are over a million signatures on Marcus Rashford’s petition on the matter. Just two weeks ago the Government voted down a motion to provide free school meals to children over the winter holidays, and the public have made clear their opinion on this shocking decision. I ask the Government to listen to Marcus Rashford, and to the other agencies, and provide free school meals over Christmas and the holidays that follow. It is their moral duty. Over 4,000 children in my constituency of Liverpool West Derby who rely on free school meals are now at risk of going hungry, in the middle of winter and in the middle of a pandemic, as a direct result of this refusal to extend the scheme.
Recommendation 12 deals with food parcels for the clinically extremely vulnerable. The report made recommendations about the distribution of these food parcels during the first lockdown. There were some extremely concerning findings, such as the feedback that the food parcels did not meet those individuals’ dietary needs, or that they actually put their health at risk. The independent Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies has stated that a small but significant proportion of people had been waiting longer than a month for their first food parcel. I know from first hand the issues faced by many of the people advised to shield, because I work alongside the two co-founders of Fans Supporting Foodbanks, and they are both in that category. They and many thousands across the country will once again be revisiting those fears. We discussed it yesterday on the phone, and they really are both fearful.
The Government’s response to that recommendation is not good enough. It does not address in any detail what they are going to do to ensure that delays in food parcels to the clinically extremely vulnerable do not happen again. It does not recognise the realities that people are living through. Our report stated that if the Government repeat such an endeavour in future, such as during a second wave of covid-19, they should make greater efforts to ensure that nutrition and dietary needs are given a higher priority from the start. Now that day has come, as the second lockdown starts today. Will the Government urgently set out in detail how they will ensure that the dietary needs of the clinically extremely vulnerable are met in the days and weeks to come?
I turn to recommendation 13. I thank the Minister for once again listening to my arguments, and for her interest in this subject and in the community projects in Liverpool, which I spoke to her about. She showed great interest and it really was appreciated. I look forward to updating her in the coming months. I also thank my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridge (Daniel Zeichner), who has been and continues to be a great champion on the subject of food insecurity, and who offers wise counsel when it is needed.
The EFRA Committee recommended that the Government should consult on whether a right to food should be placed on a legislative footing to ensure that they have a reference point for action to tackle and measure food insecurity. It is the Government’s moral duty, regardless of which political party is in office, to ensure that nobody in the country goes hungry. That was echoed last week by Henry Dimbleby, the Government’s adviser on the national food strategy. It should be a legal duty on the Government and a legal right, and it should be taken out of the hands of political decision makers.
Putting a right to food into legislation would oblige the Government of the day to ensure that people never face food insecurity, and issues such as the five-week universal credit delay and the refusal to provide free school meals would be subject to legal challenge. Enshrining a right to food in law would make clear the Government’s obligations, create mechanisms to set positive targets and monitor progress, and introduce avenues to hold Government bodies to account for violations. The events of this year demonstrate that we need that legislation in place now more than ever.
The Government cannot let the disaster of food insecurity continue to unfold, and stand by while so many of our citizens, including my constituents, are at risk of hunger and have to deal with its devastating impact on their health, wellbeing and livelihoods. I urge them to look at the Committee’s report and take urgent steps now to ensure that nobody goes hungry during the second lockdown.
Victoria Prentis
I think my hon. Friend is being rather impatient. He had the first part of the report in July, to which the Government are actively considering their response, and he will get the rest of it next year. Henry Dimbleby is in charge, and the Government will respond within six months of the final report. The report is a large piece of work, which was commissioned to help inform our food strategy and will include proper consideration of measures needed to tackle food insecurity. On the other report that we have promised to provide, the Agriculture Bill commits us to providing a food security report at least every three years. My hon. Friend and I discussed that matter at length in the Chamber and we came up with a sensible solution.
On recommendation 15, the work of the cross-Government taskforce was very valuable. I do see the value in working across Government. This matter continues to be under live consideration. I meet or communicate regularly on food issues with the Under-Secretary of State for Education, my hon. Friend the Member for Chelmsford, the Under-Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, my hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Will Quince), the Minister for Housing, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth (Christopher Pincher), the Under-Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, my hon. Friend the Member for Boston and Skegness (Matt Warman) and the Under-Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, my hon. Friend the Member for Bury St Edmunds (Jo Churchill). Whether or not we are a formal group meeting in person at the moment, we are very much in touch on these issues.
I turn to the food service sector and recommendation 16. We know how the closure of the hospitality and food service had a huge impact across the food supply chain. That was inevitable. That is why the Government stood up enormously our existing stakeholder forums with industry and developed new forums to facilitate close collaboration and know exactly what was going on. In DEFRA, we helped with specific funds for those sectors that were particularly struggling, such as dairy and fish. Of course, my right hon. Friend the Chancellor introduced a wide-ranging package of measures available to businesses generally and across the food supply chain, including the coronavirus business interruption loan scheme, which helped many businesses, and continues to do so, across the UK; the bounce back loan scheme, which has also been popular in the food sector; and the coronavirus job retention scheme, which provides for payments to be made from the Treasury to employers.
I turn to key workers in the food sector and recommendations 19 and 20. We are very grateful to all those whom we started to call food heroes during the course of the pandemic: people like Geoff Norris, the Asda delivery driver who shopped and delivered food to vulnerable customers in his own time to ensure that they had food, and Sharon McKendrick, the Morrisons store manager in Berwick who set up a food ordering phone line for local vulnerable people in her community as well as personally delivering a lot of it. There are many, many more. We have been able to honour some of them in various ways, but I would like to thank all of them—they know who they are.
Ian Byrne
In the evidence the Select Committee took, it was extremely comforting to see the link between industry and trade unions. We saw the benefits of talking to each other to get each other through this, using the expertise of the trade unions and industry. It was fantastic. One of the most heart-warming things was the link between them, not seeing each other as enemies but working collaboratively to get the nation through. Once we get past covid, hopefully we can build on those relationships and that collaboration. As we have touched on, we have many issues with sick pay and conditions, but the value of the workforce has now been seen by the entire country, and the Minister is right: they are heroes.
Victoria Prentis
I agree wholeheartedly with the hon. Gentleman, which brings us nicely to processing plants and recommendation 21. The hon. Member for Cambridge made important points about an unheard workforce. The issue is obviously a real and pressing concern. We are working closely with Public Health England, the Health and Safety Executive, the joint biosecurity centre, the Department of Health and Social Care, and, of course, the Food Standards Agency. It is a very active problem for all of us in DEFRA at the moment. Anything that the hon. Gentleman hears can be passed on to me. I also work closely with Health Ministers. Our current understanding is that outbreaks are probably linked to a combination of working conditions, working culture, living conditions and shared transport. We are also working with our devolved Administration colleagues to seek consistency of approach across the UK. Statutory sick pay is just one part of our wider offer to support people. During this challenging period, we are taking every opportunity to ensure that people are supported to do the right thing and stay at home where necessary.
On recommendation 22, we anticipated many things in Government, but not the coronavirus. As recognised by the Committee, we muddled through in the food sector and adapted as best we could, but of course there are lessons to learn.
On recommendation 25, we are not complacent. We know we have a highly resilient food supply chain and a food industry that is experienced in dealing with disruption, but there is a great deal more to do. We have extensive engagement with industry, which includes very regular—sometimes daily, sometimes twice weekly—meetings with industry and in particular the food resilience industry forum, which meets twice weekly at the moment. We will build on that approach as we plan for the end of the transition period, on which work is very much going on with 56 days to go.
Through engagement with industry for EU exit planning and, of course, the pandemic response, we have significantly improved our knowledge of the supply chain this year, but we will continue to adapt and, I hope, manage the nation’s food supply as best we can. I am quietly quite proud of what the team has managed to do this year. I sincerely thank everyone who has worked so hard to feed the nation during the pandemic—from farmers, to those involved in the food supply chain—and I thank the team in DEFRA. It has not been perfect, but I think it has been okay and we have managed it. We have had a good debate. I welcome the report and look forward to working further with all of the hon. Members present on this very important topic.
Right to Food in Legislation
Ian Byrne Excerpts(4 years, 2 months ago)
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Ian Byrne (Liverpool, West Derby) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the right to food in legislation.
I called this debate because of the humanitarian crisis we are seeing in every community and in every part of this nation. The crisis of food insecurity, which is leaving no MP’s constituency untouched, affects the basic human rights of millions of our citizens every day. We are seeing a crisis of food poverty born out of the political choices and systemic failings created over the past four decades, which have now reached a tipping point for so many in our communities. The figures are devastating for one of the richest nations in the world and highlight the inequality of the UK in 2020.
The Trussell Trust reports a soaring 81% increase in emergency food parcels from food banks in its network during the last two weeks of March 2020 compared with the same period in 2019, including a 122% rise in parcels given to children as the coronavirus pandemic continued to unfold. As long as I live, I will not forget meeting a community leader in Liverpool five minutes from my home and seeing what I thought was a queue for the bingo in my local community centre. There were people, young and old, drawn from across my community. I was corrected by the community leader, and told that, in fact, it was a queue for the food bank. It haunted me then, and it haunts me now, because it was so unfair and so wrong.
The problem of escalating food poverty in the UK can be fixed. We can see in the evidence available the direct correlation between the cuts in Government welfare spending and the numbers of families with children, pensioners, the working poor and homeless people queueing up for food parcels because of those cuts. Like austerity, this is a political choice, not a pre-determined occurrence. Therefore, it cannot be fixed without a concerted effort by the Government of the day to take clear responsibility in developing solutions and policy to eradicate the problem’s root cause. We need more voices like the inspirational Marcus Rashford, bringing the plight of hungry children to the attention of the public and the political classes.
One key recommendation made by civil society organisations and various independent experts, such as United Nations committees, is to introduce a right to food into domestic law. That approach recognises that the UK has ratified international treaties such as the international covenant on economic, social and cultural rights and three separate international conventions, protecting children, women and people with disabilities, but has never incorporated them into domestic law. Each of those treaties contains a specific mention of the right to food, yet those legally binding international treaties have limited influence and bearing in domestic courts. The right to food would need to be strengthened by the establishment of a strong system of domestic legal entitlements and the provision of easily accessible accountability mechanisms that redress violations and contribute to the improvement of citizens’ wellbeing.
Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)
I am really grateful to my hon. Friend for bringing forward today’s debate. Since the start of the lockdown, the use of food banks in York has increased by 300%. I agree with and support his call for a statutory right to food. Does he agree that, within that, everybody should be able to access a hot free meal every day?
Ian Byrne
Absolutely. I agree wholeheartedly with my colleague. That is a hugely important principle, which we should adhere to as a civilised society, and we may discuss Marcus Rashford’s petition later. Having the right to food in law would hopefully result in people having the ability to have a hot meal a day. That is why I am here today to discuss this topic.
The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee recommended that the Government consult on whether a right to food should be given a legislative footing to ensure that the Government have a reference point for action to tackle and measure food insecurity, with the flexibility to meet that commitment using different measures. Some of the evidence from the Committee’s session was compelling. Professor Tim Lang, professor of food policy at City, University of London, told the Select Committee:
“If you do not have it in legislation, you do not have indicators and it does not happen.”
Anna Taylor, who is working with Henry Dimbleby on the national food strategy, represented the Food Foundation at the evidence session. She added:
“If we get the legal structures right, the governance arrangements are right and Parliament is involved in scrutinising those, we will not be in the situation we have now with such high levels of unmet need.”
The second part of the national food strategy being drawn up by Henry Dimbleby gives us a real opportunity to recommend the right to food, and I really hope he can be persuaded that it must be a key recommendation.
The right to food should not be seen in isolation. Having enough food for your family is part of a decent standard of living. Hunger is a symptom of broader social inequalities and rights violations, not least low-paid, insecure jobs and a broken social security system—all of which have been exposed even further by the current economic crisis under the pandemic.
Beth Winter (Cynon Valley) (Lab)
In Wales, we are hoping to pilot the universal basic income initiative, because, as my hon. Friend has just alluded to, prevention is much better than cure in terms of food poverty. Does he endorse the recommendation of the Welsh Senedd that it is now time to introduce universal basic income so that nobody has to go without food?
Ian Byrne
I do endorse that call. I am a huge supporter of universal basic income. It should be looked at as one of the possible strands of the solution to what we are facing as a society. I hope the Government listen to some of the calls for universal basic income and look at different solutions. We are in extraordinary times at the moment. Universal basic income could be one of the strands of the solution, so that we do not have 9 million people who are struggling to put a meal on the table. That is hugely important.
As I said, the right to food should not be seen in isolation. We are living through extraordinary times and seeing a spotlight shone on the inequalities in society. According to the Independent Food Aid Network report, 82.7% of food banks in its sample that collected relevant data
“indicated waiting on a benefit payment or decision as one of the three most common reasons for food bank use, and 73.8% of food banks indicated interruption or reduction in benefit payments as one of the three most common reasons for food bank use.”
The solidarity shown during the covid-19 pandemic has been heartwarming, and it is one of the positives that we can draw from the period, completely at odds with the ideology of Thatcher and the infamous quote about there being “no such thing as society”. That has been exemplified in grassroots mutual aid efforts across the country, in all our communities, and we can all be proud of that. I speak with personal knowledge from Fans Supporting Food Banks, an organisation started in Liverpool five years ago and built with the magnificent efforts of football supporters from across our nation, particularly Newcastle, Leeds, Burnley, Aston Villa, Manchester United, Manchester City and West Ham. That sort of collaboration has been absolutely magnificent and has been welcome in our communities.
Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)
I thank my hon. Friend for all that he has done in working with the football community and the broader community, and even Man United fans—I declare an interest. He walks the walk and is passionate about the issue, but there are things we can all do together, collectively. We come here to make a difference. We should not even be talking about the right to food. Let us all come together and make a difference. I pay homage to my hon. Friend and thank him.
Ian Byrne
Many thanks. Fans Supporting Food Banks says, “Hunger doesn’t wear club colours”. It certainly does not, and we have fantastic friends in Manchester and across the board, and solidarity with Manchester in these troubling times.
I also pay tribute to the trade unions that have been involved locally, such as the GMB north-west and Irish region, which has been magnificent in supplying help, aid and support. That is acting collectively, as my hon. Friend the Member for Weaver Vale (Mike Amesbury) said, to tackle food poverty in the communities they serve. It has been a joy to behold, but we cannot forget that it is just a sticking plaster on a broken leg.
Sabine Goodwin of the Independent Food Aid Network has said:
“The amount of people needing to go to food banks is not remedied by food banks… The problem is a lack of income and a lack of food. It stems from the fact that there is a level of poverty that is being ignored.”
We cannot tinker around the edges of food insecurity. It must be addressed head on with political courage and a morality that has been lacking in the past decade. Ensuring that millions of our fellow citizens do not go hungry and that their basic rights, including the right to food, are protected is a moral duty. Those things should be a legal right.
I thank the Minister. I enjoyed the chat we had, which was informative. I look forward to working with her. I also thank hon. Members who have attended the debate. I note with interest that the Leader of the House wrote to his Cabinet colleagues calling for bold and ambitious Bills for the upcoming Queen’s Speech.
Bell Ribeiro-Addy (Streatham) (Lab)
I know that my hon. Friend is about to conclude, but is he aware of a charity called Foodshare? It goes around the country looking at food wastage, and deals with companies that might, for example, have quite a bit of food wastage in their production, and puts money into them. It also goes to farmers who may have over-produced a crop. Instead of those farmers putting the crop back into the ground, Foodshare gives them the extra money they need to produce the crop so that they can give it to food banks. It has been doing that work with food banks across the country. Does he agree that there is enough food in this country to feed everyone, given all the waste we have, and that the Government should put money into organisations such as Foodshare to help alleviate food insecurity?
Ian Byrne
Absolutely. I am fully in agreement. I would be interested to find out more about that organisation, because that is exactly what we need to be doing. We need to ensure that the food being produced is used and targeted. There are some fine organisations that do that, alongside organisations such as FareShare, which we have talked about. There are plenty of organisations out there, but we need more of them and we need a more targeted approach. The waste in this country is unforgivable when we have 9 million people struggling with food insecurity. That is something we need to rectify.
We have heard about the Leader of the House’s call for bold and ambitions Bills. I can think of nothing more bold than legislation that recognises the simple, basic human right to food, which would help lift 9 million people out of food insecurity. Many more people will be following them over the next six months. I look forward to working with colleagues to achieve that aim, because regardless of political party, we surely all support that. It is the decent and right thing to do, and it is where we should be as a country.