Oral Answers to Questions

Jim Cunningham Excerpts

Thursday 9th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Paterson]

The hon. Lady makes an important point. I can tell her that investigations continue at a number of sites across the UK. The City of London police are the co-ordinating police force for all of those investigations and five arrests have been made. The Food Standards Agency continues to liaise with the City of London police and, through them, is sharing information on UK investigations with Europol.

[Mr Jim Cunningham (Coventry South) (Lab)]

8. What assessment he has made of how easy it is to access and use food banks.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)]

No such assessment has been made. I welcome the work of charities providing access to nutritious meals to those who may otherwise struggle. Food aid providers are local organisations responding to specific community needs. It is not the Government’s role to tell these organisations how best to run the service they provide.

[Mr Cunningham]

The Minister will be aware that care professionals issue food bank vouchers to those they identify as being in crisis, but I am concerned that many people are not accessing food banks, either because they cannot contact care professionals because of mobility or disability issues or because they are not aware that they are eligible. Will he take steps to ensure that people are made aware of food bank services and are encouraged to use them if they are in food poverty?

[George Eustice]

Different food banks take different approaches. Some give one-off support for an immediate crisis, and many have people coming through only once or twice in six months, while others enable people to self-refer if they have not been referred by social services or other agencies. There is a range of different approaches, therefore, and the Government would be reluctant to start interfering with these charities and telling them how to run their services. They are on the ground and developing policies to deal with these problems.