Cost of Living and Food Insecurity

Jim McMahon Excerpts

Tuesday 8th February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Jim McMahon (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab/Co-op)]

I beg to move,

That this House is concerned that households are bracing themselves for the biggest drop in living standards in thirty years; notes that the cost of living crisis includes steep price increases in everyday and essential food items, making the situation worse for the 4.7 million adults and 2.5 million children already living in food insecurity and risking more people experiencing food insecurity; regrets that the Government is making the cost of living crisis worse through tax hikes, low growth, falling real wages, and a failure to tackle the energy crisis; condemns a decade of Conservative-led governments for leaving Britain uniquely exposed to a global gas crisis and failing to create high paid, secure jobs; and calls upon the Government to set out a national strategy for food including how it intends to ensure access to high quality, sustainable, affordable food for all and meet the United Nations goal to end hunger by 2030.

Members on all sides are hearing more and more from desperately worried constituents who are concerned about rocketing household bills and the cost of food, but where is the Secretary of State? Where is the Cabinet Member responsible for this Department? The person who sits around the table with the Prime Minister and the Chancellor has not even bothered to turn up to this debate. That is absolutely scandalous. Is it that they do not understand the real-life consequences of food poverty and rocketing bills? The darkness of poverty is not just not being able to turn the lights on; it is being driven into debt and despair because you cannot afford to live. And the darkness is not just at night time: it is during the day when the curtains are closed because you are fearful of the debt collector knocking on the door. That is the darkness of poverty. That is what is clearly not understood by this Government, who are too busy saving the job of one person, the Prime Minister, instead of getting on with the job of running the country—Operation Shaggy Dog in full force—and I think that is absolutely outrageous. While the Government are putting all their energies into desperately trying to save the Prime Minister, they are hitting hard-working families with a triple whammy.

[Jerome Mayhew (Broadland) (Con)]

I do not think the operation was called Operation Shag a Dog, but perhaps the hon. Gentleman would care to correct the House.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

I heard shaggy dog. I am sure everybody heard shaggy dog.

[Jim McMahon]

I am happy to clarify the record. I am, of course, referring to the Dulux dog, my favourite being Digby, although everyone has their own favourite.

Let us return to the real task in hand, because as much as we talk about the fun of Parliament and the Prime Minister’s latest crisis and turmoil, this debate is about the people of this country. The people of this country are being ignored while Downing Street is in despair: first, there is the cost of living crisis on food, energy bills and goods; secondly, the universal credit cut, cutting the income of 6 million families; and, finally, putting up taxes on working people and businesses, leaving us with the biggest tax burden for 70 years.

[Chris Stephens (Glasgow South West) (SNP)]

Is not part of the reason why the Secretary of State is not here perhaps that some of us will ask why the Department has been sitting for 18 months on a report on food bank use and ask what is driving that?

[Jim McMahon]

There is that, but I have no idea what the Environment Secretary does. I remember going up to Durham at the height of Storm Arwen, when families were disconnected from electricity for two weeks and more. The Environment Secretary, who sits around the Cabinet table with the Prime Minister, did not even turn up, and that matters to people.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Jim McMahon]

I will make some progress. The cost of everyday and essential food items, on which millions of low-paid families depend, are soaring even faster than the headline rate of inflation. As campaigner Jack Monroe explained on “Good Morning Britain”, the cheapest rice at one supermarket was 45p for a kilogram this time last year and it is now £1 for half that. That is a 344% increase, hitting the poorest and most vulnerable households the hardest. A can of baked beans has gone up by 45% and bread by 29%. All those are the staple of a household cupboard.

[John Redwood]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Jim McMahon]

I will make some progress. As oil and gas giants are seeing more profits than the whole of the Treasury corporation tax take combined, Labour has been clear that a windfall tax should be levied on companies that are profiting, cushioning rocketing household energy bills and helping hard-working families here in Britain.

[Lilian Greenwood (Nottingham South) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making a really important point. Last year, the Meadows food bank, just one of the food banks in my constituency, gave out 38 tonnes of food and fed 40,000 meals to over 2,000 households. Does he share my concern that, with rising food and energy prices, those numbers will be even higher in 2022?

[Jim McMahon]

My hon. Friend shows us the contrast of an excellent local MP highlighting the work of the Meadows food bank, because we know the difference that it makes. Frankly, I find it sickening to see Conservative MPs carrying out the same visits. They are in government, and the job of Government is to make sure that there is not a need for food banks, not to turn up for a photoshoot.

On top of the cost of living crisis, the Government are making the situation even worse. The national insurance rise in April will cost the average household £600 a year more. The freeze in the personal tax allowance will cost £78 and petrol will be up £250 a year, with real wages and pensions set to fall further. This is firmly a bills bombshell and it is made straight at the door of Downing Street.

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on the clear points that he is making. In Northern Ireland, 13% of people—241,000 people—are in poverty, with 17% of children and 14% of pensioners in poverty. With the 5% increase that the chief executive officer of Tesco said yesterday would happen to food prices, those in poverty are unfortunately facing a perfect storm that will mean they are in even worse poverty. Does the hon. Member agree that, for those reasons, this Labour motion should be supported?

[Jim McMahon]

I thank the hon. Member so much for that. Northern Ireland is a beautiful part of the world, but that is partly because it is so sparsely populated and rural. On top of the premium related to poverty, there is also a rural premium, where many energy-efficient homes are more expensive to heat and, in many cases, gas oil has to be transported in rather than piped in. That has a significant premium that is felt acutely by many communities.

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

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Jim McMahon]

I will make some progress.

We have heard that food bank use has rocketed significantly, and it cannot be right that so many food parcels are given out. It is right that volunteers step up, but we are one of the richest countries in the world and it should not be needed. I am proud of the efforts of the British people in supporting one another, and many of us have stood shoulder to shoulder with them, while at least one Government Member was earning £1,400 an hour helping tax havens to take on the UK Government. Volunteers up and down the country rallied, including groups in Oldham such as Mahdlo Youth Zone, where I volunteered to deliver sandwich packets during the school holidays, and the REEL project, where food parcels were being given out. [Interruption.] Let me tell the hecklers on the Government side the reality of this: those food parcels, made up by volunteers, were being given out to people after work—people in care uniforms and NHS staff were coming to collect those food parcels. This affects a lot of people in the community, and it is an absolute scandal that, instead of accepting that, the best we hear from the Government Benches is heckling.

[Lee Anderson (Ashfield) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Jim McMahon]

I want to make some progress. As chair of the Co-operative party, I am proud that food justice has always been fundamental to our movement. Today, we have co-operative retail societies leading from the front in supporting the great efforts of Manchester’s son Marcus Rashford to ensure that kids do not go hungry. Our food justice campaign has highlighted that the Government signed up to UN sustainable development goal 2, which is to end food hunger by 2030, but they do not seem to realise that that is in just eight years’ time. Where is their sense of urgency in making sure we meet our international obligations under that SDG?

The Government will also know that this country is deeply unequal. Their own figures show that the north-east and the north-west of England have the highest level of food insecurity in the country, yet ensuring access to a healthy diet does not feature at all in their levelling-up agenda. Let me tell the Government that they can’t level up when people are going hungry.

Central to this is how we support the amazing work of farmers and British producers, who produce some of the best-quality produce in the world. Britain should be a beacon for quality, high standards, ethical treatment of animals, lower carbon production and environmental protections, but at every turn they are undermined or sold out by this Government, who are more interested in bankers in the Shard than farmers in the shires.

[Craig Williams (Montgomeryshire) (Con)]

Will the hon. Gentleman join me in calling on the Welsh Labour Government to work with farmers? At the moment, there is a target for tree planting, which is all well and good but it needs to respect farmers’ knowledge of grade A agricultural land, so that we have a secure future for farming in Wales.

[Jim McMahon]

I am glad that the hon. Gentleman takes me on to the Welsh Government, who are leading from the front on this. We look on in England and see residents in Wales being given better access to welfare, school meals and prescriptions than people in England. But I share the fundamental concern that corporations in the City of London are buying farmland across the UK for carbon offsetting. That is not right, and it has the implications of undermining British farming production, rewilding and nature. It is really important that this Conservative Government come forward with a UK strategy to deal with that.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

The hon. Gentleman is making a series of good points. Does he share my concern that the Government’s plans for environmental land management schemes provide an incentive for landowners to clear off their tenants from the land, take big loads of cash from the taxpayer and leave those farmers without work, wrecking not only the local environment but the rural economy, and massively reducing our ability to produce our own food, thus increasing food prices in the process?

[Jim McMahon]

Absolutely. We all welcome the fact that we bring in produce from all over the world, as it gives variety and helps maintain consumer price. But it is really important that we do not undermine British produce in that process, and that we understand the importance of seasonality and of food security. If we allow food production here in the UK to be eroded and diminished, the time will come when we cannot feed our own population. That will be the real risk. The Government are watching this now and are allowing wealthy landowners on big estates to get rid of tenant farmers in favour of rewilding, and the Government are paying them for that. It is outrageous.

[Hywel Williams (Arfon) (PC)]

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

[Jim McMahon]

I am going to make some progress for a moment and then I will take the intervention, depending on the time. Food processors and farmers face steeply rising energy, fuel, carbon dioxide, fertiliser and other costs. Because of the Government’s failure to plan, our food supply chains are missing crop pickers, meat factory workers and lorry drivers. In addition, crops are wasting in the fields and there are gaps on supermarket shelves. Immorally, we have seen the cull of 35,000 pigs because the butchers were not available to send them to our supermarkets.

But the Government are not just standing by; they are actively making matters worse. Only yesterday, the Government had to issue another notice, warning of devastation in the pig industry caused, in part, by labour shortages. What an absolute waste. It is immoral to see people go hungry in this country while food is wasted. What is more, whether it is the Prime Minister, the Chancellor or the Governor of the Bank of England, every decision and every action must pass this simple test: does it make life better for working people, or does it continue to put more and more pressure on living standards?

[Debbie Abrahams]

Is my hon. Friend as concerned as I am that Oldham Foodbank is having to feed more than 1,000 people a month, as he knows? As the cost of living squeeze increases, those generous Oldhamers who have been helping source food for the food bank will get fewer and fewer, because it will not just be the people on the lowest incomes who are affected; it will span middle income groups too. What does he have to say to that?

[Jim McMahon]

Like my hon. Friend and neighbour, I think the work that our volunteers do at Oldham Foodbank reflects the work done in food banks up and down this country. They are the very best of us. They make sure that people do not go hungry, but they rely on the charity of our neighbours, and if our neighbours are struggling to put food in their own cupboards, that will have an impact on what they are able to donate to the local food bank. That is the reality, but where is the Government’s plan for that? How are we going to tackle the cost of living crisis and ensure that the safety net is in place? We just do not see it. That is a real issue that we need to address.

[Hywel Williams]

Will the hon. Gentleman congratulate the Welsh Labour Government and Plaid Cymru on coming to a historic 46-point agreement for the next three years, which includes such matters as free school meals for primary school children? Will he also commend the fact that the agreement stiffens Labour’s resolve to turn its fine words for many years into real action now?

[Jim McMahon]

This is my point—words into action is important in politics. People are so fed up with politicians saying one thing and doing another, and making promises that are not kept, that when they see a Government in power who do exactly what they say they are going to do—on free school meals, the natural environment and those issues that matter—people begin to rebuild trust in politics. I think we have seen that during the pandemic and how people viewed the Welsh Labour Government in power and making that real difference.

To conclude, Labour has a five-point plan to tackle Britain’s obesity crisis: restrictions on junk food advertising; promoting healthy food choices in supermarkets; clearer calorie and nutritional information; a ban on the sale of energy drinks to our children; and public health weight management programmes to support people to live healthier lives. But we want to go even further and to realise real food justice. Let us compare that with the Government. More than six months on, the Secretary of State is incapable of agreeing his food White Paper.

Labour is committed to fixing Britain’s broken food system. Fundamentally, we should live in a country where working people earn enough through their work to put food on the table. In short, that means putting food justice at the heart of Labour’s contract to deliver security, prosperity and respect for the British people. After 11 years, the Government stand on a shameful record of high taxes, low growth and rocketing bills. It is clear that they have run out of ideas, and the British people have run out of patience.