Question to the Department for Work and Pensions:

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, what assessment he has made of the findings of the Trussell Trust report on financial and food insecurity, published in June 2017, on the number of employment and support allowance claimants using food banks in the UK.

It is widely acknowledged that the reasons why people use food banks are complex and overlapping, and therefore it would be misleading to link this to any particular cause. We are helping people with health conditions into employment and working to change attitudes. Since June 2016 over 750,000 people who were receiving incapacity benefits are now either preparing for or looking for work. As a safeguard for people needing more support, we have a well-established system of hardship payments, benefit advances and budgeting loans.

The Department does not have data on the number of people with health conditions or Employment and Support Allowance claimants who use food banks.