Do we actually need to get two weeks of food in?

Why don’t you start by reading the guidance? 😂 It’s for people like you.

How would I cook the food?

Why would these other people need it more than me? Surely they have also been incredibly selfish?

Thats another issue is the shops even having to change to give out once everyone runs in with their £20 notes. They would hit a point where they just couldn’t give out change until people came in with change.

Not many people keep actual change in any decent quantity. We have notes in the house put apart from raiding the kids piggy banks which is mostly notes again we wouldn’t have small money.

As we don’t take out cash as a general rule apart from having a stash just in case. Or when going to coastal areas as a lot of places prefer or only take cash there.

as @Bjorkdidit said
"The question you should be asking yourself OP is why wouldn't you have a few spare supplies in, in case you're affected by 101 possible issues? Assuming you're not one of the minority who doesn't have any spare money at all and lives in a very small property such that you can't store anything spare."

Mobile food cans were deployed, people were given vouchers to use at pubs and restaurants with generators, leisure centres with generators were used etc

Why would you want to waste emergency resources that could be used for people that really need it, just because you are lazy and couldn’t be arsed to help yourself and others? Incredibly selfish behaviour.

I live in Scotland. I think we just call it Winter.

I think it's common sense to have plenty of tinned/frozen/packets of food and drink "just in case". Saw the need in action during Storm Desmond about a decade ago where our entire city lost it's power when the electric sub station got flooded. It was several days before power was restored, during which time most shops, petrol stations, etc were closed. People were swapping packets/tins/bottles between neighbours just to be able to have something to eat and drink. The council/electric supplier provided a few hot catering vans dotted around the city, but they didn't come until the Tuesday following the power outage on the Saturday and most people needed to drive to them as, from memory, there were only a handful of catering vans for a city of 60,000 people! Even when shops could open based on mobile generators dotted around the city, they had no fresh/frozen/chilled food/drink to sell as it was all lost due to the fridges/freezers defrosting, so it took a few days for the lorries to re-stock the shops. The train station had no electricity, so people couldn't even get the train to the next town as trains weren't stopping at the station (unsafe due no no lighting/heating on the station!). I think having a week or two worth of basics to eat and drink is a pretty sensible thing to do!!

I was working in the Co Op when they were hacked. For about a fortnight our distribution chain was completely disrupted and shelves were empty a LOT, I presume because stores couldn't talk to warehouses to let them know what they had run out of. So one week we would have no bread at all for days, then we'd have loads of bread and absolutely no dairy produce.

And if electricity supplies are disrupted, freezers will go off, shops won't be able to operate and you could find you've got to cook a month's worth of food in a couple of days before it goes off, with no electricity to cook on.

There have been multiple occasions where thousands of people in the UK have been left without power for more than 48 hours in recent years.

Mobile food cans were deployed, people were given vouchers to use at pubs and restaurants with generators, leisure centres with generators were used etc. No one had to eat dry noodles and there was no civil unrest.

Well just think for yourself then.

That is a very good point re: bar codes!!

There is a really good book called Powerless - the year the lights went out by Suzanne Goldring. It’s written like a diary and very easy to read. It’s about a power cut that basically sends the UK into darkness and how to survive for a longer time living without electricity.

I don’t think there has ever been a period of my life when I have less than two weeks worth of food in my home. Maybe fresh fruit and vegetables but that’s it.

Don't talk about getting changed from a tenner. There's not as many fivers in circulation as there used to be.

Andy just decided to give 100 million of our money to Ukraine. He also decided that our security and spending money of national defence is not worth it and he still wants to give money to people who cannot be bothered to work.

I do not listen to them anymore.
They clearly do not care about their own citizens.

It's ridiculous to give us that advice while not spending money on defence. It's their job to make sure we are safe.

Well when sainsburys near me had a problem with the tills a couple of years ago they closed. They couldn’t take cash as the tills wouldn’t operate. They had a supermarket full of people, some actually at the tills and they told them all to bugger off. Wouldn’t let people pay cash.

if they can’t scan a barcode how can they know how much your shopping is?

I don't think some people are accounting for what would happen if the power went out for any length of time.

The power outage in Spain earlier this year was interesting. People spoke of widespread panic because they didn't know what was happening or why. With lots of rumours flying around because no one could verify the information they were getting by word of mouth.

That's why a wind up radio - one of the items on the government prepared list - is useful.

A power outage for more than 48 hours in the UK in a reasonably densely populated area? How long before that collapses into civil unrest or looting in some places?

Yep let's just pootle along to the shop like normal with our cash when no one else has cash... What could possibly go wrong?

I wish I had the capacity to lack imagination and live with my head in the clouds.

Well, I’m not. My store cupboard usually has random stuff in it anyway. I’ve done too many of these Armageddon moments. 🙄. Can’t be bothered now.

When the war started in our region we did stock up a bit, we could literalpy see the missiles floating past our window some days. However, what emerged was a new found love of shit food. As soon as I buy corned beef, tinned hot dogs and spam, they get eaten. Suddenly everyone in my house eats like its WW2! I stocked up on bottled water and trip over it every single morning so might up my fluid intake. I do have powdered milk squirreled away for the worst scenario, its fortified and apparently can keep you alive for ages. I have a vague memory of Marvel from childhood, dark yellow and smelled like puke so hoping Trump pops his clogs before he does too much damage.

Depends if they still have any cash tills tbh.

Our Sainsbury’s for example only has the fag counter and one check out the rest are self service aprox 30 of them, out of those 30 maybe 10 take cash and that’s when they are working.

My little Tesco extra has one fag counter till and two self serve card only machines. When they till breaks aprox once a month they have to put signs up card only and run it via the self serve.

The noodles and grains you can get now are great. And also, even if you largely cook from home you reasonably will eat them if only to use them up. They have a decent long life on them plus don't necessarily need to be heated to be eaten if push came to shove.

Same as when the fridges and freezers go down the stores just bin it all they don’t give it away because of breaking the cold chain.

It’s fuck off and who knows when fresh or frozen will be back.

I have a little stash of stuff like this is. Can heat on the hob or the log burner or a camping stove if needed. They last for over a year.

I bet they wouldn't. They're more likely to take cash for at least the perishable food if they have any business sense.

Okay that’s fine, but why is it prudent and sensible? What is the point?

I get it for people living rurally. But if you live near plenty of shops, what is the point? If Sainsbury’s, Lidl, the Co-op, Aldi, Tesco and Asda, and every corner shop, were hacked and had supply chain problems, then you can just go and buy some tins or whatever then. If they all lose electricity then my house wouldn’t have any either, so I’d not be able to cook anything. I honestly do not understand why this is sensible advice unless you’re rural.