To ask why there is such food poverty.

[Helendee]

Please no flaming as I genuinely am seeking answers as to why so many children are going to school hungry these days.
This is not a critical or inflammatory post, I just want to know what’s gone wrong.
Obviously many of us are struggling financially because of Covid but food poverty was a huge problem before that.
Is it that benefit levels are too low to adequately feed our children?
What can we do to ameliorate the situation?

I think benefits are enough to cover children’s food. I’ve known friends be much better off on benefits than working and if they work part time then definitely not worth them working full time as they would then lose benefits. I know there are issues with the new UC but there is still enough for basic food.

I think things are getting crazy with how much the government is having to pay out with Covid and everything else. It’s our children who will be burdened with repaying all this debt during their lifetimes and yet people are constantly demanding the govt pay out more and more.

The future looks bleak for the next generation.

yes, that another thing.
people in temporary accomm / hostels often do not have access to cooking facilities, or have to share them with dodgy people.
so they are limited to a toaster, kettle and microwave wedged down beside the bed; and that;s probably against the rules.
with a child leaning on the bed trying to do homework and another one screaming in the corner.
i think part of the problem is literally ignorance of govt ministers. so many of them have no understanding of how people not like them have to live.
remember when stephen timms mp, asked about a couple in his area, lost jobs due to covid, 2 young children. they had leave to remain and work in uk., but their visa stated ;
they had no access to public funds.
no way to pay rent, food, bills. they were desperate.
the prime minister said they should apply for universal credit.
stephen timms repeated they have no access to public funds. pm looked blank. it was obvious he had never heard the term, had no notion of what it meant. so much for constituency work. obviously never done any personally. any mp would recognise the term.
i was shocked because although i did know the term, i had not realised that people who were given leave to remain, and the right to work, were also still categorised as no access to public funds. if they get sick for example, though they can get nhs care, they get no money at all, so become homeless, destitute, despite maybe having paid tax and NI for years.
we don't realise what a country we are living in. shameful.

@SheepandCow

Sorry I meant to say what *@TheFormerPorpentinaScamander* says. Leaving out the says suggests I was challenging you! I agree completely with what you've said.

I didn't realise the word "says" was missing . So i read it s you agreeing with me any way because I'm right

When I was growing up things like tvs and phones were considered a luxury. We had less bills to pay as there was no mobile phones or Internet. Pet insurance was unheard of. We were poor but never went hungry.

Lots of people don't live close to food shops

Compared to when I grew up, there seems to be far more food shops around. I hear about food deserts but I struggle to picture the sort of places they are. I live in an ex- mining area that's traditionally very poor but can't think of many places where significant numbers of people would be far from a co-op, Tesco express, aldi or similar.

The Tories is why there is so much food poverty.
Lack of opportunity to work reliable hours to give some security and planning for food, equipment etc.
Zero hours contracts so there are fluctuating income which is difficult to manage.
Lack of community, Thanks Maggie Thatcher for the age of the individual. Tories have their heads in the trough and are disembowelling the state to make the gaps between the rich and the just about head above water bigger.

People have issues that are not seen by most average earners yet every general election the Tories get voted in by kidding middle class voters that they are the same as the landed gentry but all they are doing is convincing people to step on their more vulnerable neighbours.

I dispair that people would deny children free school meals, but then say nothing when Boris complains that the PM wage of £150k + is not enough.
Starving children in one of the richest countries in the world, FFS its abhorrent.
Right wing politics is the reason that most kids are hungry. There is the exception of the shit parent but I think most are trying their best but you can only go so far with so little cash.

As for primary schools teaching cooking, it's very challenging in reality when you only have equipment (and space) for small groups and don't have a TA. I literally never have a TA who could take a group out to do it and so it doesn't happen, despite being on the curriculum.

There are lots of circumstances that you will never see as a middle income middle England Salaried person. Put into B&B how do you even cook, in poor quality rental on a prepay meter for electric and gas - top whack rates, escaping abusive partner - got more than one property between you, no fall back you are automatically ruled out of benefits and have to go to appeal (takes up to 10 mths) to sort - what do you eat in the mean time. Same situation no housing benefit as you technically own more than one, no legal help same reason so can't get financial hearings with representation. Debt for whatevr reason quickly escalates to be unmanageable etc etc There are plenty of black holes for people to fall down in our systems

mobile phones are a necessity for universal credit claimants.
thy are often sent messages to report somewhere, or change of attendance time. any failure to comply, even by minutes results in sanction, ie loss of payment.
also have to prove applying for jobs every day, there is a min number, so need internet access. this is all scrutinised.
the whole system is hostile, adversarial. as if one is a criminal.

Phones and Internet are both essential these days. UC is all online, DC need it for school.

My nearest (as in can walk to and carry more than a days worth of food) shops are a co-op or a corner shop. Neither are particularly cheap. Mind you my crippling anxiety means I can rarely manage to walk there, let alone the Tesco or Aldi that are further away.

Research by Joseph rowntree foundation shows Mobile phones are not a luxury at all - they are often the way homeless or transient folk can stay in contact with family, work, benefits etc. We have created a society where its essential to not be excluded

you could claim your UC from a tenner a month basic mobile - you dont actually need the latest phone and if you look after it then its cheap. Tesco home delivery if you have the cheap slots is about a fiver a month - cheaper than that taxi to school because no one got up on time or they cant be bothered to walk in the rain

[quote ChaChaCha2012]@TheFormerPorpentinaScamander The government isn't covering FSM during the holiday. It's either a local charity or local business that is covering the cost. You might want to look at some of the things the Conservatives have said about those in receipt of FSM today, it's disgusting.[/quote]
That's really interesting, please could you post a link to it?

@Helendee

I think that schools need to teach basic cooking skills from year 3 onwards, it’s so sad that many are clueless now and I speak as a pretty poor cook in all honesty.

Entirely agree.

It's actually a very complex issue because there's many reasons so there's not a one size fits all solution. For some families there is simply not enough money to pay for essential utilities, rent and basic food, for others it's a case of spending on other things rather than prioritising food at the beginning of the week/month then being short at the end of the week/month. Not being able to cook, not having cooking pans, utensils etc, not being able to afford the gas to cook on ... takeaways and convenience foods cost more so those in poor housing without a proper kitchen are in the worst position. For some kids though, not eating breakfast is more down to a chaotic house without bogus routine ms like a suitable bedtime so they get up too late to eat.

@murmurgam

Lots of people don't live close to food shops

Compared to when I grew up, there seems to be far more food shops around. I hear about food deserts but I struggle to picture the sort of places they are. I live in an ex- mining area that's traditionally very poor but can't think of many places where significant numbers of people would be far from a co-op, Tesco express, aldi or similar.

They're rural areas, the outer suburbs of major cities, small council estates on the outskirts of towns. You might not have come across these places but I promise you they exist.

I volunteer at a charity that can refer people to our local food bank. Main reasons I see for people needing the food bank are:

1. accommodation costs take up such a large part of their wages or benefits that there isn't enough left over to make ends meet. This is usually people in private rented. Sometimes it's people in council housing paying the 'bedroom tax' or people who own their own house with a mortgage then hit a rocky patch, as housing benefit/UC doesn't cover mortgage costs.
2. they've moved over to UC from legacy benefits, and either are in the 5 week wait, or took an advance to tide them over the 5 week wait and now the repayments are eating into their monthly budget
3. sometimes but less often because they lack the cognitive ability or life skills to budget effectively / are struggling with mental health / are addicted to drugs/alcohol. Particularly if this is combined with point 1 and/or 2 above.

I *did GCSEs in 2000, one of my subjects was food technology. We spent 2 years designing, branding, labelling and packaging a sandwich of our creation based on Moroccan cuisine. Completely useless in terms of teaching me to cook.

14 and under we made something every week but it was generally cakes, trifles, tarts, fruit pies. Whereas my mum who left school late 70s learned how to cook full meals, shepherds pie, lasagna and so on.*

Yes. Me too. My cooking amounts to shoving something a baking sheet in the oven.

@murmurgam

Lots of people don't live close to food shops

Compared to when I grew up, there seems to be far more food shops around. I hear about food deserts but I struggle to picture the sort of places they are. I live in an ex- mining area that's traditionally very poor but can't think of many places where significant numbers of people would be far from a co-op, Tesco express, aldi or similar.

I live on the edge of a city, within 15 mins walk I have 3 co-ops and about a dozen local convenience stores all of which are much more expensive than Asda or Tesco.

The nearest big supermarket is a 45 minute walk or £1.50 each way bus.

I couldn't walk 45 minutes with several heavy bags of shopping and if I was on a small food budget of say £30 a week the bus would take up 10% of that budget.

50 years ago the only bills you had to worry about was rent, utilities, whatever council tax was back then and food. It was easy to prioritise. Less people had cars and normally only 1 per family.
Nowadays there’s broadband and tv licences and Netflix and mobile phones and sky and cars expensive exotic pets, large TVs and games consoles, petrol costs are huge and lots of people need 2 cars for commuting/school runs etc. Kids parties are no longer cool to have jelly and cake at home, foreign holidays are seen as necessary etc etc. Now none of these new things are essential but society does place pressure on people to keep up with the jones and it makes it harder for people to prioritise their outgoings.
These leads to things like spiralling debt and is a vicious circle.

Then there always have been and always will be chaotic homes, homes where people have addiction problems, in the past neighbours would probably have helped feed the kids etc but now that burden falls to the schools to notice.

Rents are crazy prices, and even food costs a bomb now.

I don’t think it’s as easy as just raise benefits as by default prices will just rise to compensate as companies will take advantage. Also that won’t make any difference to the chaotic homes.

Children come to school hungry because of a chaotic home life more than lack of money in my experience.

Sometimes there isn’t enough money, sometimes it’s nothing to do with money. A lot of parents don’t get up in time to give their children breakfast before school, or they haven’t organised themselves enough to have the right food in the house, or are struggling with too many children to get ready in the mornings to be able to sort breakfast. The reasons for those things are complex.

Why don't you use a benefits calculator and then let us know how much spare cash you have after covering ALL of your expenditure? And how you propose to deal with emergency costs on that budget?

They're rural areas, the outer suburbs of major cities, small council estates on the outskirts of towns. You might not have come across these places but I promise you they exist.

I'm interested in examples, as part of my job I've done analysis of various populations access to grocery shops and we never found these 'food deserts'

Rural areas, of course, were further away but they also weren't populated by people at risk of food poverty.

@murmurgam my DP is from a small village that has one independent shop (expensive and doesn’t always have what you need) and one pub. The nearest Asda is 7 miles drive away, accessed by dark, country roads. There is one bus that services the village, once an hour and only goes to one of the nearest towns, it doesn’t pass the area that the Asda is in.

I live a 20 minute drive away (near “the city” if you will) but to get public transport it would take 2 hours and 45 minutes to get to his village, having to hop on and off multiple buses.

Yes things are much more accessible these days but there are still places like his village.

Food poverty is a huge issue, due to benefit cuts and austerity. I suffer from mental health issues and I lost a well paid job in the DWP in 2011. I then had to claim the benefit I was employed to deliver while I was working for the government, I was paid £71 per week. It was a struggle then and I could only afford to eat once a day. In the past 9 years that benefit (I actually hate the term benefit, it’s used to demonise the poor and vulnerable) amount has risen by £3 while inflation has sky rocketed. What the Tories have done to the country is atrocious. And people asking where the money should come from to bring social security payments in line with the cost of living, should also be asking how the Tories can afford to spend billions on failed endeavours like the test and trace and then the lovely £3000 pay rise they’re getting while normal people can’t afford food.

Some people will go to their graves denying that there is food poverty ,or that it's all down to lazy poor parenting, not knowing how to cook lentils or feckless families having loads of children they can't afford. These people need to open their fucking eyes