To think food banks aren’t fit for purpose

[ForFirmBiscuit]

I don’t need to use a food bank but when I did they gave me tins of soup, a small tin of meat pie, a litre of UHT and a small bag of oats, nothing fresh. I didn’t get much and I was really hungry as there wasn’t enough calories and it was insubstantial. It gave me loads of anxiety to be so hungry. It’s always been like that.
I think food banks should be supplied by the council and given proper budgets for good food, even if they made batches of soup themselves to give out it would be more filling than a tin of soup

It’s not funny. I can’t believe pp are so entitled to complain about the food offered to them by kind individuals like me. I find it insulting.

That’s not called for. Where do you get this delightful side of your personality from ?

I never find anything you say amusing. Glad to hear you donate though.

Do you??

If you mean are you, of course.

No I mean do you donate?

I volunteer in a food bank attached to a church and we are only open on a Saturday between 10 & 12 so can't store fresh food. We rely on donations from Lidl and coop and local fundraisers. It's a set pick list depending on your household size. Lidl kindly give their previous days baked goods and we sometimes get eggs from a local farmer. We're always very low on stock but it's always the same people every week. The food parcel is meant to be 3 days worth of food.

same people every week - I wonder why.

I have been running a 'food bank' that I set up and have been running since January 2023 at my church.

We don't have a budget but thankfully have had a couple of donations which have allowed us to keep going. Our substantial donation was for £10,000 over 3 years.

We cannot offer fresh food - we don't have the resources or capacity.

A typical bag of food will consist of:

• Tin of beans
• TIn of tomatoes
• Tin of veg
• Tin of spaghetti hoops
• Tin of Soup
• Tin of Tuna
• Tin of meat
• Pasta
• Lentils
• Rice
• Squash
• Jam
• Custard
• Biscuits
• Tea
• Coffee
• UHT milk
• Sanitary products
• Nappies and wipes + formula if needed

We don't require referrals and we do the best we can.

Ours has fresh produce from local farms in addition to the shelf stable stuff. I prefer to donate to the country food trust though. They make decent, high protein meals that are then supplied to food banks and community pantries and kitchens.

What i want to know and keep asking but get no answer is what these regular users are like. Do many have new smartphones, designer wear, air max trainers, netflix subscriptions etc etc.

Are you registered with Morrisons thet donate the green bags.

The concern is that the need isn’t always genuine and it will eventually ruin it for those that are truly struggling.

I don’t think that Food Banks have the space, the equipment or the storage capacity to do the things you want, @ForFirmBiscuit.

Making soup would need a regular supply of ingredients, staff with the right food safety qualifications, containers to package the soup (which would either have to be disposable or would rely on people bringing them back, and the food bank having the equipment to clean and sterilise them), plus the correct storage for the soup until it was handed out - with a correct use-by date on it. And if the food bank users didn’t or couldn’t store it safely, it could make them ill, and they could blame the food bank.

Food banks rely on volunteers and donations, so they have to operate in a way that fits the food they get donated, and the abilities of their volunteers.

Of course it would be better to give them fresh, home cooked, food, but it simply is not possible.

Exactly. They’ve been about for a very long time.

Yes, they have smart phones. That will be their only Internet access for things like, job applications, counselling, benefits, health, contacting the food bank...

I wouldn't say they have the other things though, most are really down to nothing, with anything of value having been sold.

They often do have addiction issues and/or MH problems. It's not as straight forward as they spent their benefits on fun, which is clearly what you're hoping to be told.

Shhh the lefties need some point scoring

How do you tell if a smartphone is new unless you know the latest models from sight? My four year old one isn't cracked or anything. How would you know if someone had their own Netflix or if their friend or relative just had a spare screen out of four?

Our town does have a 'soup kitchen'. Also some of the community pantries do cooked food on different days. Of course it's a different place to the foodbank.

So by that token, its their addiction/MH issues that mean they have no money left for food? What about those that dont have those issues?

In the future it will need to be policed properly I suspect.

Yeah that was us. Mostly struggled to get by on our own. Did use the foodbank when shit happened, car trouble, vet bill (one cat) type stuff. I attended a financial course (with incentives), I didnt learn a lot I didn't already know but most had no clue. Payday takeaways and other poor choices. I get it's miserable but that will only make it worse.

What i want to know and keep asking but get no answer is what these regular users are like. Do many have new smartphones, designer wear, air max trainers, netflix subscriptions etc etc.

I did a Foodbank shift this morning. Some clients looked beaten by life, one person disclosed sudden health difficulties, a woman who has left a DV situation and then a 'well-to-do' man who cried when I gave him his bags.

I didn't quiz them about their TV subscriptions nor did I ask to see the label of their clothes or which phone model they have. But presumably you would have?

The point is those suggesting there were no foodbanks in the 70s/80s/90s assume that life was easier then and there was less of a struggle. The reality is people made do with less and had a more frugal existence. If people nowadays with cars, pets, designer gear etc need to use food banks on a regular basis, then priorities are wrong and the way food banks are used is skewed.

There was a man who died in Glasgow from starvation