UK Food Poverty

[djembatheking]

If you’re lucky enough to afford a tent.

A tent! Luxury, we live in a rolled up newspaper.

 

[Mr Pigeon]

I don't understand how food poverty exists therefore I'm sure it doesn't exist. It doesn't matter how many studies and reports come out to the contrary; my anecdotal evidence from years ago when I was on the dole for five minutes puts me in a better position to make general assumptions about the kind of people who are experiencing food poverty (if it existed, which it doesn't because I don't think it does).

People just need to find better jobs? Or build a time machine to go back fifteen years into the past, yeah?

 

[Dr. Dwayne]

[sammsky1]
They should just work harder.[/sammsky1]

 

[Flying high]

I'd heard an example of a man earning £25,000pa in a full time job. At the 1250L tax code that comes to about £1500pcm.
- The rent on his two bed house increases annually and is currently at £900pm
- Council Tax is about £200pm
- Gas & electric, given the surge, is about £100pm
- He has to drive to and from work as it's cheaper, petrol comes at about £100pm
- Then add in the smaller things, car insurance etc.

That leaves you with, for the sake of a round figure, £100pm for four weeks of groceries including toiletries, cleaning products and food for 84 meals. I'm aware that there will be things like UC and child benefits etc but often earning £25k would put you over any claimable threshold.

This highlights that it's not really about the cost of food. It is possible to eat fairly cheaply though it takes a lot of effort to keep up nutrition and quality levels when shopping on a tight budget.

With fixed costs being so high, even for those with fairly modest lives, there's little to no room for unexpected costs let alone saving or pension contributions. Everything becomes more difficult and stressful when decisions have to be made over which necessary purchase can you delay until next month. People who live close to the edge financially for any period of time are more likely to end up paying bank costs and fines, or be financially inefficient in other ways. It's only a matter of time, in these circumstances, until you face a period of days or even weeks with no money at all to pay for food.

I don't know how much disposable income someone working full time should have. Or what minimum level of housing/lifestyle a modern society should aim for. But it seems that life for far too many people is working full time but barely surviving, while inequality continues to grow.

 

[711]

This highlights that it's not really about the cost of food. It is possible to eat fairly cheaply though it takes a lot of effort to keep up nutrition and quality levels when shopping on a tight budget.

With fixed costs being so high, even for those with fairly modest lives, there's little to no room for unexpected costs let alone saving or pension contributions. Everything becomes more difficult and stressful when decisions have to be made over which necessary purchase can you delay until next month. People who live close to the edge financially for any period of time are more likely to end up paying bank costs and fines, or be financially inefficient in other ways. It's only a matter of time, in these circumstances, until you face a period of days or even weeks with no money at all to pay for food.

I don't know how much disposable income someone working full time should have. Or what minimum level of housing/lifestyle a modern society should aim for. But it seems that life for far too many people is working full time but barely surviving, while inequality continues to grow.

That is all true, but I'll add that there are many, possibly millions, of people that would love to work full time but can't get a full time job, instead they work a mixture of part-time and zero hours as best they can to try and make ends meet, with lots of unpaid travelling and dead time in between, so they're out of their home longer than full-time workers but get paid for fewer hours.

 

[Jericholyte2]

I work for a food redistribution charity whose primary function is this exact idea. We have relationships with Ocado, Sainsbury’s, Waitrose etc. that enable us to go and collect the surplus food they have and then distribute it out to smaller food banks/charities. But without this pre-established dynamic, based on our adherence to food hygiene regulations, we would not be allowed to take their stock. The onus is also on us to go and collect it from most of these supermarkets. If we don’t have a van (or driver) available to go and pick it up, it will likely go to waste.

It would be great if there was more willingness from the supermarkets to redistribute (and equally importantly, deliver) their waste because there is literally millions of tonnes of it produced every year, but the red tape they're subject to must be endless so it’s not necessarily their fault.

It’s the lack of structure in place for the proper redistribution of this surplus that exacerbates the problem, not a lack of food.

Hey! I tried to PM you but cannot get on to your profile. I'd like to know more about the charity that you work for and what it does - it sounds like something I'd like to help with if I can.

 

[Kentonio]

The other thing that gets frequently overlooked, is that when you're scraping by on next to nothing, any sudden unavoidable expense fecks you not just temporarily but for the long term. The country is full of people who got into debt due to emergencies and then find themselves with even less to live on each month just by servicing that debt. And then when the next emergency comes along, the debt just gets bigger and servicing it just takes more and more.

The UKs system of easy access credit cards and debt is an absolute poison.

 

[F-Red]

Hrm. The workings of loss-leaders are pretty well known.... I mean, it's why Costco's dirt-cheap rotisserie chickens are all the way at the back of the store and the concessions/food is behind the checkout registers.

I can absolutely imagine a scenario where Tesco (for example) has internal numbers on how many people buy a 7.50 meal within their total purchase and their purchase profile vs internal numbers on 'poor people shopping profiles' and being able to crunch numbers and realize - among other things - that the latter NEED to keep shopping along that profile but the former could exercise some mobility should there be a price increase...

In the case given in that thread it isn't really a loss leader though. By definition the proposition needs to be leading, and drives footfall, which is the objective of those types of things. This is how discounters Aldi & Lidl have driven categories like Wine and seasonal goods to create the footfall demand. The structure of how these supermarkets work, in terms of category management, is pretty clear that with something like a meal deal won't have the same impact. A great example is M&S last year instead of increasing the price, it kept the price point at the sweet spot of £10 and removed the wine from the equation as the numbers couldn't work. If the 'meal deal' concept was a loss leader, they wouldn't be weakening the proposition. I've sold into every supermarket in the UK apart from Aldi & Lidl, and the way the categories in there are managed are very silo'd.

As for the supermarket purchase profiles, a couple of things that will happen. Firstly Tesco as your example, probably won't be attracting the 'poor' demographic as you call it. They will most likely be going to one of either Lidl, Aldi, Asda, or Iceland ahead of Tesco. Secondly a supermarket like Tesco won't be looking at price mobility, their key metrics will be ARPU. ARPU won't be affected dramatically by the change of everyday items, so the motivation behind the price moves will be a reaction to market dynamics from suppliers increasing their costs, in this case transport costs to maintain their targeted category margin. The only time I think you see price increases will be around shortages of supply to temper demand, think toilet rolls during the pandemic as a good case.

The argument presented in that original tweet though is a bit of a straw man comparison in that price movements on meal deals are focused as much as every day essentials. The issue here is deeper than what supermarkets are doing and lies firmly around some of the economic policies this current government has (reduction of £20 universal credit top up, negligence over rising wholesale energy prices, and transport costs including fuel) even before Brexit starts to come through the wash properly and this will affect our food market the most. Most of those will be a temporary fix to address some of the more fundamental issues that have long existed on food inequality. Food bank issue is a government policy fix, which should tell you everything you need to know about the Conservative party.

 

[horsechoker]

https://www.theguardian.com/society...-uk-thats-why-im-launching-my-own-price-index

We’re pricing the poor out of food in the UK – that’s why I’m launching my own price index

Jack Monroe

 

[owlo]

Rent, energy bills and council tax can all be heavily discounted or in some cases free if you are on benefits.

Ok so it’s not including them.

The benefits cap includes them. It’s the cumulative amount you can gain. Adults over 29(I think?) get around £325 a month (80/week) in cash, plus most of their rent and council tax paid. Energy bills are not discounted at all. (in Very rare circumstances they can be where for example a disabled person uses more water than usual)

Its enough to exist on if you don’t have kids or pets, a car, debts, commitments etc. Oh and you have to burn through the vast majority of your savings before being entitled to them.

 

[owlo]

Not sure if you're being serious here...



I'd heard an example of a man earning £25,000pa in a full time job. At the 1250L tax code that comes to about £1500pcm.
- The rent on his two bed house increases annually and is currently at £900pm
- Council Tax is about £200pm
- Gas & electric, given the surge, is about £100pm
- He has to drive to and from work as it's cheaper, petrol comes at about £100pm
- Then add in the smaller things, car insurance etc.

That leaves you with, for the sake of a round figure, £100pm for four weeks of groceries including toiletries, cleaning products and food for 84 meals. I'm aware that there will be things like UC and child benefits etc but often earning £25k would put you over any claimable threshold.

60% rent:income isn’t even that uncommon. It’s usually the devil or the deep blue sea (huge rent or huge travel costs) which are simply crippling people and causing debt, which is then another cost and the spiral continues....

 

[Fingeredmouse]

The benefits cap includes them. It’s the cumulative amount you can gain. Adults over 29(I think?) get around £325 a month (80/week) in cash, plus most of their rent and council tax paid. Energy bills are not discounted at all. (in Very rare circumstances they can be where for example a disabled person uses more water than usual)

Its enough to exist on if you don’t have kids or pets, a car, debts, commitments etc. Oh and you have to burn through the vast majority of your savings before being entitled to them.

Many, many people live a couple of unfortunate events away from penury. When the interest rates start to properly rise, and they will, then the shit'd going to hit the fan and benefits don't cover mortgages. Boom time for landlords revenue and portfolio expansions.

 

[owlo]

On a more serious note, poor people are expected to just exist, apparently buying a TV is frowned upon (someone's mentioned it in this thread already - not having a dig) they should just sit in a cold room and be happy with the scraps they're given.

This is such a good point which is hugely overlooked. People in this situation already have issues with self worth, being unable to provide for themselves and it eats into mental well-being. Meanwhile adult social services are stretched to the point of barely functioning so it’s near impossible to triage those who are now genuinely ill before it becomes worse (and more costly.)

When I was a kid In a direct access hostel we were poor but there was optimism. Sure we picked fag ends off the street to get a cig, but we all had dreams. A few of us even escaped to the Navy. When I have stuff delivered now to the residents there, it all seems far more pessimistic.

 

[Sky1981]

Nah i'm not suggesting it is fuelled by greed, but I do think there can be a way to still decrease food wastage while still adhering to health & safety, surely?
I don't know what that solution would look like, but I also don't think the current process is sustainable either.

It's not greed. There's stores that does giving away leftover and it backfires pretty quick with homeless abusing the system. Waiting and loittering well before the agreed time and creating a mess.

They stop doing it and chosing to just dump their leftover. Cant blame them to be honest

 

[Dan_F]

I presume parents with significant drug habits would be the biggest cause of hungry kids. And there’s a hell of a lot of them about. I wouldn’t judge them either. If life is a total grind you can see the appeal.

This is actually one of the worst posts I’ve seen for a long time and I have no idea why it’s only been called out a few times.

 

[owlo]

Many, many people live a couple of unfortunate events away from penury. When the interest rates start to properly rise, and they will, then the shit'd going to hit the fan and benefits don't cover mortgages. Boom time for landlords revenue and portfolio expansions.

I think benefits can only be paid on mortgage interest. So they would cover rate rises in most cases. If you have a mortgage and are on benefits the capital payments would have to come out of your living cash. There are ways around this with discretionary trusts and such, but a) they create tax issues b) a person on benefits would need the foresight to set things up before the fact.

Unfortunately in many situations that is self inflicted. Even successful people spend all they have, don’t maintain alternative investments etc. I know guys on 100k a year that just have a house (with mortgage) and random stock investments. No emergency fund, no disaster planning, just lots of holidays and fun.

It's not greed. There's stores that does giving away leftover and it backfires pretty quick with homeless abusing the system. Waiting and loittering well before the agreed time and creating a mess.

They stop doing it and chosing to just dump their leftover. Cant blame them to be honest

Horrible nasty homeless people eager to feed themselves and making a mess for the multibillion dollar corporations. I’m sure they make a terrible mess of the place as they don’t want food the next day.

 

[owlo]

This is actually one of the worst posts I’ve seen for a long time and I have no idea why it’s only been called out a few times.

Likely because it’s too stupid to engage with. (Considering he was replying to a post about people starving) Somebody who thinks:

a) parents with drug habits STARVE their kids to take more drugs
b) addicts starve to take more drugs
c) there’s a lot of drug addicts doing this
d) he wouldn’t blame an addict for starving their kid. Life’s a bore.

is so beyond the pale and hugely ignorant that you won’t enlighten them with a couple of posts.

(not to mention that’s a social care not a benefits issue)

 

[Superden]

There should be a clampdown on lenders who are still charging rates of 35% plus...its immoral and disgusting that the poor get flecked trying to make ends meet by money lenders

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Likely because it’s too stupid to engage with. (Considering he was replying to a post about people starving) Somebody who thinks:

a) parents with drug habits STARVE their kids to take more drugs
b) addicts starve to take more drugs
c) there’s a lot of drug addicts doing this
d) he wouldn’t blame an addict for starving their kid. Life’s a bore.

is so beyond the pale and hugely ignorant that you won’t enlighten them with a couple of posts.

(not to mention that’s a social care not a benefits issue)

Unlike you, I suspect, I had a job which involved working with drug addicts.

Obviously there’s no conscious decision made “drugs or starve my kids” but they live chaotic, fecked up lives and when they spend a big chunk of their weekly income on gear they’re not exactly in the right headspace to budget the rest of their cash on a healthy balanced diet for their families. Food is just not a priority. Hence, they (and their kids) often go hungry. So yes, a, b and c are all true. I’ve seen it happen. I don’t look down on addicts for ending up as addicts, hence d. If you choose to, that’s fair enough.

I’ll admit to my ignorance about people starving without doing drugs. That just wasn’t something I saw very often when working with families in the poorest parts of Dublin (where we have a horrendous drugs epidemic). For the homeless, absolutely. But not amongst those who had managed to get somewhere to live/welfare payments. They were more likely to struggle with health conditions from too many, rather than too few, calories. If things are very different in the UK then fair enough. I got that wrong.

 

[Dan_F]

I think the term starve is reductive in this argument, I’m sure it’s pretty rare that kids are quite literally starving in this country (although without the welfare system and food banks that would probably be likely). It’s about malnourishment by only being able to afford basics like pasta and a sauce. Or bread and Jam. Malnourishment causes lack of concentration, poor education etc.

I don’t generally buy the cheapest ingredients when I’m shopping and didn’t really notice the rise in those kind of items mentioned in the OP, but we definitely did when I was a kid and those price rises listed would have massively effected our weekly shop for a family of four. Add to that the raises in council tax, petrol, heating etc in the last three years, all while wages are basically the same.

You then add to that a problem with a car that a parent needs to take out a payday loan to fix, as they need it for their minimum wage job. All of a sudden they are saddled with debt and need to cut back somewhere from an already stretched budget.

I’m assuming there’s figures somewhere about debt and food poverty, but I would imagine that’s a much more likely cause than drugs (although I’m sure that can increase debt for a minority).

 

[11101]

The benefits cap includes them. It’s the cumulative amount you can gain. Adults over 29(I think?) get around £325 a month (80/week) in cash, plus most of their rent and council tax paid. Energy bills are not discounted at all. (in Very rare circumstances they can be where for example a disabled person uses more water than usual)

Its enough to exist on if you don’t have kids or pets, a car, debts, commitments etc. Oh and you have to burn through the vast majority of your savings before being entitled to them.

Councils will individually discount energy bills in conjunction with the providers, and if you have kids or are in a couple, the benefit amounts increase.

It's enough to exist on and that's kind of the point, it's supposed to be a safety net until you can get back to working. It's not supposed to be anything more than that but the expectation has grown too far.

 

[SilentWitness]

I’ve had points in my life where I’ve had little to no money after bills and rent and I survived on without needing help because I basically let go of having any social life. It was a miserable existence that meant it didn’t matter if I was able to afford food / have the correct foods to keep me healthy, the stress and depression caused by having little money to do anything else cancelled it out.

 

[villain]

It's not greed. There's stores that does giving away leftover and it backfires pretty quick with homeless abusing the system. Waiting and loittering well before the agreed time and creating a mess.

They stop doing it and chosing to just dump their leftover. Cant blame them to be honest

Anecdotal incidents mean nothing in the grand scheme of things.

 

[Sky1981]

Horrible nasty homeless people eager to feed themselves and making a mess for the multibillion dollar corporations. I’m sure they make a terrible mess of the place as they don’t want food the next day.

I own two BBQ restaurants and also breed German Rottweilers. I thought one day what a brilliant idea it would be to save the food left over from peoples plates and feed them to my dogs, thus cutting my food cost and giving them a better quality diet. So I started having my dish washers save only the meats and put them into a bucket and at the end of the night stick it in the freezer if I was unable to come by and grab it. Great idea right?

Well while the dogs loved it the health department wasn’t too thrilled. You can’t have left overs just hanging around. Even having the buckets stored in the freezer at night wasn’t enough. You simply cannot keep food once it has left a table stored in your kitchen.

So say we overlook that and go on. The problem then becomes logistical. Who is going to take that food every night to the homeless shelter or to random people at night. That can put employees at risk and potentially end in a lawsuit if something happened.

Also who in the world wants to eat table scraps? Even homeless people might be thinking “no thanks” You also run into the problem of employees taking it upon them self to “accidentally” make a mess up then claim they are taking it to the homeless when indeed they just want free food.

It sounds nice but it’s just not realistic.

Check out my blog and follow for more answers and info!

It's average Jane and Joe's who's having problem, not multibillion industries, but hey... it's easier to mock then to do it yourself

https://www.quora.com/Why-do-restaurants-prefer-to-throw-off-left-over-food-than-give-them-out

^Hundreds of answers there on shop/restaurant owner on why they don't do that.

I can answer part of this from personal experience. I worked for a very large coffee company famous for very dark, expensive coffee whose “partners” wear green aprons… ok, you got it. We would pull the pastry items and sandwiches every night that were past their shelf-life: they were still perfectly good and edible, just on the way to Stales-ville. Our store gave some of the food to a local drug rehab, but they also let us employees…err, partners… take some home, which was nice because most of us were low income.

That policy was soon rescinded for a predictable reason. Some of the employees were caught pulling way too many sandwiches and pastries from the freezer the night before so that there would always be extras to take home. The company was pretty good at figuring out that we needed 2 packages of Old Fashioned Donuts or 4 packages of Banana Nut Loaves for each particular day, so the dishonest employees would just pull more than what was needed.

Once their scheme was discovered it was the end to taking food home at night. It used to crush my soul to have to throw away perfectly good pastries and sandwiches, all because of the lack of integrity of a few people, but I could understand the reasoning behind management’s decision: there was no incentive to pull too many after that.

My understanding is that this is why many fast-food companies don’t let customers take home leftover food at closing: if they did the closing shift would likely fry up 30 burgers 10 minutes before closing to have extra.

Add to that the logistical concerns mentioned, the safety concerns, and most importantly in our sad litigious culture, the legal concerns of what would happen if someone claimed to get food-poisoning from spoiled leftovers. From my understanding, this is the reason that some companies even pour bleach on food in dumpsters, so they can’t be sued if someone gets sick or hurt from dumpster-diving.

 

[owlo]

Councils will individually discount energy bills in conjunction with the providers, and if you have kids or are in a couple, the benefit amounts increase.

It's enough to exist on and that's kind of the point, it's supposed to be a safety net until you can get back to working. It's not supposed to be anything more than that but the expectation has grown too far.

No, they won't. The only support is a possible £140 warm weather grant and its nothing to do with the councils. Please stop being factually inaccurate.

More people need more money to live on, shocker. It's enough to exist on if X Y Z are correct. If you or I suddenly went onto benefits it'd likely not be enough. (assuming our savings were drained first). And we'd exist, but not healthily.

 

[Dans]

Yeah. The post you initially responded to was directed towards certain people clearly posting without having read the thrust of her thread, which wasn't poor people are getting shafted, but a very specific 'poor people are getting disproportionately shafted by this much'.



Supply chain's a function of that larger mechanism described earlier (I posted about it in the 'help my foot's falling off' thread) But either way, the food-prices-disproportionately-affecting-the-poor issue predates it; it's been happening since around 2004-ish.

If anything I'd like to underscore the pain/stress you may be under. There are fairly well-off entities all over the world threatened by the container price thing. Best wishes regarding that.



Hrm. The workings of loss-leaders are pretty well known.... I mean, it's why Costco's dirt-cheap rotisserie chickens are all the way at the back of the store and the concessions/food is behind the checkout registers.

I can absolutely imagine a scenario where Tesco (for example) has internal numbers on how many people buy a 7.50 meal within their total purchase and their purchase profile vs internal numbers on 'poor people shopping profiles' and being able to crunch numbers and realize - among other things - that the latter NEED to keep shopping along that profile but the former could exercise some mobility should there be a price increase...

Take up of "loyalty cards"......a terrible mistake we made back in the 80/90s.

 

[Sky1981]

Anecdotal incidents mean nothing in the grand scheme of things.

These aren't anecdotal, it's not like people around the world hasn't tried it, they have. Well those that works in this industries have, and the result make them stop doing it.

Very logical

1. You promised or at least offered to provide "leftover" means people will que, people will expect to have something, and as with all freebies there could be ques, and there's no certainty you'll get yours for the night, chaos ensues
2. There's bad PR, you can't open a semi decent restaurant and have homeless people lining during closing hour
3. Potential lawsuit if your leftover cause sickness. It is leftover after all, even if it's not a total leftover it could have been cold and unfit for consumption.
4. Logistical Nightmare, and it's not an easy task for employees to say no to a queuing homeless. "Sorry, nothing for you for the day", "Don't you have something lad? Haven't eaten for days"
5. They aren't guaranteed to be nice, some could be violent if not getting what they want. Even if your intention is good, it's not always end up well
6. "I only have 4 breads, and 2 soup" you lot figure out how to share this between the 10 of you eh?
7. Prone to abuse, workers could have sold the extra for a few more dollars

Nice in theory, not many people would want to take the risk and hassle, maintaining a charity is a full time job

Most places try to give the food a way to lower their waste, and sometimes because they get a taxable deduction.

In any case a lot of restaurants won't do it because of liability issues.

There was a restaurant in Charlotte where several homeless people attempted to sue the restaurant for food poisoning for food that they had consumed a few years back.

These people claimed they got sick off of some sandwiches that were kept in tents and held without Refrigeration for 2 days, but they claim the sandwiches were knowingly contaminated when the restaurant dropped them off.

Unbelievingly, the whole thing went to trial, and it was determined that the restaurant hadn't donated any food during the week that these people said they consumed it.

But they still ended up spending close to $25,000 on legal defense, and saw a massive suffering in sales.

They closed about 10 months later.

So a couple of money grabbers screw it up for the whole city, ruined a Restaurant’s reputation, cost a lot of people to lose their jobs, and a couple people lost their life savings.

in my restaurant, we donate a lot of food to the food bank, but typically have them sign a liability waiver every single year.

 

[jojojo]

For anyone curious you can try out the basics of the UK benefits system calculation here:

https://www.entitledto.co.uk/?utm_source=BAdviser&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=GovUK

It's not going to calculate all combinations/circumstances but it does give an idea.

 

[villain]

These aren't anecdotal, it's not like people around the world hasn't tried it, they have. Well those that works in this industries have, and the result make them stop doing it.

Very logical

1. You promised or at least offered to provide "leftover" means people will que, people will expect to have something, and as with all freebies there could be ques, and there's no certainty you'll get yours for the night, chaos ensues
2. There's bad PR, you can't open a semi decent restaurant and have homeless people lining during closing hour
3. Potential lawsuit if your leftover cause sickness. It is leftover after all, even if it's not a total leftover it could have been cold and unfit for consumption.
4. Logistical Nightmare, and it's not an easy task for employees to say no to a queuing homeless. "Sorry, nothing for you for the day", "Don't you have something lad? Haven't eaten for days"
5. They aren't guaranteed to be nice, some could be violent if not getting what they want. Even if your intention is good, it's not always end up well
6. "I only have 4 breads, and 2 soup" you lot figure out how to share this between the 10 of you eh?

I've addressed most of your list and quite openly said that I don't know what the solution is, but equally the current situation isn't sustainable either.
Number 2 on your list is ridiculous classism and shouldn't be a factor in this, and number 6 makes no sense if there's a structure in place where food is distributed from lots of sources, not one restaurant handing out food out the back of the door.
Points 1, 2 & 5 suggest a discrimination against homeless people from you, and have no baring in this conversation.

 

[owlo]

I think the term starve is reductive in this argument, I’m sure it’s pretty rare that kids are quite literally starving in this country (although without the welfare system and food banks that would probably be likely). It’s about malnourishment by only being able to afford basics like pasta and a sauce. Or bread and Jam. Malnourishment causes lack of concentration, poor education etc.

I don’t generally buy the cheapest ingredients when I’m shopping and didn’t really notice the rise in those kind of items mentioned in the OP, but we definitely did when I was a kid and those price rises listed would have massively effected our weekly shop for a family of four. Add to that the raises in council tax, petrol, heating etc in the last three years, all while wages are basically the same.

You then add to that a problem with a car that a parent needs to take out a payday loan to fix, as they need it for their minimum wage job. All of a sudden they are saddled with debt and need to cut back somewhere from an already stretched budget.

I’m assuming there’s figures somewhere about debt and food poverty, but I would imagine that’s a much more likely cause than drugs (although I’m sure that can increase debt for a minority).

The answer many will give here is: don't have a car, you don't deserve one if you're not earning enough for it. Sell it and feed the kids.


And yes, almost everybody starving (in the figurative not literal sense) is already heavily in debt. They probably are already working part time. A food bank won't be their first stop. And people are uneducated and don't know about the mechanisms which richer people would use in these situations (DRO's, IVA's etc) so the situation spirals.


edit: https://www.trusselltrust.org/2021/...-debt-crisis-facing-households-at-food-banks/

"One particularly shocking finding from State of Hunger, was the sharp increase in the share of people at food banks owing money to the Department of Work and Pensions, from 26% in late 2018 to 38% in early 2020 and 47% in mid-2020.


This debt has been driven by design features of the social security system, particularly the five week wait for a first Universal Credit payment, and the debt generated by taking on an advance payment to cover the wait. With record numbers of people moving onto Universal Credit, there has been a record number of people hit by this form of debt.


The result is that it is now more common for people arriving at food banks to owe debt to the government than to private lenders or family and friends. "

"On the eve of the pandemic, 90% of households surveyed at food banks were in debt, and a clear majority (60%) of households had both unpaid bills (e.g. electricity or rent) and owed money on loans (e.g. a bank loan, or a loan from friends or family). This puts debt problems well above those for working age adults in the general population (6%) and working age adults in relative poverty (15%). "

Unlike you, I suspect, I had a job which involved working with drug addicts.

Obviously there’s no conscious decision made “drugs or starve my kids” but they live chaotic, fecked up lives and when they spend a big chunk of their weekly income on gear they’re not exactly in the right headspace to budget the rest of their cash on a healthy balanced diet for their families. Food is just not a priority. Hence, they (and their kids) often go hungry. So yes, a, b and c are all true. I’ve seen it happen. I don’t look down on addicts for ending up as addicts, hence d. If you choose to, that’s fair enough.

I’ll admit to my ignorance about people starving without doing drugs. That just wasn’t something I saw very often when working with families in the poorest parts of Dublin (where we have a horrendous drugs epidemic). For the homeless, absolutely. But not amongst those who had managed to get somewhere to live/welfare payments. They were more likely to struggle with health conditions from too many, rather than too few, calories. If things are very different in the UK then fair enough. I got that wrong.

This is a social care issue then. (Another area the conservatives have fecked over royally) - Anybody with that level of dependency should automatically be referred to a CMHT or inpatient, kids or no kids. Because if you give an addict a grand a week, they'll still spend it. And yea as to the bold, I doubt you can afford to live and eat healthily on benefits. You're also more sedentary as you're not going places or to the gym etc.

You are right though, I'm ignorant about drug addicts and their kids, but I assume they'd feed their kids at least the minimum before going on a bender. After all, they are still parents. (And if they don't, again a social care issue)

 

[Sky1981]

I've addressed most of your list and quite openly said that I don't know what the solution is, but equally the current situation isn't sustainable either.
Number 2 on your list is ridiculous classism and shouldn't be a factor in this, and number 6 makes no sense if there's a structure in place where food is distributed from lots of sources, not one restaurant handing out food out the back of the door.
Points 1, 2 & 5 suggest a discrimination against homeless people from you, and have no baring in this conversation.

Those weren't mine. Just listing it from you for easier read from 100s quora answer i read.

 

[villain]

Those weren't mine. Just listing it from you for easier read from 100s quora answer i read.

Quora? Ok.

 

[Wumminator]

There's a woman at my work who used to be the manager at a busy Manchester H&M. Suddenly, as she got pregnant her partner of eight years died almost overnight. She was pregnant with twins.

She now works as a cleaner at my place (to be fair, I haven't seen her in a few weeks, hopefully she got a better job somewhere else) and she would only be able to work roughly 2-5pm. That's all my work would hire her for. She wanted a job in the morning but was struggling with childcare.

I once walked in on her crying because the local bus pass service had gone. What was once 7.00 for unlimited travel for a week was now going to work out at around 12.00 for her. This 20.00 a month was incredibly important to her. She had no room to save anywhere. She would preplan her shopping within the penny.

A woman who was doing well and through unfortunate circumstances had nothing. She had a good job, a loving family and life had completely fecked her until she barely had anything left.

Do not talk about drugged up parents or people who spend it on televisions. These are hardworking people who have absolutely nothing and it is a complete disgrace. Anyone in the world at the moment who work with those in poverty - whether at food banks, early years education or assorted government outreach - can tell you this is not an issue with budgeting. This is an issue with the poorest in Britain having to simply survive on whatever they can scrape together.

EDIT: Also to add, in a prior life I worked at the Morrisons bakery counter. At the end of the night, we were told to bag everything up, waste it and pour bleach into the bag. There would be literally dozens of sausage rolls/slices good to go. They'd fill the bag with bleach so no-one could come to the skips after the store had closed and eat them.

 

[Sky1981]

Quora? Ok.

Why you laugh?

They're legit people who actually own a restaurant telling you why it doesn't work

 

[owlo]

I've addressed most of your list and quite openly said that I don't know what the solution is, but equally the current situation isn't sustainable either.
Number 2 on your list is ridiculous classism and shouldn't be a factor in this, and number 6 makes no sense if there's a structure in place where food is distributed from lots of sources, not one restaurant handing out food out the back of the door.
Points 1, 2 & 5 suggest a discrimination against homeless people from you, and have no baring in this conversation.

It's also quite BS on many of the points. Work managed to have a Christmas party for 12 homeless families mainly using leftovers from a whisky tasting reception we had a couple of weeks before. (I'll admit we did a little cheating in buying up some cakes and presents etc). No trouble whatsoever, and this in a secure location in WC1.

There's a woman at my work who used to be the manager at a busy Manchester H&M. Suddenly, as she got pregnant her partner of eight years died almost overnight. She was pregnant with twins.

She now works as a cleaner at my place (to be fair, I haven't seen her in a few weeks, hopefully she got a better job somewhere else) and she would only be able to work roughly 2-5pm. That's all my work would hire her for. She wanted a job in the morning but was struggling with childcare.

I once walked in on her crying because the local bus pass service had gone. What was once 7.00 for unlimited travel for a week was now going to work out at around 12.00 for her. This 20.00 a month was incredibly important to her. She had no room to save anywhere. She would preplan her shopping within the penny.

A woman who was doing well and through unfortunate circumstances had nothing. She had a good job, a loving family and life had completely fecked her until she barely had anything left.

Do not talk about drugged up parents or people who spend it on televisions. These are hardworking people who have absolutely nothing and it is a complete disgrace.

Yep one of the biggest problems is people working part time and STILL having to turn to food banks, after their situation has rapidly changed and they have commitments. It's alright if you knew nothing but poverty, but it's insane otherwise.

PS. I'm currently looking for a cleaner for a few more hours a week. If she's happy to undertake security vetting and work in North Manchester, feel free to message me her details. (I'll pay £15/hour)

 

[Wumminator]

Unlike you, I suspect, I had a job which involved working with drug addicts.

Obviously there’s no conscious decision made “drugs or starve my kids” but they live chaotic, fecked up lives and when they spend a big chunk of their weekly income on gear they’re not exactly in the right headspace to budget the rest of their cash on a healthy balanced diet for their families. Food is just not a priority. Hence, they (and their kids) often go hungry. So yes, a, b and c are all true. I’ve seen it happen. I don’t look down on addicts for ending up as addicts, hence d. If you choose to, that’s fair enough.

I’ll admit to my ignorance about people starving without doing drugs. That just wasn’t something I saw very often when working with families in the poorest parts of Dublin (where we have a horrendous drugs epidemic). For the homeless, absolutely. But not amongst those who had managed to get somewhere to live/welfare payments. They were more likely to struggle with health conditions from too many, rather than too few, calories. If things are very different in the UK then fair enough. I got that wrong.

Pogue - don't you work in medicine? Therefore, the only people you are seeing on poverty would be drug addicts.

I have a job that lets me see a variety of people currently living in poverty. It gives me a much more well rounded view of what they were going through. It's just like the police force, they only deal with people breaking the law so their view of society as a whole is skewed.

 

[Wumminator]

It's also quite BS on many of the points. Work managed to have a Christmas party for 12 homeless families mainly using leftovers from a whisky tasting reception we had a couple of weeks before. (I'll admit we did a little cheating in buying up some cakes and presents etc). No trouble whatsoever, and this in a secure location in WC1.



Yep one of the biggest problems is people working part time and STILL having to turn to food banks, after their situation has rapidly changed and they have commitments. It's alright if you knew nothing but poverty, but it's insane otherwise.

PS. I'm currently looking for a cleaner for a few more hours a week. If she's happy to undertake security vetting and work in North Manchester, feel free to message me her details. (I'll pay £15/hour)

If I ever see her, I absolutely will pass something on and message you. The likelihood is, I genuinely don't think I've seen her since Christmas and there is a rapid turnover in our janitorial staff, so there is every chance she has already moved on.

 

[owlo]

If I ever see her, I absolutely will pass something on and message you. The likelihood is, I genuinely don't think I've seen her since Christmas and there is a rapid turnover in our janitorial staff, so there is every chance she has already moved on.

Cheers mate. Hope you never do and she's moved on to greener pastures! Still, a quick 'I'm moving on text' would be appreciated.... Finding appropriate cleaners is a nightmare for me.

 

[villain]

Why you laugh?

They're legit people who actually own a restaurant telling you why it doesn't work

Were talking about complex societal, logistical & economic issues, and you’re citing Quora as a place to get answers, that’s why I’m laughing

It's also quite BS on many of the points. Work managed to have a Christmas party for 12 homeless families mainly using leftovers from a whisky tasting reception we had a couple of weeks before. (I'll admit we did a little cheating in buying up some cakes and presents etc). No trouble whatsoever, and this in a secure location in WC1.

Yep my work do something similar with two local food banks near our offices and we now have monthly drives where we donate office food, and people can bring in canned goods & other house items hygienic items.
On a small scale it’s possible, but scaling it while also decreasing food wastage is the challenge & each area im sure will have different individual problems too.
But this, along with housing should be a priority for any government imo.

 

[Pogue Mahone]

Pogue - don't you work in medicine? Therefore, the only people you are seeing on poverty would be drug addicts.

I have a job that lets me see a variety of people currently living in poverty. It gives me a much more well rounded view of what they were going through. It's just like the police force, they only deal with people breaking the law so their view of society as a whole is skewed.

Yeah, I definitely saw a skewed sub-section. This was when I worked in mental health. It was also in an extremely deprived part of Dublin in the middle of one of the worst epidemics of heroin use anywhere in the world. That was where I saw how damaging drug addiction can be to children/families.

I subsequently got exposed to families from the same areas without drug problems when I did a short stint as a GP. That was when I saw that childhood obesity was a big issue. The opposite to what I saw with children of addicts.

I think what I’m missing here is what you describe above. In Ireland we have a decent enough welfare safety net. Obviously it’s still a shitty existence but hunger is not often an issue if the state covers the cost of accommodation. What I hadn’t thought about was trying to make ends meet on minimum wage, paying rent and council tax while not receiving any (or very little) benefits. There’s an example earlier in the thread which does the maths in that scenario and it does look scary.