The ‘Hunger in the UK’ report was published today, delivered in partnership with the research agency Ipsos and Trussell Trust food banks, this research comes at a time when Slough Foodbank – along with other UK foodbanks, is seeing record levels of need.
The research found:
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Food bank use is just the tip of a much deeper iceberg of hunger in the UK:
14% of all UK adults (or their households) experienced food insecurity in the 12 months to mid-2022, equating to an estimated 11.3 million people. Meanwhile, 7% of UK households received charitable food support in this same period, including from food banks and social supermarkets.
Slough Foodbank provided 9,322 food parcels in 2022 to people in food poverty crisis in Slough. -
The main driver of hunger and food bank need in the UK is low income:
Overwhelmingly, this is caused by problems in the design and delivery of the social security system, but is compounded by too many jobs being inaccessible, unstable and not paying enough to cover essential costs.
In Slough Foodbank, the majority, 61% of the people that we support are on Universal Credit, including many who will also be in work. -
Paid work does not always protect people from needing support from food banks:
Amongst those referred to food banks in the Trussell Trust network, one in five (20%) are from working households, the majority of whom (62%) are on incomes low enough to mean they are also in receipt of Universal Credit. In Slough Foodbank we are seeing a similar level.
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Job insecurity has a clear impact on working people needing to turn to a food bank:
30% of people in paid work referred to food banks in the Trussell Trust network are in insecure employment.
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The overwhelming majority of people at food banks have been forced to seek help as a last resort having exhausted all other avenues:
They are likely to have accumulated multiple forms of debt, run down whatever limited savings they may have had, and exhausted all options from family and friends. The impact of having no money leads to worrying levels of social isolation and loneliness, spiralling debt, and a decline in physical and mental health.
Trussell Trust do not believe food banks are the answer when people are going without the essentials in one of the richest economies in the world. We agree that we need a social security system which provides protection and the dignity for people to cover their own essentials, such as food and bills. This is why, in partnership with the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, Trussell Trust are calling on the UK government to create an ‘Essentials Guarantee’, to enshrine in law the amount Universal Credit payments should be to guarantee that our essential items, such as food and bills, are always covered.
You can read more information and download the full report here: https://www.trusselltrust.org/what-we-do/research-advocacy/hunger-in-the-uk/