POLICY BRIEFING
Below the Breadline: Latest Oxfam
Report
22 July 2014
Andrew Jones, LGiU Associate
Summary
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This 2014 report (available here) published jointly by Church Action on
Poverty, the Trussell Trust, and Oxfam, compiles data from a wide range of
sources in an attempt to build up a comprehensive picture of the extent and
causes of food insecurity in the UK.
The report’s publication follows the creation of an All Party Parliamentary
Group on Hunger and Food Poverty, which has formally launched an inquiry
into food poverty, co-chaired by the Bishop of Truro, which is due to report at
the end of 2014.
As with earlier reports and investigations, this report shows a rapid rise in the
use of emergency assistance with food. Among the primary causes are
current changes to the welfare regime.
This briefing will be of interest to members and officers in all councils who
work with local residents and communities, to officers in upper tier councils
directly involved with the local welfare schemes and to partners in the third
sector, particularly those concerned about food security, poverty, and welfare
reform.
Briefing in full
Background
Reports of a growing recourse to food aid among low-income UK citizens have
attracted considerable media interest and have stimulated some political
controversy. The Trussell Trust, the coordinating body of the UK’s largest network
of food banks, reported a 170 per cent increase in the numbers of people using their
food banks between 2011-12 and 2012-13, a rise from 128,697 to 346,992 (see
related briefings). In its latest press release published in April 2014, the Trust
reported that it gave out three days’ emergency food to 913,138 people between
April 2013 and March 2014 (of whom 330,205 were children), a 163 percent increase
on the previous year.
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On 18 December 2013, the use of food banks was debated in the House of
Commons (see here for the Hansard record). In February 2014 Defra published a
report on food insecurity in the UK. The Defra report was essentially a scoping
study, identifying both what is known and not known so far about food aid in the UK,
and drew on both international and UK sources (see related briefings). The report’s
conclusions were necessarily tentative, but it pointed out that there was no evidence
supporting the claim put forward by Lord Freud that increased food aid provision is
driving demand. All the available evidence, it was stated, both in the UK and
internationally, points in the opposite direction. In other words, there is a growing
need and informal food aid providers are responding.
Faith leaders have spoken out strongly on the issue of food poverty and hunger. In
February 2014, more than 43 Anglican Bishops and non-conformist church leaders
signed an open letter calling for urgent action to ‘End Hunger Fast.’ A second letter
addressed to the three main party leaders in April was signed by more than 30
bishops and more than 600 other church leaders.
As a result of the increased level of interest in the issues, Frank Field MP and Laura
Sandys MP set up the All Party Parliamentary Group on Hunger and Food
Poverty with broad political representation. In April 2014 they formally launched an
inquiry into food poverty, co-chaired by the Bishop of Truro, which is due to report at
the end of 2014.
This 2014 report (available here) published jointly by Church Action on Poverty, the
Trussell Trust, and Oxfam is a follow-up from an earlier 2013 report on food
insecurity in the UK. It contains little original research, but compiles data from a wide
range of sources in an attempt to build up a comprehensive picture of the extent and
causes of food insecurity in the UK.
Food poverty in 2014
There is increasing scrutiny, it is stated, of the true picture of food aid provision in the
UK. Oxfam and Church Action on Poverty have calculated that 20,247,042 meals
were delivered to people in food poverty in 2013-14 by three of the main food aid
providers (Trussell Trust, Fareshare, and Food Cycle). This is a 54 percent
increase on 2012-13.
The report’s authors draw on some statistics calculated by Barnardo’s (see here)
which indicate that more than half a million children in the UK are currently living in
families who are unable to provide a minimally acceptable diet. Kellogg’s have
helped to set up more than 1,000 breakfast clubs across Britain, and aim to donate
15 million breakfasts by 2016 (see here). Magic Breakfast, a charity dedicated to
ensuring that every child gets an adequate breakfast, has set up clubs in 242
primary schools in areas with high levels of free school meal eligibility. Breakfast
clubs are part of the mix of emergency food provision.
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It is pointed out that the Trussell Trust is the main national food bank provider, with
more than 400 food banks in the UK. The Trussell Trust statistics are the most robust
nationally collected on food bank use. However, the Trussell Trust is far from the only
food aid provider in the country, and there is an extensive network of other charities
and independent providers. Some examples are given. In Tameside (Greater
Manchester), there are two Trussell Trust food banks and 13 independent food
banks. Sheffield’s food bank network lists nine food banks, three of which are
Trussell Trust and six independent. In Dundee, the Trussell Trust provides two-thirds
of the food parcel provision. This means that the Trussell Trust’s statistics on their
own cannot account for the total number of people receiving food aid. The true scale
of food poverty, it is concluded, is under-reported.
The causes of the rising use of food banks
The earlier January 2014 briefing on food banks gave a breakdown of Trussell Bank
statistics on the reasons for food bank usage in 2012-13. The table below updates
these figures for 2013-14. They are not reproduced in the Oxfam report.
Benefit delays
Low Income
Benefit Changes
Other
Debt
Unemployed
Homeless
Domestic Violence
Sickness
Delayed Wages
Child Holiday Meals
Refused STBA
Refused Crisis Loan
30.9
20.3
16.9
10.5
7.9
3.7
3.1
1.9
1.7
1.0
0.9
0.6
0.6
The February 2014 Defra report cites unemployment, delays to social security
payments and sanctions as a trigger for the increased use of food banks in the UK. It
also found that a combination of falling real incomes, low pay, rising food prices and
increasing personal debt meant an increasing number of households could not afford
to buy enough food.
In December 2013, the Scottish government published An Overview of Food Aid
Provision in Scotland . The report found that the fast growth experienced by the
Trussell Trust was broadly indicative of the growth observed by other food parcel
providers. The report also concluded that the Trussell Trust data on the reasons for
referral are largely representative of what has been happening nationally for other
food parcel providers and that providers who participated in the study were in
agreement that welfare reform, benefit delays, benefit sanctions and falling incomes
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have been the main factors driving increased demand. In addition, the Scottish
Parliament’s Welfare Reform Committee published a report in June 2014 in which it
was concluded that the UK government’s welfare reforms were a significant cause of
the rise in food bank use in Scotland. As well as welfare reform, the Committee
pointed to the economic downturn and increases in food and fuel prices as
contributory factors to the rise in food bank use.
The Oxfam report shows how rising living costs have reduced the purchasing power
of households at the lower end of the income scale (see the related briefing on the
IFS Green Budget for the trajectory of real incomes over the course of the
recession). UK food prices have increased by 43.5 percent over the eight years to
July 2013, with yearly rises ranging from 24 percent to 55 percent.
Defra publishes an annual report on family food. The most recent report, for 2012,
found that on average 11.6 percent of household spending goes on food, rising to
16.6 percent for families in the lowest earning 20 percent. The amount of food eaten
has been in steady decline, but food expenditure as a proportion of total household
expenditure has continued to rise. Households purchased 4.7 percent less food
while spending 17 percent more in 2012 than in 2007. Those in the bottom income
decile spent 22 percent more on food in 2012 than in 2007 and bought 5.7 percent
less.
Research produced by real life reform (see related briefings) has found that many
people experiencing food poverty now buy cheaper, lower quality food and spend
less on fruit, vegetables, meat and fish. However, this strategy has not helped lower
income households who could not trade down, as they were already buying the
cheapest products. The lowest-income households simply have to buy less food. In
May 2014 170 public health professionals wrote an open letter to David Cameron
expressing their concern at the situation, referred to as a ‘public health crisis’.
A variety of sources are drawn upon to demonstrate the impact of housing costs on
household finances. A survey by YouGov and Shelter, published in April 2014,
found that nearly four million families were “only one pay cheque away from losing
their homes”, and that 2.4 million families would lose their home immediately if they
lost their jobs tomorrow. Shelter identifies high housing costs and stagnating wages
as the causes of this situation, with people living from month to month with no money
left over to save. This analysis, it is stated, supports the evidence from food banks
that people have nothing to fall back on. Therefore when they encounter an
unexpected cost, they have no choice but to use a food bank.
Fuel prices are added to the list of rising costs for households: between 2010 and
the end of 2013, energy prices for household gas and electricity rose by 37 percent,
an increase of three times the rate of inflation (see related briefings on fuel prices).
A report published in the Independent is used to support a claim made by the
Trussell Trust that there is an increasing number of people in work who rely on food
banks. It is pointed out that the scheduled increase in the National Minimum Wage
for October 2014 is the first real cash rise since 2008. However, it is argued that the
National Minimum Wage is still a long way from covering the cost of living, even
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when social security payments are taken into account. Although unemployment is
falling and employment is rising, many of the new jobs are low paid and on insecure
contracts with minimal rights. There is a ‘churn’ of people in and out of work.
The cumulative impact of social security reform
A separate section is provided for changes to the social security system. Welfare
reforms, it is claimed, have had significant impacts on low-income households, and
there is clear evidence that this is driving increasing numbers of people to use food
banks. The cash value of the majority of social security payments has been lowered
in real terms. Entitlement to Housing Benefit has been cut, and Council Tax Support
has been reduced (see related briefings).
Research undertaken by Oxfam and the New Policy Institute in April 2014 found
that as a result of cuts in Housing Benefit and changes to Council Tax Support,
around 1.75 million of the poorest families have seen an absolute cut in their income.
Of these, 480,000 families are seeing their social security being cut twice, as they
are affected by more than one of the changes.
These changes are having a significant impact on food poverty. The proportion of
clients accessing Trussell Trust food banks due to a change in social security
payments increased from 12 percent in 2011-12 to 18 percent in the period April –
September 2013. Fifty two percent of referrals between April and June 2013 were
due to problems with social security.
These findings are echoed in the Scottish Government’s report (see above). It
highlights the top three reasons for referral to food banks as delays to social security
payments, changes to social security, and low income. Social security recipients
reported uncertainty about when they would receive their money and how much they
would be getting. Also identified as driving factors were the bedroom tax (or spare
room subsidy), Council Tax Support reduction, the abolition of the Social Fund and
the increase in social security sanctions. The Scottish Government has recently
acted to mitigate the impact of the bedroom tax and the loss of the Social Fund.
The section includes a summary of the impacts of the new sanctions regime (see
related briefings). Since the new sanctions policy was implemented in October 2012,
more than one million sanctions have been applied. Twenty percent of these have
been imposed on people with a disability. Overall, men and young people are being
disproportionately sanctioned. Of the Trussell Trust food banks surveyed in March
and April 2014, 83 percent reported that sanctions to social security have caused
more people to be referred to them for emergency food in the preceding year.
Research by Landman Economics for Oxfam (forthcoming) shows no relationship
between the extent to which sanctions to social security are used in each Jobcentre
Plus district, and improvements in the employment rate, or reductions in
unemployment, or reductions in inactivity. However, it is argued that regardless of the
policy intentions, the speed at which the new regime is being brought in, combined
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with DWP redundancies mean that a significant number of people are being
inappropriately sanctioned. Research by Policy Exchange found that 70,000
jobseekers have had their social security payments withdrawn unfairly, leading them
to rely on food banks to feed themselves and their families.
Finally, changes to the Social Fund have caused further hardship to low-income
households. Following an interim period of localisation, the fund is to be scrapped
entirely, and crisis funding will be entirely at local authority discretion (see related
briefing on DWP performance). Charities have warned that this will lead to a
postcode lottery in terms of who gets financial assistance, and will further increase
the number of families turning to food banks or becoming dependent on loan sharks
or payday loans.
Comment
There have been repeated calls for a systematic government inquiry into the use of
food banks, made again in this Oxfam report. In the Work and Pensions Select
Committee’s report on its inquiry into the role of Jobcentre Plus in the reformed
social security system (see related briefings) it was recommended that the DWP
monitor the extent of financial hardship caused by benefit sanctions, including the
signposting to food aid by Jobcentres and the reasons for it. This recommendation
was rejected, and it would appear that a full and systematic account of the extent of
food poverty in the UK must await the publication of the APPG’s report in late 2014.
Even after the publication of the APPG report, however, it is likely that the causes
and extent of food insecurity will continue to be disputed.
One outcome of such an inquiry should be an assessment of the extent to which
food banks and informal food aid have become more than a temporary supporting
prop for the welfare state. The authors of the Oxfam report point to the experience of
in the USA and Canada, where food aid organisations have changed from being
providers of emergency relief to permanent institutions supporting a failed social
security system. As in the UK, North American organisations report that users of food
aid are often in work and point to a lack of decent jobs as being an important cause
of their use. The relationship between food aid and the social security system has to
be explored systematically, along with issues such as the impact of food poverty on
children and the implications for public health.
Related Briefings
Civil Society, Fairness Commissions and Poverty Reduction
Monitoring the performance of the Department for Work and Pensions in
2012-13
Household Food Security: Final Report for Defra
The 2014 IFS Green Budget
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The Role of Jobcentre Plus in the Reformed Welfare System
Update on Food Banks
Coping with the cuts? Local government and poorer communities
Real Life Reform: Research on the Impacts of Welfare Reform
The Benefits Cap in Haringey
Energy Policy Update: What’s Happening to Fuel Prices?
Welfare Reform Update: October 2013
For more information about this, or any other LGiU member briefing, please
contact Janet Sillett, Briefings Manager, on janet.sillett@lgiu.org.uk
© Local Government Information Unit, www.lgiu.org.uk, Third Floor, 251 Pentonville Road, London N1 9NG. Reg.
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