Long queues outside food banks during festive period depict UK as third world country

Long queues outside food banks during the Christmas holiday period has embarrassed the British government and triggered profound concerns about the extent of social injustice in the UK. 

On observing the scene, John McCorry, who is the CEO of Newcastle West Close food bank, was rendered speechless. He described scenes that “took the wind out of your sails. It's just shocking to see so many people really in such deprivation”. 

Describing the queue as the longest he had ever seen outside a  food bank, McCorry complained: “When I saw the number of people in the rain I just thought, oh my God. I just felt sorry for the people who needed to come here to queue to make sure they have a decent Christmas meal”.

McCorry was at pains to say that people had not showed up there purely by their own initiative, but in fact they had been referred to the food bank by another charity and given a voucher for an "emergency food parcel". 

According to a study by the University of Newcastle, since the beginning of the coronavirus pandemic in March, the number of people trapped in food insecurity has quadrupled.

Meanwhile, the Trussell Trust (a charity fighting hunger in the UK) which boasts a national network of 1,200 food banks, said in April that it is confronting an "unprecedented challenge".

According to multiple reports, 32,000 people received food parcels issued in the 12 months to March 2020. This number increased to about 34,000 in an eight-month period, from March to November.

Furthermore, a recent report shows that the total number of three-day emergency food parcels in the UK has risen from 35,000 in 2010 to 1.9m this year.

Referencing this report, veteran North East labor politician Lord Jeremy Beecham, is set to showcase this shocking increase in food poverty in Parliament.

Lord Beecham is to submit a written question to the House of Lords to:  “Ask Her Majesty's Government how it accounts for the increase of three day emergency food parcels from 35,000 households in 2010 to almost 2m in 2020, as revealed by the Trussell Trust, and what if any steps will it take, and when, to substantially to [sic] reduce the reliance of so many people on support of this nature"?

“This is 2020 and we're looking at what appears to be appalling figures of poverty and deprivation. These are 19th century kind of figures. It's just awful and there is no apparent attempt to deal with it”, Lord Beecham added.

By any measure, poverty in the UK is rising fast and the coronavirus pandemic has exacerbated the problem by undermining the British economy.

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Rising poverty levels, and the government's apparent inability to feed large swathes of the British population, undermine the UK's international image, not least as it calls into question the government's claim that it commands the fifth largest economy in the world.

The situation is set to worsen in the immediate post-Brexit period as friction on the borders - especially with France - exacerbate the UK's food security problem.    

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