Food Banks: Of community - and polarised politics
Food banks have become another one of those political footballs that get kicked around between left and right to seemingly little effect but stopping a great many people – or rather, more accurately, me - from giving them much or enough thought. We saw another example of the polarisation over the weekend with a Mail on Sunday ‘special investigation’ from undercover reporters, headlined: ‘ No ID, no checks... and vouchers for sob stories: The truth behind those shock food bank claims .’ The piece targeted the Trussell Trust charity, which runs more than 400 of Britain’s 1,000 or so food banks and has been vociferous in criticising the Government for recent rises in demand for food banks. It fed into a general right-wing irritation about Labour using food banks to beat the government and provided a few good reasons for scepticism about the real circumstances of some people using them (for example those on big salaries made redundant who retain Sky TV and iPhone contracts). ...