A REPORT recently released by the Trussell Trust highlights a staggering increase in the use of food banks in Scotland over the past six months. As we come to the end of 2015, it is shocking to think that food poverty – the inability of people to feed themselves and their families – is actually rising in what is a rich nation.

According to the Trussell Trust over 60,000 men, women and children in Scotland had to turn to a food bank for support. This is a 17 per cent increase since the same time last year and must raise a serious concern as winter approaches.

Of the 60,458 emergency three-day food supplies distributed, 19,058 went to children. The scale of the issue can also be seen in the growth of food banks in Scotland run in partnership with the Trussell Trust. In 2011 there was one foodbank but as of November 2015 there are now 50 such food banks across twenty-seven Scottish local authority areas. Trussell Trust foodbanks in Scotland were responsible for 10.85 per cent of the overall emergency food provision in the UK, which is beyond Scotland’s population share of 8.2 per cent.

Food poverty has a serious impact on people’s physical and mental health, especially if it is not short term, but happens on a repeated or regular pattern. New research from England has highlighted a rise in patients suffering from malnutrition and it is no doubt the same in Scotland’s NHS, as those who are not able to consume nutritiously balanced meals over time find their health affected and have an inability to ward off infections and diseases.

The Scottish Association of Mental Health’s report, “Worried Sick: Experiences of Poverty and Mental Health across Scotland” also covered the issue of food poverty. It highlighted the experiences of those with issues such as depression and how the lack of food made them feel worse and even exacerbated other physical illnesses such as Crohn’s disease. Age UK also stated a concern that malnutrition in older people was often left undetected both in the community and in hospitals.

The effects of relying on tinned and processed food from a food bank also impacts on children’s health. While eating such food is fine in a crisis, in the long run it’s never going to meet a child’s nutritional needs. This was one of the findings in a report from Parenting Across Scotland (a partnership of charities which offers support to children and families in Scotland including Children 1st, Aberlour and Capability Scotland). The report also highlighted that 51 per cent of single parents and 30 per cent of couples had cut back on food shopping.

The Trussell Trust report lays bare the main causes of food poverty – benefit delays, low income and benefit changes. Benefit delays account for 28 per cent of the referrals to foodbanks, the same proportion of referrals as they did in the previous year. Although there has been a small decline in referrals due to benefit changes (from 18 per cent to 16 per cent) there has been an increase in referrals due to low income, rising from 18 per cent to 21 per cent (this is the highest rise of any single issue in the last six months). Ewan Gurr, Scotland Network Manager of Trussell Trust, said:

“Difficulties related to welfare benefits still drive the majority of people to our Scottish food banks but now one in five of those referred is on a low income and among that number is a growing body of people in low paid employment who are simply unable to make the pay cheque stretch far enough when crisis hits.”

This corroborates the results of a Scottish Government report from December 2013 which said: “Providers who participated in the study were in agreement that welfare reform, benefit delays, benefit sanctions and falling incomes have been the main factors driving the recent trend observed of increased demand for food aid”.

According to the IMF (Oct 2015), the UK has the ninth highest GDP in the world, yet an ever increasing number of its citizens are turning to food banks to get fed. The priorities of this UK Government are all wrong. As we’ve seen recently there is an open cheque book for war but nothing left when it comes to helping people survive. More and more people are knocking at the doors of food banks as a direct result of UK Government policies, whether that’s through benefit cuts, sanctions or forcing people into low paid and insecure employment.

In contrast the Scottish Government is using its limited powers to try to address the issue of food poverty. This includes establishing a short life working group on food poverty and working with organisations like FareShare to tackle the criminal food waste of supermarkets and suppliers. It is ironic that so much unsold food is destroyed when we have so many people turning to food banks to survive.

The Scottish Government’s Emergency Food Action Plan is providing £1 million over two years to support 26 local emergency food aid projects and the charity FareShare to redistribute surplus food from the food industry to communities across Scotland. This is feeding more than 15,500 people in homeless hostels, women’s refuges, day centres, every week redistributing 495.5 tonnes of excess food.

But this still isn’t enough. In my constituency one in five children go to bed hungry every night while Paisley Job Centre has the third highest number of sanctions in the whole of Scotland. We need the powers to stop the sanctions and develop a welfare system that supports, not punishes, those in need. But we need to go further, we need to have the power over our economy to promote sustainable jobs which provide a decent living wage (not the Tory sham one) so that the need for food banks is diminished and eventually consigned to the history books. As I mentioned in my maiden speech; “Food banks are not part of the welfare state; they are a symbol that the welfare state is failing.”

Yet, as winter approaches, more will need to be done as the cost of keeping warm eats into household budgets. More and more people will have to turn to food banks for help. Historically December is the busiest month for Scottish food banks. I know from my constituency casework that more people are turning to local foodbanks. I genuinely admire and support all those who do their bit to help their local food bank, whether it’s groups and businesses taking in donations – such as one of the local taxi companies in my constituency which also provides free customer delivery service and free transport for Renfrewshire Foodbank volunteers living in the Johnstone area. Food banks rely on the generosity of local people to support them. The Trussell Trust estimate that 90 per cent of the food they give out is donated by the public. So please, if you can, help your local foodbank.