Food banks

Police Community Support Officer whitewave - ours are hard working and fully engaged with the community. Their presence has made a big difference to low level anti-social behaviours and they work very closely with statutory and other organisations to improve community life for the locals.

I am in despair , I read my g grandfathers journal and find I am doing in 2015 what he did before WW1 , over 100 years ago !

What's a PCSO?

It all sounds quite dreadful.

The homelessness charity I co-founded works hand in hand with the food bank, the local PCSO's and a local Christian organisation that provides free hot meals via very loose referrals. We make referrals to one another and ensure that people who are homeless have access to frequent hot meals, warm sleeping bags and adequate clothing. The food bank makes up food parcels for families with children and delivers them during the summer holidays; their volunteers bake cakes and also serve refreshments when the food bank is open. The leaders of each resource meet together on a regular basis to share information, training and good practice and we are all collaborating with statutory providers to try and improve the lives of the marginalised people we meet in our community.

Recently we attended a conference, hosted by the local conservative council and attended by two local conservative MP's, where the impact of current and future cuts was spelled out and it was so very much worse than I think anyone in the room had imagined. Even though we were a group of generally well informed people we were truly shocked and surprised at the scale of the cuts and the speed at which they will have an impact.

At the moment there are plans to sack every single PCSO in Devon and Cornwall along with 700+ police officers; although there is still hope that the cuts won't be quite as Draconian as this there will nevertheless be a huge gap in provision if PCSO's are lost and if police numbers (already cut to the bone) are further reduced. The impact of the Universal Credit system will hit vulnerable people especially hard - and with a five week initial gap between payments the local food banks were warned to anticipate extra demands. Access to affordable/social housing is already a joke and homelessness is set to rise to unprecedented levels.

When I was a child I lived in a family where poverty was crippling and I am sad and disheartened that in 2015 I'm still coming across people whose lives are currently blighted by it.

I think it's time that the likes of IDS stopped thinking that everyone who needs some help either with food, money, household goods or just good advice is trying to take advantage of his idea of our 'wonderful' society. He hasn't got a clue, but why would he? He and his kind (I see them as a different breed), on the whole, have had and still have a privileged, wealthy, bubblewrapped existence. It would be interesting to see how he would cope in the world some of the most vulnerable and poor inhabit, where every day involves some sort of battle against poverty and/or discrimination. He doesn't make my blood boil - he makes it run cold.

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Pensionpat We managed to maintain a good relationship with the local permanent Charity Shops by explaining what we were doing and that we were focussed on Christmas & Children. If we received donations of good adult clothing we passed that on to them (except for Christmas Jumpers). When we closed we re-sorted our stock, taking the rubbish to a £1-a-bag clothes recycler and the best was to the other Charity Shops. Most chain Charity shops will not accept shoes but we did - mainly once worn party shoes and too small Wellies. A couple of the shops even accepted our 'fliers' and passed them on to their customers who were particularly looking for children's stuff. We handed out the fliers on the High Street and outside the Job Centre also via Womens Aid, Home Start, Social Work, and the food banks.

If you are serious about opening a pop-up shop next year please contact me and I'll pass on details of what we have learned from our experience.
I must admit that the Shop was the most enjoyable piece of volunteering I have ever done. Saw people at their generous, human best every day - too many heartwarming incidents to recount here.

Buddie a point to remember is that some children don't get much of a meal at all during school holidays, so perhaps some easily prepared food that an older child could manage for themselves may be a good idea. That's just my thought though, and I think food banks have lists online of what things are suitable.
Cereals too and dried, not fresh, milk.

I have put in tins of, for example, ready prepared chilli con carne which i wouldn't use myself, but I donate them because we can't put in fresh meat, onions etc.

Thank you Rosequartz, Granny23 and others who have offered idea for seasonal donations. I was wondering about selection boxes of chocolates or biscuits and think mince pies rather than a jar of mincemeat would probably be a better idea as you suggest. I already include tinned fruit or fish along with soups and beans or pasta along with dried goods.
I was watching a programme recently where they interviewed people using food banks and one single chap pointed out his only means of heating food was a single gas ring so a point to bear in mind when considering what he could actually use to make a meal.

Our group have always made their donations in November ahead of the Christmas holiday and in July before the school summer holiday as parents will be needing to feed their children a midday meal they may normally have had at school as we assumed these to be the times of greatest pressure on a limited budget. Interesting to hear demand is actually less during the summer months. Might this reflect seasonal work being available for some users of food banks?

Durhamjen, I, too, donate only items that I would use myself. In many cases this comes from basics or essentials ranges as I use them myself. They are perfectly good products and I am not paying for the packaging or advertising. This leaves me to choose fresh goods of a higher quality and indulge in the odd luxury. In terms of my donation, however, it means I donate more items which is surely to the general good. Incidentally, I fully appreciate this is a political issue but I was looking at it from a humanitarian angle and asking what we could donate now to help those currently in need. As I pointed out, the issue will not be resolved overnight and people should not be ignored whilst matters are debated.

DurhamJen. It could be a good sign. It could be that the model we are following rigidly does not meet the needs of my town. I think we need to be more creative and flexible. I believe there was much discussion with organisations such as Social Services, Local Authorities before setting up. I don't know if the local people have been consulted in the right way. I am asking questions, tactfully I hope.

MamaCaz. That is an interesting point about higher demand in Winter. I shall soon see. It's got really cold.

Granny23. What an excellent idea. I shall remember this for next Xmas. There are plenty of empty shops. I wonder if local traders would object?

Yes, I forgot to say toiletries etc, and perhaps a gift set at Christmas if people can afford to donate one or two or those.

That sounds very well organised Granny23

A Woman's Group of which I am a member, will again this year be running a Pop-Up Christmas Shop, stocking mainly Christmas Toys, Books and Party Clothes. The shop is run on a 'pay what you can afford' basis so that parents/grannies/aunties can, however little money they have, actually choose and 'buy' Christmas goodies for their children and not rely on charitable handouts. The system also allows the better-off to pay handsomely for some trinket and thereby contribute to the cause. The 'profits' or donations after expenses (only PL Insurance and electricity) are divided equally between our two local food banks. Last year they each got 50% of £1,700.

Our 2 foodbanks are like chalk and cheese. One is church run and mainly stocked with food donated regularly by local congregations. It is fairly formal and only accepts referrals from authorities and charities. There is no access for hungry people off the street, a written referral comes in giving the size of the family and their address and a volunteer driver delivers the bag of 3 days worth of food to their door. They operate a 3 referral per family per year policy as they believe this forces the DWP, SW. etc to find more permanent solutions. This food bank has told our group that their most pressing need is for money to buy daily fresh bread and milk to include in their 'nutritionally balanced' food bags but they will accept Selection Boxes, packets of biscuits and toiletries in the run up to Christmas.

Our other foodbank is an offshoot of a Community Group and is very informal. The will give food to anyone who turns up on their doorstep in need, even those with known drug or alcohol problems, however the majority of their customers have been sanctioned or suffer mental illness or disability. There is always a pot of soup and cups of tea on the go there. They do accept home baking and jam and home grown fruit and veg. Every other day they get a delivery from the Community Garden Project. Their main request is also for cash for milk and bread but they are stockpiling Christmas Food for their 'regular' families.

Another thing our Group did was collect a huge supply of basic toiletries, toilet rolls, nappies, wipes and women's sanitary protection which has been greatly appreciated but is seldom donated.

Neither of the Banks has room for toys or clothing and the local Charity Shops (as discussed elsewhere on Gransnet) get more and more expensive. Which is why we think our pop-up shop which enables parents, by their own efforts, to ensure that Santa visits their children and that they have an almost brand new outfit for their Christmas Parties, is such a benefit to the local community. BTW the majority of our stock is donated by the customers bringing in their own kids outgrown or unused books, toys and clothes and 'exchanging' them for something new to them.

we had been discussing what we could include to make our offerings more seasonal yet still useful,

I would just buy tins and packets of stuff in sizes that a family of, say, 3-5 could use to make meals.
At Christmas you could include packets of supermarket mince pies, Christmas pudding, tins or packets of custard, tinned fruit, biscuits, chocs, other goodies - but not home-made ones.

DN who volunteers in one said that when they sent out a call to local businesses for Easter eggs for children they were inundated!

It made me very cross to see that enormous pile of parsnips which would be sent for animal feed or ploughed back into the ground - all that hard work growing, harvesting only for a supermarket to reject them as not being quite good enough!
Unfortunately, food banks don't take fresh food, not even potatoes, as I found when I bought a load of fresh stuff to donate. I know better now.

One of our local businesses collects chocolate advent calendars and selection boxes during November to donate to food banks for the children.

I was also told that our local food bank was quiet recently (back in September, I think).
That set me wondering: A very limited budget will go a lot further over the warmer months, won't it, when heating isn't needed and seasonal foods are more plentiful and therefore cheaper? Therefore, is it reasonable to assume that demand on food banks is almost certainly going to be at its highest in winter, when a huge chunk of a low income can be swallowed up by even very limited heating?

sustainablefoodcities.org/campaigns/2015beyondthefoodbank/ourapproachtothechallenge

Here's an interesting idea, beyond the food bank and what people should be doing in their communities to help those who need food banks.

Surely, pensionpat, it should be seen as a good sign that your foodbank is not needed as much. Has it always been like that?

Buddie, of course there is emphasis on whether food banks should exist. They do; they shouldn't in this wealthy country. It is political.

By the way, I quite often put in packs of Green and Black's chocolate. I know that fiver could buy more basics, but I do not see why, just because they are getting food from food banks, it should always be basics or value packs. I help collect, too, for a food bank near me, so know what people give.