Food Banks and Poverty- was Nye right?

NYE Bevin has always been a hero of mine he was a South Wales miner as was my maternal Grandfather. Not too far from the truth if we go on as we are.

What worries me about food banks etc is that charity has replaced social care and as long as we give to such things the government will not feel responsibility. And, if we cut off that charity we will be held responsible.

I haven't seen any reports of people starving to death in the UK and I don't think I will. Do post links if there are any such reports. Though I should be shocked by such news, if there are any such reports I feel I should know about them.

Elsewhere across the world famine and starvation are also gradually being eliminated except in war zones. See ourworldindata.org.

Quite honestly, this is about what's happening in this country; does it not bother you that people have to depend on food banks even when they have jobs or do people have to be riddled with disease and starving for you to feel sympathy....….can you tell me at what level your empathy button is triggered?

Are people starving to death in this country ?

I have met people who choose between fuel and food. I don't know if that counts as starvation.

So, do we have to wait till people are starving before we care? What about people sleeping rough on the streets? Do they count or are they not starving enough??

Does the DWP have a formula on which they base the benefits payments i.e. so much for food, heating, etc., etc?

Not as far as I know. The basic amount was set in stone ages ago and has increased slightly over the years. It's been frozen for years. It has no relationship to anything.

The basic weekly amount for a single person 25 and over is £73.10, £57.90 up to 25 and £114.85 for a couple.

Universal Credit means that people with temporary work/zero hours contracts and the self-employed usually receive less than that.

Is this emaciated enough?

Or this …

"The coroner said that when David Clapson died he had no food in his stomach. Clapson’s benefits had been stopped as a result of missing one meeting at the jobcentre. He was diabetic, and without the £71.70 a week from his jobseeker’s allowance he couldn’t afford to eat or put credit on his electricity card to keep the fridge where he kept his insulin working. Three weeks later Clapson died from diabetic ketoacidosis, caused by a severe lack of insulin. A pile of CVs was found next to his body."

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/09/david-clapson-benefit-sanctions-death-government-policies

I agree with you Labaik. I see people (usually females) dropping a packet of cereal into the bin in Waitrose. These are the same people who moan all the time about tax rises.

I'm sure food banks help, but people in poverty have loads of other needs, which aren't covered by a tin of budget baked beans.

Perhaps somebody could come up with some sort of way to allocate £71.70 so that awful things like this didn't happen. Some sort of ratio so that all the bills would be covered.

Oh no, hang on a minute, that's actually impossible.

Any discussion on these threads are pointless, one poor man died and this can be discussed but any mention of someone
living very comfortably on benefits would cause accusations of
one being a Tory or uncaring.

Honestly, can you live comfortably on benefits? I would like to know, I would.

For what's it worth, I think the benefit system needed an overhaul. A one stop shop idea is sensible. But it was not properly piloted and applied cruelly .

The point I was trying to make is that though bad things, like the starvation, lack of care, and death of David Clapson do sometimes happen and are truly awful, they are also rare, especially in developed countries like the UK, thank goodness and, globally speaking, getting rarer.

I don't think that quote attributed to Nye Bevan was prphetic in the least; I think it was highly, and wrongly, negative. For the most part things have improved since his time.

This does not mean everything is good.

Anniebach Baggs claimed that she'd never seen any reports of anybody starving and thought she never would. She asked people to post links, so I did. That's all!

£73.10 Don't exaggerate!

Anniebach If there is anybody who can live very comfortably "on benefit" (which benefits?), they should honestly be appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer, because such a person is a miracle worker.

Exactly growstuff

I agree with you inkycog. The old system was ridiculous and there were too many "cliff edges". Initially, I thought Universal Credit was a good idea. It would be even better, if it were integrated into an advice service for training opportunities and ways of saving money, etc. However, it quickly became obvious that it was a cost cutting exercise and wasn't designed to be fairer and "make work pay". It was designed to be punitive, in the same way that workhouses were deliberately grim, so that people wouldn't use them.

Growstuff, I think you are being unkind about ladies who drop cereal packets in the Food Bank box at Waitrose. How do you know they complain about taxes. I drop Cereal packets or tinned meat in Tesco Food Bank box and dont complain about taxes. It is a disgrace that people have to use food banks at all but if the Waitrose ladies and people like me didn't do our little bit there wouldn't even be food banks. I hope you contribute .

Because I live in a small town, know many people by face and have canvassed in elections and spoken to some of them.

growstuff Universal Credit IS linked to a support system for training opportunities and saving money. It's all available at the claimant's Jobcentre Plus.