Tory MP blames food bank use on people not knowing how to cook or budge

choughdancer

Whitewavemark2

I think that we have deviated a long way from the subject?.

The reason people can’t cook proper food is poverty.

Nothing more or less.

I agree with so many comments on this thread, but I think this one sums it up perfectly. Every crisis we have (Covid 19 for example) ends with the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer. Please correct me if I am wrong about this.

It seems to me that we are encouraged by the rich and powerful to blame and misrepresent people in need, by calling them 'benefit fraudsters', 'illegal migrants', 'homeless addicted to drugs and alcohol', ' lazy', 'obese'; anything to make it seem that they are at fault.

The problem is that inequality increases year upon year; the gap between the richest and the poorest widens consistently; the people in power have demonstrably no idea of the situation of people using food banks, filling up tummies with the cheapest carbs and fats. The 'big reset' needs to tackle this, but I don't honestly think it ever will with the system as it is.

I don't think we'll manage to get back to the serious stuff now that this has turned into a Food thread

Threads about inequality are never very popular anyway because few people seem to believe that a very large percentage of the money that the government feeds into the economy is drained out of it by the wealthy, leaving very little for everyone else to share.

So true Maizie.

Not only do people not believe that inequality is getting worse but they don't want to give up what they have.

Accusing people of not being able to cook or budget is just part of the culture war.

I don’t think that learning to prepare for dinner parties or to be ‘a housewife’ is the point. Men cook too, in my world.

If that was a comment on learning to a "cordon bleu standard" it's a very ignorant one.

My point, which you were so damming about, is that now is not the time for the 'cookery lessons'. This is an immediate crisis, not a moral or educational one. It is about not being able to feed your family because you don't have the money to enable you to do so. All else is obfuscation and a cover-up for the government.

Twerp, to be polite, and saying buy value foods! What does he think people have been doing????
The sooner we're rid of these overprivileged spoilt brats running the country the better

GagaJo

Woodmouse

I have always worked to a budget but am amazed at the number of people who don't. I have met folk who don't check their bank statements, use up food leftovers, shop around for the best deals or save up for things. Some people are in hardship because they have been reckless with money.

Let's be clear. They are not the average poor person. The average poor person is in work but is not paid a living wage. Anytime they can't pay rent/mortgage, bills and eat, that isn't poor budgeting, it's poverty.

I had a friend judge me the way you've judged some people when I was poor. I was poor because I didn't earn enough. Not because I was wasteful with money.

My late dear ma, used to say "I don't know WHAT you do with your money" when I had to decline invites to expensive theme park days out with her and my son.... I was always expected to pay our way, and on a low income just couldn't. All she kept saying was... when I had you kids I worked three jobs blah blah, yeah mum but nowadays you cannot take your kids to work with you like you did, and we lived in a large town then. It took one almighty row one day when I just snapped at her, followed by a weeks silence then I wrote all my ins and outs down and posted it to her...we got along much better after that blowup, and my son got to spend much more fun with Grandma doing silly stuff for free!

You obviously didn’t listen to him ? his words have being twisted by scum media. If you had checked before you posted he used to work in a CAB for many years and he helps out in a food bank and in his food bank they teach ppl to cook meals on a budget. And give ppl debt advice to help them. Maybe watch his interview on GBnews from last night. The problem is ppl want fast food quick and don’t know how to cook and it should be taught in schools. One of my staff didn’t even know how to boil an egg and Yes I’m now on benefits and I’ve never used a food bank but I don’t have debt or smoke or drink. Or eat takeaways I actually am a chef.

And?
I'm also on benefits and don't smoke, drink or need a foodbank.
I'm not a chef though.

Shropshirelass

Perhaps he shouldn’t have said what he said, but he is right. I have said for years that schools should not have stopped domestic science lessons (or reduced to 6 week modules). When they do cook in schools they use packet mix and processed food. Many people are frightened of trying to cook and have no idea what some of the ingredients are. All of my children could cook at an early age and still do so now. Cooking skills are passed down the generations, this seems to have been lost for many people.

To be able to cook, you need a few basics in the cupboard already, pepper, salt flour oil, spices herbs etc......... AND the cookware and utensils required to prepare and cook it, you get the idea, and the fuel to cook it with. No amount of lessons at school is going to help with the lack of the basic items. Example, I am not the worlds best cook, but could manage to follow a recipe and cope with substiituting missing items untill recently.
Today, I have been given a carrier bag of swedes, a local farmer had lots stored for animal feed and thought I might make use of them....great, but for the fact I have no butter, no pepper , a tiny bit of salt left, and 83p left on the leccy meter that needs to last all weekend. Currently wondering how ill we'll be eating raw swede....

Nannashirlz

You obviously didn’t listen to him ? his words have being twisted by scum media. If you had checked before you posted he used to work in a CAB for many years and he helps out in a food bank and in his food bank they teach ppl to cook meals on a budget. And give ppl debt advice to help them. Maybe watch his interview on GBnews from last night. The problem is ppl want fast food quick and don’t know how to cook and it should be taught in schools. One of my staff didn’t even know how to boil an egg and Yes I’m now on benefits and I’ve never used a food bank but I don’t have debt or smoke or drink. Or eat takeaways I actually am a chef.

Actilually, you're a good candidate for the £1 per day meal challenge, with your cooking skills.
There is a thread about it, if you're interested?

Pushing tax cuts for the rich uses an illusory truth effect which talks about their beneficial effects on economic performance. Governments have had to say this because such a policy has no moral foundation. The reasoning goes that it will focus the economy on efficiency gains and remove behavioural distortions.

This twisted view of the truth has been proved wrong, in both the USA and the UK. Yet here we are again with a government telling us the lies about the economy are truths and that they don't need to do anything to help the poorest.

Piketty, detailing the growth of top incomes over the 20th century, demonstrated that steady reductions in tax over the decades caused a rapid rise in income inequality. Studies, in both countries, found that lower taxes on the rich, especially top marginal income tax rates, strongly affect the economy in favour of the rich and to the detriment of the poorest.

This government is so antediluvian that it seems some truly believe that the poorest will benefit by the rich getting richer. With such uneducated views, it is time they went.

DaisyAnne

^I don’t think that learning to prepare for dinner parties or to be ‘a housewife’ is the point. Men cook too, in my world.^

If that was a comment on learning to a "cordon bleu standard" it's a very ignorant one.

My point, which you were so damming about, is that now is not the time for the 'cookery lessons'. This is an immediate crisis, not a moral or educational one. It is about not being able to feed your family because you don't have the money to enable you to do so. All else is obfuscation and a cover-up for the government.

Hang on!

I wasn't referring to your comment at all. I wasn't damning anything, and I am certainly not covering up for the government.

As i have said in all my comments on this topic I think that teaching people to cook would be more sensible than teaching 'cutting skills', but also that the root of the matter is poverty, not an inability to cook, so there is absolutely no need to be so aggressive.

It’s much easier to work to a budget when you have money. No expensive card meters, the time and ingredients to batch cook and get creative with leftovers. Big freezer; fuel to cook…

I’ve been on the bones of my arse and I’m much thriftier now I’m not, because my circumstances make it possible.

Missingmoominmama

It’s much easier to work to a budget when you have money. No expensive card meters, the time and ingredients to batch cook and get creative with leftovers. Big freezer; fuel to cook…

I’ve been on the bones of my arse and I’m much thriftier now I’m not, because my circumstances make it possible.

Yup I remember the days when I could afford to snap up offers and bargains, bulk buy things we use all the time, was definately cheaper then

A saying my gran had, was something along the lines of money begets more money, she wasn't wrong

I don't think it is unusual to assume the post that comes after yours is in reply to it Doodledog and you were cutting towards whoever you were addressing.

Agreed. Going to Costco to buy in bulk can save a fortune, for instance, but requires an outlay in the first place.

I'm beginning to wish I hadn't posted on this thread, as this topic brings out the worst in people who make assumptions and judge others, whatever they are saying. It seems like people start out thinking that there is one solution, and anyone who suggests a different one is either over-privileged, a rampant Tory, a loony leftie or doesn't live in whatever their version of 'the real world' happens to be.

I don't think anyone could make a balanced map for 30p, whether they are skint or relatively comfortable, but if they are starting with a full pantry and the gadgets to help them they will have a better chance of making one more cheaply than someone without. Regardless of that, as long as people are expected to work for less than it takes to pay high rents and fuel bills there will be food poverty, and it is a disgrace in a country as rich as the UK.

DaisyAnne

I don't think it is unusual to assume the post that comes after yours is in reply to it Doodledog and you were cutting towards whoever you were addressing.

Oh. So does that mean that you have bothered to read what I said now, and that you realise that I was not making an 'ignorant' comment, or 'damning' your post?

It would have been good to see an acknowledgement of that, if so.

The gap between richer and average is widening and the gap between average and poverty is narrowing.

That MP does not have a clue about families living in accommodation without cooking facilities.

The greedy f*****s don't have a clue about anything except making sure they and theirs are ok.
They don't care.
That's the short and long of it.

I think "They don't care" sums this government up completely MissAdventure.

Skydancer

In the 70s when my children were small we had little money. I bought vegetables and made vegetarian dishes. I learned how to make cheap nutritious meals from scratch. If we couldn’t afford something we did without. Show me a “poor” family who haven’t got a mobile phone each. I don’t consider myself right wing but it’s sadly true that a lot of people haven’t a clue how to budget or cook.

The notion of the ‘undeserving poor’ is alive and well isn’t it ? A mobile phone is pretty much a necessity these days rather than a luxury and with the offers on contracts and pay as you go, are probably cheaper than a landline these days. It’s a myth that poverty is the fault of the poor. How on earth are you supposed to make ends meet on a zero hours contract that pays minimum wage ? Rents are sky high and buying your own home is out of the reach of many these days. Benefits are means tested to the bone and so complicated that people often lose out because they don’t know their way around the system. The gap between rich and poor is widening all the time, but as usual, it’s all the fault of the poor, and if you could just learn to cook and budget all would be fine. What a load of codswallop !!

Doodledog

Agreed. Going to Costco to buy in bulk can save a fortune, for instance, but requires an outlay in the first place.

I'm beginning to wish I hadn't posted on this thread, as this topic brings out the worst in people who make assumptions and judge others, whatever they are saying. It seems like people start out thinking that there is one solution, and anyone who suggests a different one is either over-privileged, a rampant Tory, a loony leftie or doesn't live in whatever their version of 'the real world' happens to be.

I don't think anyone could make a balanced map for 30p, whether they are skint or relatively comfortable, but if they are starting with a full pantry and the gadgets to help them they will have a better chance of making one more cheaply than someone without. Regardless of that, as long as people are expected to work for less than it takes to pay high rents and fuel bills there will be food poverty, and it is a disgrace in a country as rich as the UK.

You’re talking good sense Doodledog, ignore the naysayers.

That's why decent people, who do care (aka everyone else) need to support the vulnerable, nurture the young, look after those who need it - whatever the reasons.

Schools should do this schools should do that, the government tells schools what to teach !