Note what it is that they actually say here, not what people will say that they say:
The most common reason for people needing to attend a Trussell Trust food bank was because of delays in receiving benefits payments or due to changes in the benefits they were entitled to.
Over two in five people attending Trussell Trust food banks between April and September this year gave benefits changes or delays as one the reasons they needed emergency food.
Note what it isn’t. It’s not sanctions, punishments, it’s not policy. It’s incompetence on the part of the bureaucracy, nowt else.
And yet there will be the usual cries that government must take over this vital service because…..
“David McAuley, Chief Executive of The Trussell Trust, said: “… it’s clear that more can be done to get people back on their feet faster. Many food banks now host independent welfare and debt advisers but they cannot solve all the issues.
“To stop UK hunger we must make sure the welfare system works …”
Spot on!
It cites changes in benefits. Why have they changed? If it’s because the government has pissed about with the system (for good reasons or bad) without properly establishing a process for doing so then it’s as reasonable to blame the policy (and the implementation thereof) as it is to blame the bureaucracy that can’t handle it.
Most of the changes the Tories have made seem fair enough from a policy point of view – but there have been massive problems in practice, and if you’re going to cut entitlements then the least you can do is be ready to hand out the reduced amount.
It’s not like you to give the politicians a pass for their unending ability to fuck things up, Tim!
TTG: “If it’s because the government has pissed about with the system (for good reasons or bad) without properly establishing a process for doing so then it’s as reasonable to blame the policy (and the implementation thereof) as it is to blame the bureaucracy that can’t handle it.”
You think the civil service can’t handle change, that they have no mechanism for it?
It’s interesting that people who are the third generation to be drawing benefits, or who are living unemployed near former pits where we’ll never dig coal again aren’t a cause for concern, but anyone who’s ever used a foodbank due to a temporary problem is.
The foodbanks are a sticking plaster. 9 days food a year is not going to solve many issues beyond 9 days or so of eating.
Its also a ‘one size fits all’ solution when the actual problem may require hours or days of time to get a solution done. If a solution can be done.
But the supporters crow about the numbers they help – whereas those actually trying to help get on with the job.
An example, not that uncommon from my own experiences.
Old man, long term alcoholic with some health issues and previously lost accommodation for breaking rules, violence while drunk and weeing where he wants to. In and out of prison.
3 days food doesn’t help much when on the streets. Few, if any, places will take someone failing risk assessment.
Every year he is part of the success the foodbank crows about, every year they give a bunch of food he sells for drink and he has the same problems year after year.
Probably dead by now, haven’t seen him in a while.
The sticking plaster helped him get more cider, not sure what else help they have ever tried as his circumstances never changed.
@ Julia
I think that successive governments have dicked about with everything at a policy level and the infrastructure in place for delivery has never kept up. Part of the blame lies with the civil service, but even the most nimble and able would struggle mightily.
Large private organisations have all the same problems.. where the powers that be drop their decrees and expect everything to happen by magic.
We know that the government is, for example, a terrible procurer of IT. They really should fix that, but in the meantime those at the top have to understand this weakness and adjust their tinkering accordingly. Instead, they make policy in line with the news cycle and hand the mess they’ve made to the people still drowning in whatever mess they got handed last week. It’s clusterfucks all the way down.
How much of that is failure to enact the rules properly (executive), as opposed to having bad rules in the first place (legislative)?
@ Andrww M
Some of it is just losing pieces of paper, elementary incompetence.