Food banks are taking over from the welfare state, warns Gordon Brown

theguardian.com:

Food banks are increasingly “taking over from the welfare state”, former Labour PM Gordon Brown has warned, amid growing concerns that lack of state support is forcing them into a permanent role in fighting poverty.

With food banks increasingly warning that even working people are seeking help, a new “multibank” model is now emerging to help families with everything from hygiene products to furniture. However, concerns are growing within the food aid movement that their services are becoming so widespread that they are now a crucial fixture, rather than a last resort.

Writing in the Observer last Sunday, Brown, who works with a multibank in Fife, calls on companies to donate their surplus goods and produce more items at cost price as he warns of “rising deprivation among those without money or power”. He also warns food banks are filling the growing hole in support. “As charities take over from the welfare state as our national safety net and the food bank, not the social security system, becomes the last line of defence against destitution, it is difficult not to fear for the future,” he writes.

The Trussell Trust, which works to fight hunger in the UK, distributed a record 3m food parcels in 2022-23, and recent research suggests that basic state benefits given to low-income households are at least £140 a month below the real cost of food, energy and everyday basics.

Keely Dalfen, head of the Brick By Brick multibank in Wigan, said she had thought “long and hard” before deciding to go ahead with the project. “We need to be having these difficult conversations about food banks,” she said. “Charities like us are becoming more and more an extension of the welfare state. That does worry me a lot, because we don’t have the