More than half a million children will go hungry during school holiday periods from the October half-term if the government fails to renew a £1bn local welfare crisis fund due to end in six weeks’ time, charities have warned.
English councils last year spent £370m from their household support fund (HSF) allocations on holiday food vouchers for pupils on free school meals (FSM) – but more than a quarter of authorities say this support could disappear if the fund is ditched.
Well, they've still got the child benefit. They could always spend it on feeding the child for a change.
“If HSF ends, with no long-term strategy to replace it, it will instantly plunge millions into more financial turmoil. The effects of poverty, deprivation and even malnutrition will be exacerbated and the additional costs to public services will be huge,” a report by the charity End Furniture Poverty report concludes.
'Furniture Poverty'...? What on earth..?
Yes, Reader, it's a real thing, apparently.
Council-run local crisis support would disappear from nearly a third of English local authority areas covering 18 million people, including Birmingham, Bradford, Nottingham, Westminster, Croydon, Hampshire, Slough, and Stoke-on-Trent. Its removal would also push scores of local food banks to the brink of insolvency, with many having become reliant on HSF cash grants to meet the explosion in demand for charity food as a result of Covid and the cost of living crisis.
Give something away for free and there's a rise in demand for it? Well, imagine my shocked face!
The chancellor, Rachel Reeves, last month identified the £500m HSF budget for the first six months of this year as one of a number of “unfunded” commitments made by the previous government – part of a £22bn spending shortfall – which would come under Treasury scrutiny. Campaigners say they believe ministers will be wary of provoking a public backlash if school holiday food vouchers disappear in many areas of England. A popular campaign led by the footballer Marcus Rashford in 2020 twice forced the then prime minister, Boris Johnson, to reverse plans to scrap holiday free school meals support.
I think campaigners should be well aware by now that Starmer's government couldn't care less about a 'public backlash'...
Campaigners are urging the HSF to be maintained for at least six months. Claire Donovan, the head of policy at End Furniture Poverty, said: “We know the HSF is a sticking plaster, but we desperately need one last extension of funding while an urgent review of local authority crisis support is carried out.”
Let's hope you don't get it. Because you should never have got the initial money in the first place.
A charity to 'end furniture poverty' has a 'head of policy' who is 'concerned' about parents not feeding their children and expects the rest of us to pay for it! Does she get paid for this 'role'? It seems to me that most charities were set up to provide jobs for their founders, so let them provide the cash.
ReplyDeleteMaybe the head of policy is worried the kids will be chomping on his table legs.
DeleteIf a 'charity' receives money from the central government, or local authority, it is NOT a charity, it is a funded non-governmental organisation and, as such, should not be requesting donations from the public. I always that obtaining money under false pretences was a criminal offence?
DeletePenseivat
Julia, I agree, parents are responsible for feeding their children.
ReplyDeleteHowever,
The government must keep taxes low and fuel prices low so that the poorer families have enough take home pay to be able to afford to feed them.
But
As usual with commies, they are all about redistribution of wealth. So they take with one hand and give with the other. It's always inefficient and only benefits those who are deemed worthy; ie. potential voters who like sucking on the public teat. That includes these whingeing charities who are forever holding out their hands demanding more free stuff.
I'd rather have low taxes, small government that only spends what is necessary for the basic provisions to keep us as a nation safe and secure. And only give money to foreigners once we have satisfied our own needs and only then on helping in extraordinary circumstance, not as an obligation imposed on us by some unelected foreign body.