Politics isn’t working when a country as wealthy as Britain can’t feed its people

On Wednesday, the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs select committee released a report on food security, which I’d wager most front benchers were hoping would be quietly forgotten. And for the most part, they got their wish: the report received very little coverage – with the noble exception of the Guardian’s Patrick Butler.

The thrust of the report is that there needs to be another inquiry into the use of food banks. Butler notes: “despite a growing number of people relying on emergency food aid ministers collect no robust data on this phenomenon, or analysis on why it is happening.” He observes that the government is “neurotically incurious” about the re-emergence of hunger in the UK, which is – let’s remind ourselves – one of the wealthiest countries in the world.

Last year, Class published a blog by Richard Bridge looking at the reasons behind the rise of food banks in this country. Bridge found that the devolvement of crisis assistance to local authorities in 2013 – shortly after localising Council Tax Support and the introduction of the bedroom tax – had led to a situation where social security was unevenly distributed and had been stripped back to its bare bones. Food banks are therefore part of a wider picture in which faith groups and charities are acting as secondary but leaky safety net to make up for the failings of the welfare state.

In other words, this is a process of changing the “social safety net” we all rely on from something the state supplies as statutory, to an optional system where voluntary and third sector organisations help those who need it if they feel moved to do so. Bridge says: “Multinational corporates have quickly moved onto the turf [of food banks] to salve their corporate social responsibility, thereby legitimising the notion of hunger as a matter for charity and depoliticising debate on the right to food.”

I’m of the mind that this is a deliberate exercise from the government, and the reason ministers don’t want anyone poking around in the data is because whoever does will likely discover government policy (particularly with regards to benefits) is causing a lot of people to fall through the cracks. So in the interim, we can expect more asinine comments from culprits such as Lord Freud, who argue the surge in food bank use is simply because people like free stuff.

Despite the government’s best efforts, food is extremely political. The far-right knows this, which is why the BNP attempted to set up food banks and why Golden Dawn give out free milk in Greece. One way Labour could ensure ground isn’t ceded to UKIP is by pushing for another inquiry into food banks, as well as calling for a proper system to monitor the growth of food banks, who is using them, and why people need them. It’s no wonder there’s a sense that politics isn’t working when a country as wealthy as Britain can’t feed its people.