The “out of touch” award this week goes to Lee Anderson, a Conservative MP who claimed in the Commons that there isn’t a massive need for food banks in the UK. As he sees it, the problem is that families don’t know how to cook or budget. His comments were refuted by his local food bank as well as campaigners such as Jack Monroe, famed for her tight-budget recipes, who artfully put it: “The square root of fuck all is ALWAYS going to be fuck all, no matter how creatively you’re told to dice it.”
One problem with out-of-touch politicians is that they are unable to imagine how bad things can get and overestimate the ability of families (and voters) to cope. Right now, the dashboard is flashing red. The Bank of England has forecast that inflation will reach 10% this year, as the energy price cap is lifted and the economic shocks from the war in Ukraine continue. For some families, the impact will be felt more deeply still – for those who live in poorly insulated homes, who are disabled and haven’t benefited from existing measures, or who already only spend on the bare essentials. The former boss of Sainsbury’s has declared that the UK’s “golden era” of cheap food is coming to an end. Two million adults didn’t eat for a whole day in the past month due to tight finances, and the National Institute for Economic & Social Research (NIESR) has warned that an additional 250,000 households face destitution in 2023.
