Tory MP Lee Anderson’s disrespectful remark that food banks are largely unnecessary is another reminder of a modern phenomenon in which the party insults or patronises the very people it hopes will vote for it (Tory MP blames food poverty on lack of cooking skills, 11 May). This sort of thing generally did not occur in the pre‑Thatcher period.
After Thatcher’s election, Norman Tebbit told us to get on our bikes; Norman Lamont told us a degree of unemployment was necessary to keep inflation down; Michael Portillo told us that we had no respect for authority (we proved it at the following election by kicking him out of his safe seat); John Major told us that we had to get back to basics and family values (before it was discovered that several of his colleagues had got back to basics with someone other than their wife, including Major himself); and today’s party is looking dangerously like the last days of Major. Expect Boris Johnson’s version of the traffic cones hotline.
David Redshaw
Gravesend, Kent
• Over 30 years ago, when I was the chef/proprietor of a small hotel in Somerset, I was asked to help prepare a lunch for a local volunteer-run day centre for pensioners. Our budget then (1990-91) was 50p per person per lunch. I managed to provide a shepherd’s pie, vegetables and an apple crumble for the requisite 50p, but only by leaning on my regular meat and veg suppliers for a discount. Quite how Lee Anderson thinks he can make a meal for 30p in 2022 is beyond me. Gruel anyone?
Tony Rhodes
Ottery St Mary, Devon
• Could Lee Anderson please give a recipe that will provide a meal for 30p, starting from an empty cupboard and giving the cost of each ingredient? If he’s unfamiliar with shopping, eggs are about 11p each, a half-pint of milk is 30p.
Florence Rayner
Sheffield
• Cooking food involves the use of heat. If you can’t afford heat, you can’t cook, however good your culinary or budgeting abilities. Food banks report that users are rejecting potatoes because they can’t afford the gas or electricity to cook them.
Jane M Card
Harwell, Oxfordshire
• Perhaps if the Tories hadn’t removed all practical life skills such as cookery and home economics from the school curriculum, there would be a modicum of justification for Lee Anderson’s remarks.
Peter Fellows
Bradford
• Lee Anderson’s comment has made it totally clear to me: the Tories have all the right policies, it’s just that the UK has all the wrong kind of poor people.
David G Cantrell
York
• I love cookery programmes on TV. Imagine my delight when I heard that someone has pitched the following idea: Lee Anderson cooks healthy meals for just 30p. First episode: desserts, featuring Eton mess and cabinet (thick as) pudding.
Rod Price
Mollington, Oxfordshire
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