Food Bank Donations

Winter_Phoenix

I'm sure that everyone who has posted criticisms of the foodbank system is correct. There ARE people who cheat the system, there ARE reporters who con their way into being given food, there ARE politicians who should act, there ARE ungrateful recipients who want to pick and choose.

To me, none of that is as important, and urgent, as the fact that children are going hungry in 21st century Britain, and foodbanks are feeding those children.

The carrier bag of shopping I take to the nearest foodbank every week won't feed a family, but at least it means that some unknown child will have nourishing suppers and breakfasts this week, and their mum or dad a few cups of tea or coffee.

meritaten

there are always people who abuse a system. there will always be the 'undeserving poor'. but, I would rather donate and know that the system is working, than not donate and think that some family is going hungry.
saying that - its absolutely bluddy shameful that families have to go to foodbanks in the first place!
and the major cause of it is - the system messing up benefits. they can stop a benefit immediately - yet it takes weeks to get it put right. in that time the family spirals into debt and poverty.
monthly wages don't help either - when starting a job the benefit often stops on the start date - not the date of first pay - which can leave a two month gap in money.

Teg-Rem

I volunteer in my local food bank once a week, in fact I have been there today. It is run by a local church through the Trussel Trust. People who come for food have to be referred either through a homeless charity, the job centre, the salvation army, CAB, or other such agencies, none through a GP. and they have to bring with them a voucher to say that the said agencies have seen them and referred them, so no-one can just "turn up" and get "free" food. They are all genuine recipeints and most grateful for the small way in which we can help them out. Also only 3 vouchers a YEAR can be accepted, so you have to be in real dire straits to come in the first place, and believe me most would rather not have to come in at all. hope this goes some way to informing people on the ways in which foodbanks operate.

honeythewitch

Teg-Rem wrote: »

I volunteer in my local food bank once a week, in fact I have been there today. It is run by a local church through the Trussel Trust. People who come for food have to be referred either through a homeless charity, the job centre, the salvation army, CAB, or other such agencies, none through a GP. and they have to bring with them a voucher to say that the said agencies have seen them and referred them, so no-one can just "turn up" and get "free" food. They are all genuine recipeints and most grateful for the small way in which we can help them out. Also only 3 vouchers a YEAR can be accepted, so you have to be in real dire straits to come in the first place, and believe me most would rather not have to come in at all. hope this goes some way to informing people on the ways in which foodbanks operate.

What about the people with no benefits for two months? Do they only get fed three times and go hungry the rest of the time?

meritaten

honeythewitch wrote: »

What about the people with no benefits for two months? Do they only get fed three times and go hungry the rest of the time?

Short answer - Yes.

happened to my son and his family - the benefits people didn't care if they starved, and luckily it was summer or they could have frozen to death.

My OH isn't on good wages himself and we found it a real struggle to help them. The food bags were a godsend for the three weeks they had them (out of nearly 11 weeks) - but, what would have happened if they hadn't had us?

kerri_gt

My local food bank has a list but I recall them saying before that they really appreciate tins of fish / meat. I guess because these are more costly, they probably get less donated.

Around xmas time I also delivered some xmas specific items like stollen, gingerbread, that kind of thing. It wasn't on the list and I checked with them first but they were delighted saying that everyone deserves a treat at xmas.

Another thing to note, i happened to have some items that were nearing or just past their Best Before date, again I checked if these could be accepted and they were (they just asked I leave a note in the bag highlighting this so they could be used first) - not all food banks may accept items past BB (that's best before and not Use By) but worth checking before throwing something out.

blackandwhitebunny

I work quite closely with a local food bank and they always prefer to get two smaller items than a big one. They're not linked to anyone else and due to a local supermarket's delivery depo they seldom run short of food so basically give whatever people can carry. And that's the problem - lots of the people in need are reliant on public transport so can't carry huge amounts. Smaller bottles and packets mean that people can get a bigger variety of items, important when its often quite plain food to start with.

meritaten

the food banks don't do fresh or frozen stuff - so those tins of peas, carrots, green beans, sweetcorn, new potatoes etc are really important. and often people don't think of them - in the weeks my son had 'food bank bags' there wasn't one tin of veg. and I think an occasional tin of chicken in white sauce or chilli con carne would be lovely!
and Tortilla Wraps? food banks don't do bread either. these can make a lovely alternative to a sandwich.

I try to donate items like these - I don't mean to sound ungrateful, but sometimes its really hard to come up with meal ideas from the contents of food bags. especially when its mostly baked beans. or tinned spaghetti. my DIL called me in to help her and frankly I got flummoxed! and if I hadn't provided items like bread, cheese, sausages - they would have lived on bowls of beans/spaghetti for a week.

MacaronVanille

Really inspired to go and donate now. I imagine pesto would be quite nice to give as it has so much flavour.

Home bargains does really cheap jars of herbs and spices which could be good. Bland food is never good!

toontron

Following the death of my Dad, I was clearing out the food cupboards, all the food was well within date, and due to my Dad's illness he couldn't eat much so there was a great variety and quantity of foodstuffs. I emailed my local foodbank a list of the items asking if they would like me to drop them down.

Well they sat in bags in the hallway for two weeks, so I emailed a gentle reminder, and got a reply saying they were too busy to look through lists of items and received a great number of emails and that their staffing levels meant that they could not answer them all. Apparently I could have taken the items down and "they would see what they wanted".