Senior Tory claims people are abusing food banks
People are abusing food banks and using them as a “weekly shop”, Conservative Party deputy chairman Lee Anderson has claimed.
Leading a Westminster Hall debate, the controversy courting MP for Ashield also said, “I don’t do divisive politics”.
“We have got this culture now in some of these deprived areas where people are so dependent on food banks it is like a weekly shop for them,” Mr Anderson said.
“One particular family I was helping, really helping, and they were going to the food bank two or three times a week to get their groceries and then, you know, I see them in McDonald’s two or three times a week.
“I am thinking, my goodness, I don’t want to stop the children going for a treat once in a while but it is all about priorities. If you are really struggling for money and you are going to a food bank two or three times a week, you shouldn’t be going out for fast food, takeaways every week. You shouldn’t be doing that.
“Food banks are being abused. Constituents tell me every single day, now they are either making it up or telling lies or whatever, but they are abused. They are abused, food banks are abused by people who don’t need the food banks – we should target the food banks.”
Protests
As other MPs protested, he added: “You can shake your head all you want.”
Closing the debate on tackling poverty and the cost of food, the Conservative Party deputy chairman said: “Little bit disappointed with some of the divisive comments that came from the opposite side of the chamber today. I don’t do divisive politics. I like to debate sensibly.
“Some of the divisive language was awful. I didn’t say that everybody was abusing the food bank system.”
Mr Anderson noted he said “some people”, adding: “We should be very careful with the tone and delivery in tomorrow’s headlines in the paper because it leads to hatred, it leads to nastiness, it leads to threats.”
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How many times a week does Lee Anderson eat a subsidised meal in the parliamentary estate?
Well Anderson, if this is the case, may be it’s because food banks are beginning to rival supermarkets! What are you and your party going to do about it??!
‘we should target the food banks’
He does realise that food banks are run by voluntary organisations relying on donations? Does he think they are part of the system, and required to separate the deserving from the undeserving poor in the service of government mandated meanness?
“We’ve helped create a culture where some people feel they can abuse the food bank system because there are so many using it, that they’re unlikely to be spotted.”
It’s a bold statement to make.
Would a Tory MP really visit McDonalds 2/3 times a week – or ever?
‘I’ll have a McLobster thermidor with fries, and a bottle of Chablis please. Charge it to my expenses.’
File under ‘things that never happened’.
Of course it didn’t. You’d order the McMeursault with the lobster.
Well, well, yet another Tory talking down the good work the food banks and their – our – communities. Their very existence is due to unwise government policies and the parsimony it engenders. Quelle surprise! What will be news will be when a Tory demonstrates a hint of empathy for the rest of the great unwashed humankind. Isn’t it sad that there are so many ways to be disadvantaged in this slanted society the Tories have created? Antipodean, I regret that the self-evident sensibility of a fair crack of the whip is absent in the upper reaches. More like an… Read more »
I’ve heard that Tory MPs were using food banks
Most food banks require you to get a voucher from various agencies who refer people after viewing their finances. Its not that easy to abuse the system. Perhaps the MP could explain why Shell paid no windfall tax last year, and why the oil and gas companies have continued to profit from war at our expense ? Why we have some of the most expensive energy in the world ? Why his party puts private corporate profit over household budgets. If they changed that, there wouldn’t be so many people using food banks would there Lee !
The concept of the “weekly shop” is alien to many food bank dependents. They are between a rock and a hard place and need to get some relief from that misery. Anderson would do well to direct his energies and efforts at the profiteering utility companies who are emptying people’s wallets faster than ever. He could also go after landlords, most of them H.A’s created or enabled by government, who neglect to maintain homes to a decent standard. Off your high horse old boy and start doing your job for real.