Introduction and context

In the UK, the most well-known charity operating foodbanks is the Trussell Trust, a large, national, Christian franchise which operates a voucher system for people seeking emergency food provision. Their network issued more than half a million emergency food parcels in the first six months of 2016. This staggering number means that the Trussell Trust foodbank network is on course to distribute the highest number of food parcels in its 12-year history during 2016–17 (Trussell Trust, 2016). Overall, however, it is difficult to quantify the exact number of foodbanks in existence as there are many organisations and independent groups that offer charitable food aid.

As foodbank use has risen, the idea that more people are using foodbanks due to their availability has become a popular one within some sections of the mass media and the government. In April 2016, the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Hunger warned that there is evidence of serious and growing hunger in Britain, particularly affecting children, but that many voters ‘no longer believe’ some claims about foodbank demand (APPG, 2016). In reality, people are largely using foodbanks as a last resort, due to factors such as benefit delays, sanctions, debt and low pay. Almost half of the reasons people cite for using foodbanks can be attributed to austerity-led welfare reform (Trussell Trust, 2016). Empirical evidence from academics and frontline charities has further shown how benefit sanctions and delays, fuel poverty and low-paid, insecure work drive people towards foodbanks (see Lambie-Mumford, 2014; Perry et al, 2014; Loopstra et al, 2015; Garthwaite, 2016a).

This growth in food banks has coincided with a popularisation of the genre of ‘poverty porn’ television shows, together with an ever-present government narrative which blames and shames people using food banks for their own situation, resulting in many ‘hidden costs’ (Purdam et al, 2015) of using a foodbank. Such ideological myths of ‘shirkers and scroungers’ (Garthwaite, 2011), ‘troubled families’ (Shildrick et al, 2016) and the ‘abject’ citizen (Tyler 2013) have become increasingly visible as welfare reform and austerity has gone on. Wells and Caraher (2014) note how a frequent theme of newspaper articles from Conservative politicians characterised people using a foodbank as ‘unable to manage their personal finances, [they are] freeloaders abusing the service the foodbank offers or they are opportunistically taking advantage of the burgeoning network of foodbanks offering free food’ (2014: 1436).