MADAM – Last year, thanks to generous local people, Stroud Foodbank provided emergency food for three days to 3,387 people, including 1,306 children.

Other charities, such as Marah, provided hot meals to the homeless.

So was disturbing to see in the SNJ that stocks are running low at the Foodbank warehouse.

In December 2013, MPs were briefed that the government’s welfare reforms would have “a significant effect on families reliant on benefits and tax credits… and there may be a knock on effect on demand for the services of foodbanks”

The need for foodbanks continues to rise at an unprecedented rate.

Trussell Trust foodbanks fed almost 350,000 people April to September 2013 – triple that for the same period the previous year. Can charities continue to pick up the responsibility for helping increasing numbers of destitute people – previously a duty of the state?

Should they?

Contrary to popular belief, people turn to foodbanks as a last resort. Many are working people relying on tax credits, housing benefit etc to top up woefully inadequate wages.

Frequently, it is delays or changes to these benefits that tip them over the edge.

Or they may be struggling with increasingly unjust and punitive conditions and sanctions, if claiming employment support or jobseeker’s allowance.

Government rhetoric is misleading, and sets people against each other, while diverting attention away from the misery the cuts cause.

In reality, benefits subsidise employers paying low wages, and landlords charging unaffordable rents.

We are one of the richest, yet most unequal countries in the world, where those struggling to get by are hit the hardest; yet large corporations evade tax, and bankers continue to take huge bonuses. (HSBC chief executive is awarded a £32,000 a week rise).

Is this a society you want to belong to?

Christine Stockwell

Stroud Against The Cuts