Feeding yourself on £5 per week?

Could you feed yourself for £5 a week?  This is about 70p a day – just about covering the cost of a loaf of bread.  Emerging findings from a Bevan Foundation study into the Social Fund has found that this is exactly what is being asked of some people who find themselves without money, and in need of urgent funds to feed themselves and their family.

There have been very few studies into the Social Fund, which is the ‘safety net’ that exists to protect the most vulnerable people within society.  As part of our Cuts Watch Cymru project, we are specifically looking at changes to the Crisis Loans.  These are loans which are paid to people who find themselves in urgent need of cash to feed themselves, or pay for an item which they urgently need, that are repaid through future deductions from their benefits.  Last April, the current UK Government decided to restrict the number of Crisis Loans each person in the UK is able to receive to 3 per year.  This effectively means that after the third time you find yourself in urgent need of a loan from the state to feed yourself you are left with nothing.  The safety net vanishes.

As our study into the Social Fund progresses, and in particular as we have looked further at restrictions to the Crisis Loans, the more harrowing stories we have come across.  With rising unemployment, huge increases in the cost of living, and further benefit reductions, you don’t have to look hard to see why more people today in Wales are finding themselves without money for food.  However, even if they are granted one of their 3 lifelines per year, we have found that the money they receive may be woefully inadequate.  In the early stages of our research we heard from one person who had received a £20 crisis loan and another who had received a £23 crisis loan.  Both individuals were expected to feed themselves for a whole month with this loan.  For most people this would not last them more than a couple of days, and yet, at the same time, people are being told by the state that this is enough to last them a whole month.  If you actually break this down, as I did above, it works out at about 70p per day – can 70p pay for 3 meals per day?

It beggars belief that somebody can be offered such a woefully inadequate ‘safety net’ today in Wales.  However, whilst the present looks bleak, there is hope for the future.  The current Welsh Government consultation is asking for views on how Crisis Loans should be delivered in Wales from 2013 – when the UK Government passes the Welsh Government the responsibility to deliver the system in Wales.  This is the perfect opportunity for Wales to design a system that protects its most vulnerable citizens.  Whilst our research into the Social Fund continues, one thing is clear, from 2013 onwards, nobody in Wales should be expected to feed themselves on £5 a week.

Cuts Watch Cymru is a research project that aims to capture the impact of the cuts on the most vulnerable people in Wales. The project will be launching its first report on 28th February at the Norwegian Church from 12pm – 1.30pm. For more details please contact Lila Haines at Oxfam Cymru on [email protected] 

Michael Donnelly is Policy and Research Officer at the Bevan Foundation