Priti Patel says there is no evidence linking sanctions to increased foodbank dependency
A Tory MP says there is no link between benefit sanctions and rising foodbank use.
Employment minister Priti Patel said there was no evidence showing that stopping a person’s benefits led to them seeking emergency supplies from a foodbank.
Patel made the claim during a House of Commons debate.
“We have looked at this issue extensively and we agree with this conclusion reached by the All-party Parliamentary Group into hunger that the reasons for food bank use are complex and overlapping,” she said.
“There is no robust evidence that directly links sanctions and foodbank use.”
The claim was quickly counteracted by SNP MP Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh who said she received heart-breaking accounts about being sanctioned regularly from her own constituents.
“It is absolutely clear from all independent evidence that the sanctions regime is having a heart-breaking effect on people,” she said.
There is no robust evidence that directly links sanctions and foodbank use - Priti Patel
Chairman of the Trussell Trust, Chris Mould, responded by saying the claim is “simply not true.”
“Independent research from the University of Oxford published in April 2015 found that areas of the UK facing greater unemployment, sanctions and budget cuts have significantly greater rates of people seeking emergency food aid,” he said.
“Furthermore, joint research in Emergency Use Only by the Trussell Trust, Church of England, Oxfam and Child Poverty Action Group, found that 19-28% of the foodbank users for whom data was collected had recently had household benefits stopped or reduced because of a sanction.
“Further research, particularly as further changes to the benefits regime are planned, is going to be critical to understanding the scale of the problem.
“We urge the government to review the existing literature on the subject and meet with agencies and charities on the front line dealing with clients affected by benefit sanctions.”
During the same debate a fellow Tory MP also contradicted Patel’s claim.
Andrew Percy, who represents Brigg and Goole on Humberside, said his constituents were being forced to foodbanks because of the way sanctions were being administered.
Despite supporting the sanction regime, he said: “All I know is that those at Mission Trinity, an excellent independent non-political food bank in Goole, tell me that benefits sanctions are driving people to use it.
Percy called for a review of the system to “ensure that the recipients of the sanctions properly understand the consequences."
Patel follows a long line of Tory MPs who defy statistics and deny the link between sanctions and foodbanks.
Iain Duncan Smith routinely refuses to make the link, while Esther McVey steadfastly held the postion during her tenure as employment minister that the dramatic rise in numbers using foodbanks had nothing to do with her government’s welfare reforms.
Scotland's only Tory MP David Mundell was ridiculed earlier this year when he denied the link. He was subsequently sent a dossier of evidence proving the contrary by the Scottish Parliament's welfare reform committee.
A Department for Work and Pensions spokesperson said that the dramatic rise in food bank use is because job centres now point claimants in need to food banks.
