Steep rise in people seeking help
By Katie O’Keeffe
The number of people accessing food banks across Cork has risen greatly amid the cost-of-living crisis.
City-based food bank charity Feed Cork are seeing a huge demand for their services as the cost-of-living crisis continues to put pressure on people.
“448 families have registered with us so far this year, last year we had 480 families for the entire year,” explained Emma Byrd, volunteer with Feed Cork. She added: “Donations are definitely less than what we would normally get, the people who would have once helped us are now asking for help.”
The charity was established in 2017 and now operates five locations in Cork city and county, Clare, Limerick, and Wexford.
Their aim is to help raise people out of the food poverty that affects one in five people in Ireland. The group heavily relies on donations from the public to create their food packages that help people. However, they are noticing a drop in the amount of donations received.
Households are dealing with rising rent and energy bills and constantly rising fuel prices. Irish shoppers are currently paying up to 70 per cent more than their counterparts in the UK for Irish goods. A tub of Sudocrem for example - an Irish product, is now almost five euro cheaper in the UK. All of these rising costs are forcing people to exhaust all of their income and not have anything left over for the basic necessities such as food.
“We’re seeing people come to us who have exhausted all of their funds, these are people who are working but still struggle to buy food.”
The charity also operates an after school programme which links with 13 DEIS schools in Cork city to provide hot meals to families on Fridays. Feed Cork are currently looking for people to help out with delivery and chill vans. Emma explained their usual service has not been as reliable in recent weeks.
“Without our delivery vans we wouldn’t be able to keep up with our service, so it’s a worry at the moment that we won’t be able to help if we don’t have these deliveries.”
Back to school
“The month of September is a tough month for families who have battled to get everything organised during the summer holidays,” according to Catriona Twomey of Cork Penny Dinners about why families preparing for their children’s return to school in the autumn need help now with back-to-school costs.
At the start of June, the Government agreed a €67m package to help with the back-to-school costs. The package includes a €100 increase in the back-to-school allowance, while school transport fees are being waived for some 122,000 children. Extra school meals are to be offered to more DEIS schools, benefiting 60,000 children.
However, Catriona says her worry is about the kids who are hungry during the summer. “While the kids are at school, many schools would cover feeding the students but during summer holidays there's that extra cost for families to cover.”
She added: “These people are paying so many bills to keep the roof over their heads and keep the electricity on so the food supply gets impacted.”
Similarly, to Feed Cork, Penny Dinners are also seeing a rise in people seeking help for basic needs such as food and clothing.
“We're seeing all walks of life now, families, individuals, working people, people with two jobs, people struggling to keep up with their mortgage, everyone and anyone is being affected and it's all down to the cost of living.”
As the Government takes its eight week recess many people feel as they have been left to fend for themselves in a time of severe hardship. Catriona believes the Government should be nurturing their people throughout the difficulties. “The cost-of-living crisis is rocketing at an alarming rate, homelessness is rising, the current state of affairs in our country needs immediate attention, that can't be given if the Government are on holiday.”
She added: “It's incredible the generosity we are seeing from people who are struggling themselves, we need the Government to have that same nature as well.”