Southend Foodbank: August was our second busiest month ever and winter's looking 'bleak'
They've already given away more food this year than they did in the entirety of last year
As the cost of living crisis continues, an Essex foodbank has warned they're expecting a 'bleak' winter.
Southend Foodbank says this August was their second busiest month ever on record and that they saw a 79% increase in the number of people they fed compared to the same month last year.
Cass Francis is from the charity: "August was a real surprise for us.
"We normally have a drop off in numbers during the summer months because nobody's feeding a meter, you don't have to put the heating on, you don't have to worry about updating the school uniform just yet, normally it's nice...
"But this August hit and it has been the second busiest month we've ever had in nine years. We really weren't expecting it.
"That's a 79% increase this August compared with the number of people that we fed last August.
"For every 10 people we had last year, we're feeding 18 people this this August - if this is what it's like in August with the sun still out, I'm not entirely sure where October is going to go...
"We've given away more food this year already than we did in the entirety of last year, so when people ask me what's going to happen, I can't think of anything good to say."
She suggests the new Prime Minister's attempts to ease the rising cost of energy, by introducing a price cap on energy bills at £2500, isn't doing enough to help those struggling: "Capping bills is a great idea, except they're being capped at twice the amount they were last year.
"We've already got people coming to food banks all over the country and this is not going to make that better for all those people...
"It's definitely not going to be enough to help people through this winter."
Cass notes the charity is also being impacted by increasing costs: "We've had a short fall in donations - around 8% - because people have less money to spend, food is more expensive and they've got their own bills to pay...
"The Southend Foodbank warehouse is in a building that doesn't have any insulation, so we're looking forward to some fantastic energy bills ourselves, too.
"At the moment we've not been feeling those costs, but that will be on the cards for us... We're going to have to have a strategy put in place for how we'll cope. I think it's going to be really bleak."
Cass says she'd love to see foodbanks become a thing of the past, but doesn't think that'll happen anytime soon: "Foodbanks were only ever supposed to be emergency food providers.
"It used to be that you'd have the five or six week wait for Universal Credit to kick in and we were there to help people get through it... We were never supposed to be part of the system... but we've become so embedded in society, it's a real, damning indictment of the society we currently live in.
"It's wonderful we're there, but isn't it awful we're there? People should be able to afford to buy food and heat their homes."