Food Prices and Food Poverty
Opposition Day — [Un-allotted Day]
5:43 pm
Nia Griffith (Llanelli, Labour)
Obesity may very well be on the increase because unhealthier foods are the only type that some families can afford; they cannot afford the healthier alternatives. That is a real issue. People look at the different pricing mechanisms and go for what can fill them up. That is the type of food that they are having to rely on now. They do not have the luxury of choice.
Let me move on from pricing in supermarkets and our adjudicators Bill to my worry about families who cannot afford something very basic: enough food to eat. That is very serious. It is nothing to be proud of that we need to have food banks; that is something that we do not want to see. We do not want anybody to have to rely on charity for something that every family should be able to afford. We want proper policies that will put money in the pockets of the people who need to spend it on food. No one in this country—one of the richest countries in the world—should have to look to charity for food. We need to make absolutely certain that the policies put in place deliver fair prices for consumers and farmers, and that the distribution of income levels is fair, so that those who have the least can make the purchases that they need to make to feed their family. It is an absolute disgrace to rely on food banks to do something that everyone should be able to afford to do: feed their family.