The Trussell Trust’s recently published report: ‘State of Hunger: A study of poverty and food insecurity in the UK’ cites evidence to show that the drops or gaps in income that drive benefit claimants to food banks are “frequently designed into the benefit system".
It specifically calls out: the five week wait for the first Universal Credit payment, benefit sanctions, changes to eligibility for health-related benefits, the benefit cap, ‘bedroom tax’ and, last but not least, the rules around how much benefit can be deducted.
Download the full report at stateofhunger.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/State-of-Hunger-Report.