Agenda item

This report outlines progress on addressing food poverty in Hammersmith & Fulham, including measures to provide support, Food Bank services and further research being undertaken.

Councillor Vaughan stated that Daphine Aikens, Manager of the Hammersmith & Fulham Foodbank (HFFB) was unable to attend the meeting, but had read the report and had no comments, ‘other than to say that my Trustees and I are very grateful for all that the Council are doing to help us in our effort to launch a third Distribution Centre at 75 Bloemfontein Road’.

Ms Spiller introduced the progress report on addressing food poverty in Hammersmith & Fulham, which included measures to provide support, Food Bank services and further research being undertaken.

A food collection point had been installed at Hammersmith Town Hall, was proving to be a success.

The Council had agreed a Citizen’s Advice Bureau (CAB) funding proposal to enable  the service to work in partnership with HFFB to train their volunteers to become CAB Information and Budgeting Assistants and provide assisted information on money, benefits, budgeting, employment matters and housing matters and carry out an assessment of any further advice and support required and signpost/refer accordingly.

75 Bloemfontein Road had been identified as a suitable location for an additional H&F Food Bank in the north of the borough. The space was in need of renovations and refurbishing and Amey, the Council’s contractor for property repairs and maintenance had agreed to undertake the works under its Corporate Social Responsibility programme. In addition, Amey had agreed to collect the food from Hammersmith Town Hall and take to HFFB.

HFFB would need to secure additional funding for the Bloemfontein  Road site. It was proposed that the Council provided a grant from the 3^rd Sector Investment Fund to support the HFFB service, and to provide support to identify and apply for alternative funding sources as the service developed.

The Trussell Trust was interested in working with the Council and HFFB in the alleviation of food poverty at an early stage.

Councillor Fennimore stated that she was delighted with the joined up approach, and it was planned to put in place other areas of support to reduce the number of people using the foodbank. The Trussell Trust had commended the Council’s innovative way of working.

Mr Naylor queried whether there was a distribution method to help older people who found it difficult to travel. Ms Spiller agreed to discuss this with HFFB and noted that  the Winter Pressures work included food packs being left with community organisations for distribution.

Councillor Vaughan queried the age profile of those using HFFB. Ms Spiller responded that there was a fairly broad age range. It was difficult to get data from the Trussell Trust, which had concerns about confidentiality and use of the data. Food poverty tended to be a short term issue, with people using the foodbank maybe three/four times over a six month period.

Ms Spiller responded to Councillor Carlebach that the highest number of referrals tended to be from the Job Centre in Hammersmith and the CAB. The food vouchers were distributed by some 250 partners across the borough, but people did not always redeem these vouchers. It was planned to undertake a piece of work with HFFB to identify the number of partner vouchers redeemed.

Councillor Vaughan queried how it was intended to sustain the progress. Ms Spiller responded that addressing food poverty was a priority for the Cabinet Member for Social Inclusion. There would be a timescale for what needed to happen to put an infrastructure in place. However, there were resource issues in respect of  HFFB being run entirely by volunteers and the capacity of the Council, HFFB and Trussell Trust. Longer term work would include the prevention of food poverty. A piece of work into the links between worklessness and poverty was at the early stage of scoping.

Councillor Fennimore added that the partnership work was very strong and, whilst the Council would support HFFB, the ultimate goal was for there to be no need for foodbanks.

RESOLVED THAT:

1. The Committee highly commended the progress made against the PAC recommendations made at its October 2014 meeting, and specifically the opening of a site in the north of the borough.

2. The Committee was highly interested in  research into who used the foodbank and the age profile.

3. A further report on the recommendations arising from the work with the Trussell Trust should be added to the work programme.

4. The Committee recommended that the Council and HFFB consider how to accommodate the problem of foodbanks being site specific and people being unable to travel.