Part 133. Support cooperatives (4)

I noted the need for foodbanks over fifteen years ago and helped form a community interest company to promote their development. The speed of the growth in the number of foodbanks has surprised me, although the need for them and the causes of that need are clear. Too many people live in abject poverty and need help.  Society should will the means to take individuals out of poverty. Instead government pays lip service to overcoming poverty and leaves it to the voluntary sector to pick up the pieces of broken lives. It is a tragedy.

There is no quick fix solution. What is required is better education, better health and wellbeing provision, better housing,  better public transport, better job opportunities, better care for the elderly and so on. People have been saying this for many years but government is bedevilled by short-termism and the realisation that there are not many votes to be gained by promoting policies to bring about improvement. And so the causes of poverty continue. We have sink schools, a health service on its knees, poor quality and quantity of social housing, declining public transport etc.

Christians are providing bandages. We need to campaign for fundamental  changes in  policy and expenditure priorities of government. 

Foodbanks are either self-standing organisations or part of a larger organisation. They may be community interest companies, or unincorporated associations or limited companies with or without charitable status.They are not operating as cooperatives. The clients of foodbanks are not members with equal voting rights. The Rochdale Pioneers saw self-help as the key to improving their lives.  This is an approach churches should encourage and support.