‘Buy a whole chicken from Aldi for £2. Roast it for Sunday lunch. Make chicken sandwiches for the following day. Stew the bones, produce a stock, add sweetcorn and dried noodles for a tasty soup. 3 tasty meals for less than a fiver. It's how I fed my own children on a tight budget.’
This was the (inaccurate) tweet, by self-described Thatcherite Joanna Louisa, that took over Twitter on Sunday evening (inaccurate because, you can't actually get a whole chicken in Aldi for £2, although according to the website you can get their smallest, 1.25kg chicken, for £2.19, which I struggle to see how you'd feed a family of four on with leftovers). Thousands of quote tweets, replies and screengrabs later, it was clear she’d divided opinion in an outrageous manner. Same goes for Dominic Farrell, a former major in the British Army that tweeted about how he’d managed to feet his kids for 22p with Aldi’s Wheat Bisk’s and a splash of milk.
Of course, what both of these people are missing – apart from some humanity for poorer families – is that the ingredients for a specific meal aren’t the only things to account for when adding up how much it can cost to feed a family. As many rightly pointed out online, there are an abundance of other things families have to budget for.
‘I see a load of sentient hams on here think they can do my job today, cobbling together and costing an omelette,’ wrote anti-poverty campaigner Jack Monroe. ‘Pity they left out the price of rent, gas, a cooker, a pan, oil, salt, pepper, plates, lighting, the mental health cost of self-care, and a fucking knife and fork.’
‘Food poverty is a SYMPTOM of a wider set of complex circumstances that encompass every aspect of health and wellbeing,’ she continued. ‘It’s why I don’t just do recipes, but also work to eradicate poverty. In many areas, every day, mostly behind the scenes. You can’t solve this with an omelette.’
Monroe’s tweet was part of a thread about people using her low-budget recipes to prove it’s possible to eat on a budget. But like she says, that is a far too simplistic outlook on tackling poverty. Not only that, but it puts the blame on parents with the same kind of ‘pull yourself up by the bootstraps’ attitude that constantly ignores the very real oppressive factors many people in this country face.
Poverty is caused by a number of factors.
'Poverty is caused by a number of factors, largely to do with work - low pay, zero hour contracts, unreliable working hours, the lack of good quality childcare,’ says Louisa McGeehan Policy Director at Child Poverty Action Group. ‘We don't do enough to support low paid working parents and now they'll be worst hit by the Covid-19 pandemic. More than 70% of children growing up in poverty have a parent who works.’
‘Social security support has been cut or frozen for years - child benefit alone lost £5 in value since 2010 - so the budgets of low-income families have been pared away as wages have stagnated, housing and childcare costs have risen and work has become increasingly insecure,' McGeehan continued. ‘And the two child limit on benefits has caused huge hardship in families affected. Because of the policy around 60,000 families who have had to claim universal credit for the first time because of Covid-19 are discovering that there is no support for their third or subsequent child if they were born after April 2017 yet those are parents who had a third or subsequent child in better times.’
Ultimately, it’s a lot more complex than simply ‘buy some Wheat Bisk’s guys’, and to imply any different is to not only show your own ignorance, but to insult thousands of poorer families who quite frankly, have a much better understanding of poverty than any of the obviously affluent people tweeting their unsolicited advice.
Click through to find ways to help tackle food poverty...
Ways To Help End Food Poverty UK - Grazia
1 of 3Help out FareShare
A charity Marcus Rashford is ambassador for, FareShare redistributes surplus food to charities that turn it into meals. You don't just have to donate, you can also volunteer your time to help them too.
2 of 3Write to your MP
You don't just have to donate money, writing to your MP to ask what they are doing about food hunger is just as important. If your MP voted against extended free school meals, you're more than entitled to ask why and express your anger as a constituent they represent. WriteToThem makes this process easier than ever, simply type in your postcode to find your MP and you'll be met with every elected representative responsible for your area. Simply find your MP, click their name and you'll be directed to a form where you can write whatever you choose to your MP. Your taxes pay their salaries, your votes keep them in or out of office, you deserve to express your voice in how they represent you.
3 of 3The Trussel Trust
Just like FareShare, the UK's leading food hunger charity the Trussell Trust need more than just donations. Check out their 'ways to give' and 'volunteer' pages to see all the ways you can help them end food hunger.
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