00:00I'd like to congratulate the Right Honourable Member for Aberdeenshire North and Moray East
00:06for securing this important debate. The work that food banks do is invaluable and in my
00:12own constituency of Bracken, Radnor and Kemptowie, I'd like to personally thank all of the volunteers,
00:17the dedicated volunteers, who run them for the tremendous work they do across our communities.
00:23There's Pantry Food Bank in Pontardower, there's one in Bracken, Knighton and Pristine, Llandrindod
00:29Wells, Rheada, Ystragynlais, Ystilivera and Gwancaegeryn, all of which provide vital support
00:35to people in our communities, helping those in need. And that need is growing across Wales.
00:43Food bank parcel distribution increased by 77% since 2018. An estimated 6% of households
00:52in Wales accessed food aid last year and one in four households in Wales is either eating
00:58smaller meals or skipping meals altogether. In Wales, child poverty rates are significantly
01:05worse than elsewhere in the United Kingdom. In my own region, a staggering one third of
01:11children in Neathport Talbot Council and 20% in Powys live in absolute poverty. And these
01:18high child poverty rates have remained stubbornly high across Wales, not moving barely at all
01:25since the early 2000s. And this can only represent a failure of policy and political will across
01:32successive governments on both sides of the M4. Volunteers at food banks often say that
01:38although the work they do is valuable, they shouldn't need to exist at all. They exist
01:44due to our state's failure to address poverty within our communities and to adequately support
01:49those who are struggling to make ends meet. Tackling food poverty requires a cross-sector
01:55approach. The rising costs of energy and housing are pushing more and more people into poverty.
02:01The cost of energy itself makes producing food in this country even more expensive.
02:06In Wales, we urgently need to see more investment and well-paying jobs brought back into deprived
02:13areas. Former mining communities, such as those in the south of my constituency, are
02:18still waiting for their new industries to arrive. The new government cannot afford to
02:24continue to make the mistakes of the past. We cannot end up in a situation where the
02:28same number or more children are relying on food banks in 10 years' time as they do today.
02:35And we will continue to hold this government, as well as those in the devolved parliaments,
02:39to account to ensure that this isn't the case.
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