00:00Autumn afternoons outdoors are a routine for Skylie Taylor and her kids.
00:10The fresh air offering some breathing room.
00:13One, two, three.
00:15In a cost of living crisis.
00:17Taking my daughter to the park, like, just think that's the only thing at the moment that doesn't cost money.
00:22The burden of household expenses weighs heavily on the 24-year-old Canberra mum.
00:28I was scraping by to feed everyone.
00:31I think I probably would have been in hospital from being malnourished myself,
00:35putting all the kids first and not feeding myself.
00:38So, yeah, scary place to actually think of.
00:41Last year, she started looking after her younger sisters, but extra mouths brought extra costs.
00:48She turned to local food pantries to get by.
00:52It was hard to reach out for the help.
00:55I felt like I couldn't do it on my own, which isn't a great feeling, being a mum and a sister.
01:02As families feel the squeeze, so too do frontline services.
01:06Are you on the list? Otherwise, write your name.
01:08Just over the ACT border, crowds queue each week at this Queenbeyan community centre
01:14to get their hands on donated groceries.
01:17Hot meals are also in hot demand.
01:21In the last 18 months, with the housing crisis, but also with the cost of living,
01:27we are finding there are people that we wouldn't have necessarily seen beforehand.
01:32A few figures from food rescue organisation OzHarvest shows 77% of charities around Australia
01:39have experienced a surge in people seeking food in the past year.
01:43Families are having to make decisions as to whether to pay the rent, pay the electricity or feed the family.
01:50The OzHarvest data paints a bleak picture of the cost of living crisis in the nation's capital.
01:56Of those seeking food relief around Canberra, 37% are doing so for the first time.
02:03It's the highest rate of anywhere in the country, and the new faces are taking charities by surprise.
02:09It's people who have mortgages, it's people who have double incomes.
02:13And so, I think in Canberra, the general wealth that we experience here
02:19often means that we don't notice this level, this layer of need in our community.
02:25Charities say the sector needs more funding to fight food insecurity.
02:30Thanks so much mate.
02:31But addressing underlying causes of poverty will take bold solutions.
02:36Considering we're supposed to be the lucky country, for a lot of families it doesn't feel that lucky.
02:41Canberrans falling through the cracks, hungry for change.
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