Food campaign supported
The BFAWU foodworkers’ union’s ongoing “right to food” campaign gained the support of last month’s TUC Congress. The union’s motion called for a right to affordable, nutritious food to be enshrined in law, highlighting that up to 11 million people suffer from food poverty in Britain.
The motion was backed by the British Dietetic Association and Unite.
The union wants clarity on the government’s obligations on food poverty.
In 2019, the government commissioned Henry Dimbleby, co-founder of food chain Leon, to carry out a major review of England’s food system by focusing on its impact on the environment, the nation’s health and the safety of the country’s food supply.
BFAWU general secretary Sarah Woolley, who has been vocal in calling on the review to be more focused on ending food insecurity and hunger, said the new strategy needed to bring meaningful change and recommend a “right to food” law.
Instead, “it offers little more than crumbs in the fight against hunger,” she said of the latest review findings released earlier this year. “Food sector workers like our members who have produced the food to keep shelves stocked throughout the pandemic, often come home to empty cupboards, due to low pay and insecure work.”
Woolley said the union will not sit back “while people are struggling to survive”, adding that the campaign for the right to food to be enshrined in law “will only grow until we end the scandal of food poverty”.