THE plight of the hungry and desperate was at the heart of an election campaign visit in the region today (Tuesday, March 31).

Labour’s prospective candidate for Redcar, Anna Turley, was joined by Shadow International Development Secretary, Mary Creagh, when the pair had a tour behind the scenes of a foodbank.

Based at St William’s Church, South Avenue, Dormanstown, near Redcar, the church is used as a warehouse for collecting and sorting food to be distributed to the most needy in society with up to 90 families a week being helped out with basic food items.

Ruth Fox, manager of Footprints in the Community who organises the foodbank, said: “I don’t think people want to come to foodbanks – they only come because they are desperate. Many feel it’s humiliating or it’s embarrassing but we are always here for them and are as welcoming as we can be.”

Ms Turley added: “We (Labour) want to put an end to families having to use foodbanks. There are more and more families in work who are having to rely on them, so we need to address low wages as well benefit sanctions that are leaving people without food.”

As part of the tour the shadow minister spoke of setting up partnerships with local supermarkets to collect and use fresh food that would end up in the bin.

“Nobody wants to see fresh food thrown out,” she said. “It takes fuel to transport them, man hours to grow them – we don’t want to see any food end up on the compost heap.”