Tory MP Lee Anderson has doubled down on his controversial comments that people use food banks because they can’t “cook or budget”.
The Conservative for Ashfield triggered an online outcry after he made a speech in the Commons on Wednesday saying a large portion of food bank users simply need to taught these basic skills – despite the crippling cost of living crisis which means millions are skipping meals.
On Thursday morning, he defended his claims and told Times Radio that a lot of people out there would be able to stop using food banks with the “right support and the right education”.
He added: “The point I was trying to make was I think the actual food bank use is exaggerated.”
Anderson said he works with a local food bank in Ashfield and they’ve got a “wonderful initiative” where people receive one food package but have to sign up to a cooking course along with a budgeting course at the same time.
The MP also claimed that he was able to make 170 meals for £50 by cooking from scratch, using fresh vegetables and meat from the local supermarket while batch cooking.
He said this would feed a family of five for a week and a half – suggesting the “real nub of the problem” is the “generations of people out there who simply haven’t got the skills to “budget properly”.
Referring to the backlash from his remarks in the Commons, he said: “I’m sort of glad it caused all this fuss because it brings that debate out.”
He then claimed he had invited all Labour MPs to join part in these courses and “as yet not one has accepted”.
Anderson said until people had attempted the cooking course in Ashfield, “you’ve got no right to comment” on his remarks.
“This not me being a nasty Tory,” Anderson claimed.
The MP did then clarify: “There’s always genuine people, Stig, in need. I wasn’t making that point.
“The point I was making is that there’s a lot of people out there who with the right help and the right support and the right education they will be able to fend for themselves.”
However, shadow communities secretary Lisa Nandy suggested Anderson’s comments show the Tories are “living on another planet”.
Speaking to Sky News, she said: ″We’ve got, at the moment, a crisis that is engulfing families and businesses across the country, record inflation – it’s not that people aren’t budgeting properly, it’s that they simply cannot afford the basics.
“And is a damning inditement of 12 years of a Conservative government.”
She said there was a food bank in Wigan which was now giving out “cold boxes” because people can’t actually afford to cook the food they’re being given.
The Labour MP called for significant government intervention to ease the crisis, explaining: “We’ve got to get help to people now, we’ve got to get money back in their pockets, and most of all we have to stop with this sort of patronising rubbish that this is somehow the fault of families who have seen their income drop dramatically in the last few months.”