Inequality is becoming entrenched as food bank use rises again.

At the end of April, the Trussell Trust, the charity running most of the UK’s food banks, published its end of year figures. They do not make for happy reading.

Over the year from April 2018 to March 2019 the trust has given out 1.6 million three-day food parcels, half a million of these went to children.

Amongst the reasons for having been referred to their local food bank given by users 33.11% said their income, even from full time work, was not enough to cover basic living costs.

Users also cited delays in payment of benefits (20.34%) and changes to the benefit system (17.36%) as reasons why they were struggling to make ends meet.

Chief Executive of the Trussell Trust Emma Revie said ‘what we are seeing year upon year is more and more people struggling to eat because they simply cannot afford food. This is not right.’

The biggest driver of the rise in food bank use has been the rollout of Universal Credit, with many claimants having to wait five weeks or longer for their first payment, leaving them without money for basic living costs.

As currently constructed Universal Credit was, Emma Revie said, ‘sweeping’ people into the poverty from which it was supposed to be protecting them.

These latest figures about the rise in food bank use were released just before the publication of the Social Mobility Commission’s sixth State of the Nation report.

Based on analysis of data produced by the Office for National Statistics this shows that inequality is becoming entrenched in the UK.

Among the report’s findings are that people from a better off background are 80% more likely to end up in professional jobs than those from a working class one. Social mobility has stagnated since 2014 something that has largely gone ignored as political leaders have become increasingly distracted by the protracted disagreements around leaving the EU.

Dame Martina Milburn, chair of the Social Mobility Commission, said ‘at a time when our country needs to be highly productive, we must find a way to maximise the talent of all out citizens, especially those that start the furthest behind’.

Just how far behind inequality forces some families to start behind is shown by the report’s finding that those most in need of the thirty hours free childcare offered by the government are the least likely to take advantage, mostly because they don’t know it is available.

Although there are more disadvantaged 16 to 18-year-olds in further education funding for colleges has fallen by 12% since 2012. Only 16% of students who had free school meals are achieving two A Levels by the age of 19, compared to 39% from other social groups.

The report recommends that the government increases spending on further education for 16 to 19-year-olds and pays a premium to support the most disadvantaged.

Almost half (49%) of adults from disadvantaged backgrounds have received no training since leaving school and are likely to be paid less than the living wage, the report found. This is the group that will be hit hardest by the increasing automation of many routine jobs.

Despite this funding for adult education has been cut by 62% over the past decade and many further education colleges are being forced to make yet more cuts to staff and courses.

The report calls for government departments to lead the way by becoming Living Wage employers. Director of the Living Wage Foundation Katherine Chapman said there was ‘cross party and public support for the real living wage, but there are still staff working in vital public sector jobs who are struggling to get by.’

She added that it was time ‘for our major public institutions to lead by example’.

Tackling endemic inequality isn’t just about making the UK more productive, important though that is. It is about bringing back basic fairness to our society and giving individuals the dignity that comes from having agency over their own lives.

As Emma Revie put it, nothing her charity does ‘can replace the dignity of having financial security’, which is why the Trussell Trust are using their #5WeeksTooLong campaign to call on the government to ‘ensure benefit payments reflect the true cost of living, to help ensure we are all anchored from poverty.’