Devizes Food Bank

Hunger is not just a third world problem. Many people are living on the edge of poverty within our Kennet area. Over the last year more than 500 food boxes were issued right here to people in need.

Your food bank helped our member when she had her benefit money stolen. She still had two young boys to feed; so thank you very much

All it takes is low income and a sudden, unexpected event; a bereavement, relationship breakdown, illness, redundancy or theft; to throw people into a genuine crisis. Take a look at these (click here) example cases from our distributors, to see what we mean.

Donations to the Devizes Food Bank (UK charity registration number 1125441 ) provides people with essential food at a time when they need it most, covering the time it takes before other parts of our social care infrastructure can come into play.

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The Territory We Cover

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CASE STUDIES

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A young mother and child had just gone into suitable accommodation. The families benefits went completely adrift due to this change in circumstances, and mother was without funds to meet the basic needs around her child. We delivered a food parcel. The little girls eyes lit up and she said "Oh mummy its just like Christmas and its all food and I like everything in the box". One very happy mum and child who otherwise were looking at an hungry few days. Government departments aren’t available to sort it out outside working hours.

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I have had one family where the partner left, abandoning his wife and four children. The family had no money and very little food in the cupboard. We were able to supply them with emergency supplies to tide them over the weekend. Many of the boxes we hand out are for families that, due to a sudden change of circumstances, have to wait for benefits to come through.

We have only given out one food box so far (we have one here in the office ready for the next need). The family who had the food box was a single parent mum with one child of 3 years old. Mum had been having difficulty with benefits and had not received any benefits for some months. She had used all her savings and had no food in the house. The Food box enabled her to manage for a little longer and her benefits are now sorted out.

I visited a lady (single parent with at least one teenage child at home) who had been mugged in the street on a Thursday evening and had her handbag stolen. Her losses included her bank ATM card, credit cards and cash. She contacted the police and on their advice cancelled all her cards. She then realised that she had no cash or food for the weekend, and she had no way of getting any money for food until her new bank cards arrived on the Monday or Tuesday of the following week. Even then it would be difficult as she had just withdrawn her money to go shopping, so there was very little in the account. The Police referred her to us, and I was able to deliver a family food parcel to her to tide her over until she could sort things out with the bank. It was also an opportunity to discuss the other services we could offer and reassure her that we could visit again and support her if any other issues arose from the mugging, such as a court case; if she needed the locks changed; or needed help to fill in forms to apply for new documents such a driving licence.

She was extremely pleased to receive the food parcel; it was one less thing for her to worry about. She otherwise had only what was in the cupboards for the weekend following week. She knew she would be spending a lot of Monday in the bank trying to sort out a loan etc to tide her over, so at least she didn’t have to worry about how to feed herself and her family in the meantime.

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