Yesterday our cafe/foodshare manager, Emily Carrigan, delivered a powerful message to a City Council meeting. She shared about Rainbow Junktion's work and our fears for the desperate plight of so many in our community during this cost of living crisis. Imam Qari Asim, Matthew Magnus Hall and our vicar, Heston Groenewald, joined her in representing the LS6 community. Heston extends our thanks to our ward councillors Jonathan David Pryor and Al Garthwaite for inviting them, and for keeping their eyes wide open to the pain and struggles in our city's life.
Here you can read the speech that Emily shared at the meeting:
Imam Qari, Rev Heston, Brother Magnus and I are a deputation from Rainbow Junktion, a community café and foodshare, based in LS6. Hyde Park is a dense, diverse mix of cultures, religions and socio-economic groups. We share food, company, advice services and a warm space with LS6 neighbours, and increasingly with people from across Leeds, as need grows for the food and support we offer.
Rainbow Junktion is a community café and foodshare, but food insecurity is just one of the many complex and connected struggles that our customers are facing on a daily basis. We are are on the frontline of poverty in the city and we are extremely worried for the year ahead.
The increased numbers of people needing food at the moment is scary, we have had record breaking attendance week after week at the foodshare and the desperation is palpable. We see all sorts of people at Rainbow Junktion, many of those using the foodshare are working and although they are doing everything they can to get themselves in a good financial position, rapidly rising costs mean their basic outgoings are now just more than what they have coming in. There is no way for them to budget themselves out of crisis. I have had multiple parents come to me saying they have nothing for their children and that they themselves haven’t eaten for several days. This is utterly unacceptable in 2023.
There is also a desperate need for more emergency housing in Leeds that is both available and suitable for vulnerable people, especially in the coldest weather. The waiting lists for council accommodation are unacceptably long and in an emergency there is very little on offer. We have paid for hotel accommodation for someone fleeing violence in the home, after they were told that they were ‘choosing to make themselves homeless and therefore could not be helped’.
We are also concerned about Adult Social Care services not being able to meet the demands of people in crisis. We are struggling to get referrals accepted for some of our most vulnerable customers. People who would be able to thrive with some support are languishing in crisis because they don’t meet the criteria or because the services are overwhelmed.
Fuel poverty is an immense issue, at the food bank we are more and more frequently asked about food that doesn't require cooking as so many people don't have fuel or are trying to use as little as possible. When delivering food parcels I have seen whole families living in one room to keep warm and know of many customers who have been without fuel for days/weeks at a time.
We are still worried about the gatekeeping and the way that people in crisis are sometimes spoken to on the lines they call for support such LWSS or emergency housing. We believe that the criteria for support needs to be reviewed and also that some training for those answering the phone around dealing with people in crisis would be beneficial.
We are incredibly worried about the lack of available mental health help; many people in immediate crisis have to wait several hours for a call back from the crisis team. And many customers complain of not being able to get any mental health support at all. We desperately need a variety of well resourced and free mental health services in Leeds.
The cumulative impact of 12 long years of austerity, covid, brexit and now the (so called) cost of living crisis means our community is suffering and we need your help. We understand that your resources are limited and that many of these are complicated problems which require systemic change. However we firmly believe in the power of working together to solve them. Our communities are also resilient, knowledgable and have creative solutions, the crisis we are facing requires us all to work together, from the grassroots to the very top. So thank you for the chance to share our perspective and worries with you today and we look forward to being part of the solution.
We find that generosity is the best weapon against austerity - and generosity takes a whole community. So we are also incredibly grateful to the people of Leeds who are sensationally generous, giving their time energy compassion love and money to help us continue and expand our work through these tough times. And we are grateful to our ward councillors in LS6 for their massive friendship and partnership and support. Thank you for listening.