The government and UK churches ‘need each other’ to effectively tackle the cost of living crisis, the Evangelical Alliance (EAUK) told parliamentarians in November in Westminster.
The event, The Church’s Response to the Cost of Living Crisis, was held alongside the charity Christians Against Poverty (CAP) to launch the latest Stories of Hope resource
Danny Webster, EAUK’s director of advocacy, addressed more than 60 policymakers and MPs including Danny Kruger and Sir Stephen Timms. He said: ‘Churches are places of hope. We need strength and partnership between churches and the government in this upcoming season. Neither of us can do this alone, we need each other.’
He added: ‘The church is the most overlooked social support structure in our nations … Churches and Christian organisations provide life-changing support and provision for those in greatest need. They are often the first to respond and the ones who stick around long after headlines have faded and attention shifted.’
A retired man also shared his struggles with gambling and debt, and how CAP had been supporting him during the cost of living crisis. Gareth McNab, CAP’s director of external affairs, spoke of the difficulties low-income households are facing to pay bills, urging the prime minister to keep to his leadership pledge to increase universal credit in line with inflation.
The Stories of Hope series shows how churches are providing hope in different ways. EAUK’s head of public policy, Alicia Edmund, whose own church is spending a further £4,000 on food items for the foodbank, said after the event: ‘The varied support local churches provide is too invaluable for policymakers to ignore.’
‘Previous promises from prime minister Rishi Sunak and chancellor Jeremy Hunt of ‘doing what is right and compassionate for the most vulnerable’ will be tested as they unveil tax and spending decisions.’
By October, UK food prices had soared by a record 11.6% in a year. In early November a Sky News poll revealed that a quarter of people are paying for food with credit cards.
