Two private firms paid £200million in taxpayers cash to provide food parcels to the vulnerable during lockdown sent boxes containing inedible items at a cost nearly double the supermarket value, analysis reveals.
Food firms Bidfood and Brakes were given the hefty sum earlier this year in a bid to cater to Brits who were shielding and unable to leave the house or find online food delivery slots.
The free boxes cost taxpayers roughly £44 per package, but many reported receiving parcels containing inedible food, rotting fruit and vegetables’ and in one case ‘dirty toilet rolls’.
Some 4.7million of the packages were handed out in total between March 27 and July 31 but the New Statesman calculated the actual cost of each package’s contents to be just £26 on average if you compared the contents and delivery to supermarket prices.
An image of the food parcels containing essentials being sent to people across the country
Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick, helps deliver free food boxes to the most clinically vulnerable in Tonbridge, Kent, as the scheme is rolled out across England
Food firms Bidfood and Brakes (pictured, its HQ in Kent) were given the hefty sum earlier this year in a bid to cater to Brits who were shielding and unable to leave the house or find online food delivery slots
The free boxes cost taxpayers roughly £44 per package, but many reported receiving parcels containing inedible food. Pictured: Bidfood’s HQ in Slough
Sandy Lucas, 66, from near Wigan, suffers from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and was told by the Government to shield for 12 weeks to protect her from coronavirus.
She lives alone and usually orders groceries online but was unable to secure a delivery slot or find any food because of panic-buyers.
Ms Lucas, who has not left her house since lockdown was initiated in March, became increasingly thwarted as she claims she received a dismal box week after week with barely any fresh produce and no eggs or meat.
One week she even burst into tears upon seeing the mix of wet bread and ‘sprouting potatoes’ that was delivered to her.
She told the New Statesman: ‘It got to the point where you just didn’t want to cook.
‘There weren’t two things in the box you could put together and make a proper meal.’
She even received men’s toiletries, ‘bars of soap the size of a 50 pence piece’ and ‘loose, crushed and dirty toilet rolls’.
Up until she stopped receiving the boxes on August 1, Ms Lucas had been given 72 tins of Heinz tomato soup.
Pictured is an average Government box that was handed to vulnerable people shielding during lockdown
Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick, helps deliver free food boxes to the most clinically vulnerable in Tonbridge, Kent
She added: ‘How soul-destroying is it to get 72 tins of tomato soup?’
Ms Lucas, who spent years working in the Prison Service and the Manchester Market Police, took it upon herself to write to her MP, the Health Secretary, the Home Secretary and even 10 Downing Street to question who had decided on the contents of her food boxes. No one replied to her.
She said that she would be fed better in prison.
Lorraine Smith, a shielding mother in Dover, Kent, revealed she was receiving rotting fruit and vegetables every week.
At the time a Brakes spokesman admitted to Kent Live that there ‘may be the occasional issue with fresh products’ because of the ‘current season changeover’.
All costs for the food products have been redacted from the Government’s website.
The New Statesman was refused information on the average price of each individual weekly box by Defra and Brakes.
A Freedom of Information request from the publication for the costs of certain items in the food boxes was also refused by Defra. The department explained that disclosing the cost would ‘prejudice the commercial interests of the supplier’s [sic] Brakes and Bidfood’ and ‘negate Defra’s ability to achieve value for money’.
A spokesperson for Defra told the publication: ‘The contract with Brakes and Bidfood delivered more than 4.8million food parcels as part of an unprecedented support package to help our most clinically vulnerable people shield from coronavirus.
‘Thorough market analysis and engagement was undertaken before awarding the contract, and the cost of the food boxes was independently assessed and benchmarked to ensure the best use of taxpayer money.’
Bidfood and Brakes have been contacted for comment.