Why We Submitted This Evidence

For over ten years, Sufra has been on the frontline of an entrenched poverty crisis. That’s why we can say with confidence that handing out emergency food parcels cannot fix a broken system.

The Right to Food UK Commission recently gathered evidence to build a legislative roadmap to make the Right to Food a reality in law by 2030. This means legally recognising that access to nutritious food is a universal human right, and that it is the responsibility of the government – not charities – to guarantee it.

We submitted our evidence because we see the human cost of these systemic failures firsthand at our Food Bank and other services. While providing immediate relief is a vital act of compassion, charity cannot be the end goal – it should be justice.

We are speaking out to ensure that the lived experiences of our community directly shape national policy. It is time to move beyond managing the crisis and start demanding a statutory safety net that guarantees everyone the dignity, choice and income they need to afford healthy food.

The Reality on Our Doorstep

Sufra operates from St. Raphael's Estate in Stonebridge – now officially the most deprived area in London, where up to 82.5% of residents experience income deprivation. Last year alone, we provided over 73,000 instances of support to ensure over 17,000 people could access nutritious food.

But our experience on the frontline for over 13 years has made one thing clear: handing out food parcels doesn’t make a dent on extreme poverty, which continues to rise.

In our evidence submitted to the Right to Food UK Commission, we outlined recommendations for transitioning away from transactional emergency food aid towards holistic, rights-based safety nets.

Download Sufra’s Full Submission to the Right to Food UK Commission

Our Evidence Base

Our recommendations are backed by rigorous academic data and the lived experiences of our guests:

• The SALIENT Trial: We partnered with the University of Liverpool to host the first Randomised Controlled Trial comparing standard food parcels against supermarket payment cards. The results were definitive: 98.1% of our guests chose supermarket vouchers over pre-packed parcels.
• Asylum Seeker Research: Alongside the University of Hertfordshire, we captured the reality of asylum seekers living in contingency hotels with No Recourse to Public Funds (NRPF). The research exposed how rigid, processed, and inadequate hotel catering acts as an active driver of malnutrition and severe physical and mental health decline.
• Proximate Leadership: Our advocacy is entirely shaped by those we support. 13% of our volunteers are former service users, and 31% of our staff were once volunteers.

Our 5 Priority Recommendations for Government:

To make the Right to Food a reality, Sufra is calling on the Commission and the Government to enact the following statutory changes:

1. Mandate a 'Cash-First' Statutory Safety Net: Local welfare assistance schemes – such as the DWP Crisis and Resilience Fund (CRF) – must be permanently deployed as ‘cash-first’ systems. We back the 'Essentials Guarantee' campaign to ensure statutory income support covers the true cost of a healthy diet.
2. Establish a ‘Minimum Advice & Support Standard’: Ideally, no individual should receive emergency food without also being provided with co-located, professional welfare advice to address the root causes of their crisis, such as housing and debt. Funding and/or support should be made available to local food aid providers to ensure this happens.
3. Transition to Community Hubs: Local authorities must support the transition away from traditional, transactional food banks, investing instead in integrated, place-based community hubs and kitchens that restore social capital and address the causes of financial crisis.
4. Reform Asylum Food Provision: The use of catered asylum hotels must be rapidly phased out. In the interim, the government must mandate self-catering facilities or direct cash support to restore dignity and dietary adequacy for vulnerable migrants.
5. Mandate Co-Produced Local Food Strategies: Local authorities must co-produce cross-sector Food Strategies (as we are currently modelling in Brent), governed by local Food Partnerships and community working groups.

For more information, you can download the full submission below, or contact rajesh@sufra-nwlondon.org.uk.

Download Sufra’s Full Submission to the Right to Food UK Commission