The cost of living crisis is putting growing numbers of people in Herefordshire, even those in work, on the breadline.

A Survation poll for campaigning group 38 Degrees found 23 per cent of people in Herefordshire worried they would have to use a food bank in the coming year, 59 per cent worried they would not be able to pay their energy bills, and 20 per cent feared being made homeless.

Councillor Kevin Tillett who represents the deprived Hinton & Hunderton area of the city said the figures “don’t surprise me”.

“The numbers seeking help continue to increase,” he said. “The St Martin’s Church FoodShare, for example, is supposed to just be a top-up service, but people are saying, ‘have you any bread, we rely on this’.”

He added: “It’s easy to make assumptions about who is using these, but this is a relatively low-wage county and even some are in work can’t make ends meet.”

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Hereford Food Bank is also “seeing a sustained increase in demand”, manager Jacquie Alsop said.

Between January and September the charity fed 3,096 people with three meals a day for seven days, totalling 65,016 meals, which Ms Alsop called “an extraordinary figure”.

Echoing Coun Tillett, she said 40 per cent of those using the food bank are in work, albeit on low wages; “people who would never previously have resorted to a food bank”.

“We keep asking ourselves how we will meet growing levels of demand,” she said.

“We are hugely grateful to donors. But the crisis impacts them too, and we can't rely their goodwill indefinitely.”

The food bank itself has gone from having 35 volunteers, to over 100, and is on the lookout for more, including warehouse staff and drivers.

While Covid-19 brought a rise in food bank use, “we knew it would end”, she said. “But now there is no end in sight.”

Leominster food bank is also seeing 100 new users each month, a representative said.

Robert Thomas, lead executive of Hereford social charity Vennture, said: “I was shocked by the poll figures, but a straw poll of our workers confirms that is what they are finding.”

Each week the charity works with around 150 families and individuals, whose “choices becoming more and more difficult”, he said.

“People who took out mortgage rates when interest levels were low have seen their monthly payments tripling. There are also high numbers of people on the point of eviction. They have jobs, they may both work, they aren’t ‘scroungers’.”

They are facing a gradual accumulation of debt that eventually becomes unsustainable, he said. “And more people are reaching that point.”

Those new to the benefits system then encounter “an alien world of rules and regulations, which we help them navigate”, he added.

“Hard-working people who have paid their taxes think the state will provide. Sadly it doesn’t work like that.”

Also, there is “just not enough of the right kind of housing” in Hereford, he said.

Vennture has just seven rooms of emergency accommodation, though is seeking funding to make a further 13 rooms in the mothballed Merton Hotel available for families, Mr Thomas added.

How you can help

• Donate to St Martin’s Church FoodShare at tiny.cc/smfs, or contact them with an offers of surplus food on 01432 353717.

• Download the BankTheFood app (bankthefood.org), which alerts shoppers to the foods that local food banks most need.

• Donate to Vennture at vennture.org.uk/donate.