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Foodbanks are facing their worst summer ever as shelves are running bare and volunteers struggle to fill food parcels, according to the man who helps run the city’s largest network of them.

School holidays are driving more desperate parents to seek emergency help from the city and county’s foodbanks than in any year since they were first set up.

At the same time summer often sees a drop in the number of donations coming in and reserve stocks of essential foods are drying up and they are operating “hand to mouth”.

The situation has got so bad that some have come within a week of shutting down and one foodbank which serves the city centre, Mount Zion in Alfreton Road, has to be completely restocked from other foodbanks every time it opens.

Nigel Adams, 52, director of Hope Nottingham, which works with the Trussell Trust to run 16 foodbanks across the city and the rest of the county, told Nottinghamshire Live: “One or two have said to me they are going to need to shut in a week. We found a way to keep them going but sometimes it becomes very hand to mouth. It is quite difficult to sustain.

“Our stocks are the lowest they have been for a very long time and the need is greater.

“We do not often have to appeal for food even though it is quite common for donations to slow right down but it seems worse than usual and the need is more than usual.

“When people come in we are going to be scratching around to have enough of the right kind of food.

“When you see a family coming along that is just desperate to get some food it is just heart rending. It's the worst summer we have ever seen."

He added that foodbanks always have enough of basics like pasta and beans but what they lack are items such as tinned fruit or meat, milk and pasta sauces.

This time of year is particularly difficult as parents who rely on free school meals to provide the main meal of the day for their children lose that support during the holidays.

Every year since they started the foodbanks have seen an increase in use, which Mr Adams puts down to the culminative effect of austerity cuts.

The Trussell Trust has calculated that between April 1 last year and March 31 this year, they handed out 23,322 three-day emergency food packages across Nottinghamshire.

Of those almost 9,000 were for children. This total number is up from 20,993 for the same period between 2016 and 17 and 18,989 between 2015 and 16.

In order to get help from a food bank you need to be referred with a voucher, which can be issued by a number of local community organisations, such as Citizens Advice or a key worker, if they judge you are in an emergency.

Wendy White, who runs the Clifton foodbank, is currently giving free breakfasts to children aged 12 and under every day but worries that they might not have enough to get them through the holidays.

She said: “People are busy in summer so they forget to donate. But we are busy with parents and running short on food.

“All of us are, it is getting very bad – we are worried we will not have enough.”

Nationally the Trussell Trust is giving out more food than it had been bringing in.

This has prompted the charity to call on the government to make sure the benefit system stops people needing to use them, to unfreeze child benefits and to “make changes to work allowances so families keep more of their earnings before Universal Credit payments are reduced”.

In response a spokeswoman for the government said: “We are committed to supporting families to improve their lives, and employment remains the best route to achieve that.

“We recently announced a £2 million fund for organisations to support disadvantaged families during the school holidays, which can include providing healthy meals.

“Meanwhile we have a record employment rate, household incomes have never been higher and there are 300,000 fewer children living in absolute poverty than in 2010.

“Our welfare reforms offer parents tailored support to move into work, ensuring that even more families can enjoy the opportunities and benefits that work can bring.”

But Mr Adams believes it is the government's pressure on people to get them back to work that is causing some of the problems as sometimes they are not ready.

He also appealed for people to donate food from the following list to their local foobank (which you can find here).

 Milk (UHT or powdered)

 Sugar (500g)

 Fruit Juice (carton)

 Soup

 Pasta Sauces

 Sponge Pudding (Tinned)

 Tinned spaghetti/macaroni

 Cereals

 Rice Pudding (Tinned)

 Tea bags

Instant coffee

 Instant Mash Potato

 Rice/Pasta

 Tinned Meat/Fish/Vegetables

 Tinned Fruit

 Jam

 Biscuits or snack bars