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Desperate families are so strapped for cash that they can’t even afford to cook the food they have been given by food banks.

Oxfam Scotland have warned that some people are handing back food because they don’t have enough credit in their electricity meters to switch on their cooker.

The Scottish Parliament’s welfare reform committee will discuss food banks at a meeting at

Holyrood on Tuesday.

In a letter to the committee, Oxfam Scotland’s Francis Stuart said: “One of the most shocking pieces of evidence we have seen is people who use food banks have started giving back items that need cooking because they can’t afford to turn on the electricity to cook the food they desperately need.”

The number of hard-up Scots families turning to food banks has reached record levels, with 7700 asking for help in January – half the number for the whole of 2013.

Last month, Scotland’s biggest food bank, Glasgow City Mission, shut after running out of food.

Welfare reform committee convener Michael McMahon said: “It is vital we get on the record the situation on the ground from the people staffing food banks and supporting our most vulnerable.

“It is simply unacceptable that our society needs to step in and help feed our fellow citizens.”