FOOD banks across the city have been the canary in the coal mine for the cost-of-living crisis.

For quite some time now, the signs of financial strain on households have been sadly apparent through a sharp rise in demand for emergency food aid.

What is particularly alarming is how the contents of food parcels are changing. Volunteers are acutely aware that many more people lack the ability to heat the food they receive.

Tinned pies which need to be cooked in an oven – once a staple comfort food item included with the three days of emergency rations – are out in favour of items requiring little or no energy to prepare.

The outstanding volunteer team headed up by Linda Stuart at Glasgow North East Foodbank does a truly phenomenal job. The love, care and compassion they all give to the service is remarkable.

That’s not to say that they love the food bank itself. I would be willing to bet that each of them shares my opinion that there should be no need for food banks to be there in the first place.

The very existence of these vital charitable groups shames the British Government.

Almost 13 years of brutal Tory austerity and punishing social policies have driven up demand to the point that there are now more food banks operating across the UK than there are branches of McDonald’s.

When the Tories first came to power in 2010 – propped up in coalition by the Liberal Democrats – around 60,000 food bank packages were being handed out a year across these islands. Today that figure sits at more than two million.

The Tories say their big priority is growth but in reality, all they’re delivering is growth in the demand placed upon charities.

Recently, a viral clip of the Prime Minister visiting a homeless shelter left me gobsmacked at a toe-curling, out-of-touch exchange with a homeless man.

Asked by Rishi Sunak if he worked in business, the man replied that he did not and that he was homeless. The PM went on to boast about his own impressive career in the finance industry before entering politics, asking if that would be something that he would “like to get in to”.

The man’s reply was devastating: “I wouldn’t mind, but I don’t know, I’d like to get through Christmas first.”

It felt like satire – a real-life ‘Thick of It’ moment. Except it wasn’t funny.

This Tory Prime Minister – by far the richest MP in Parliament – is so detached from reality that the writers of Spitting Image would have had a hard time creating a more absurd caricature.

The Conservative party seem to inhabit another planet, one where their systematic dismantling of the welfare state hasn’t caused many of the problems that are all too apparent for the rest of us to see.

Let’s face it though, Tory delusion and denial isn’t a new phenomenon.

A 2019 report by the UN shone a light on poverty in the UK and stated that the British Government had ‘systematically and starkly eroded’ the social safety net.

Yet since then, they have pushed ahead with increasingly devastating social security policies.

Just this week for example, the DWP condemned around 120,000 people in low-paid jobs to the threat of sanctions if they do not look for employment which provides them with more hours and more money.

This policy is cruel, ideological and will end up driving more people to seek help from food banks as they are pushed into destitution.

It needn’t be this way.

Nicola Sturgeon’s government in Scotland has taken a vastly different approach to social justice.

No family in Scotland need worry about the basics for their newborn thanks to the baby box.

No child in Scotland will go hungry at school following the expansion of universal free school meals.

No parent will worry about affording essentials for their children because of the “game-changing” Scottish Child Payment.

However, with limited tax raising powers, no borrowing powers, and 85% of welfare spending still controlled by Westminster, the Scottish Government can only do so much.

It could do a lot more if it did not have to use its resources to mitigate the devastating impact of policies imposed by Tories at Westminster that Scotland did not elect.

As the SNP’s social justice spokesperson, I’m tackling these important issues head on.

The inadequacy of the UK social security system and the vast difference between the approaches taken by the Scottish and Westminster governments makes the clearest case for Scottish independence.

I’m not saying that self-governance is a panacea for all our problems, but it is the best chance we have of actually tackling them head-on and fixing them.

But for as long as Westminster keeps knocking people down, food banks will continue to be the safety net that saves them from a tragic fate.