Two Fife Councillors to live on £7 a week to raise money for foodbanks

Councillors Lea McLelland and Rosemary Liewald will survive on £1 a day for a week in order to draw attention to the realities of food poverty.

The pair will begin their challenge on 16 November to fundraise for organisations across Fife, such as Benarty Foodbank.

Foodbanks and charities across Fife have seen a marked rise in the number of people requiring their services since the beginning of lockdown in March, according to the SNP councillors.

Lea McLelland said: "We appreciate that it is not going to be easy. We want to highlight how challenging it is for people to live on the benefits system that we have right now and just how difficult it is for people to survive in this day and age.

"When people actually say '£7 a week' you think well that isn't too bad, but when you actually sit down and we kind of went on a wee mock to different shops to see what we would get for our £7, and this isn't going to be easy at all. What we want is to make people aware of just how challenging it actually is.

"As much as I'm very prepared for it - the hunger - the people that are struggling to feed their families have also got the struggle with heating their homes and have also got the challenge of hygiene poverty. It's not just food and I would say to anybody, just think about what people go through and just see how difficult it is."

The figure of £1 a day was listed by the charity Live Below the Line to give the public an understanding of what living on the breadline is like.

If you would like to support this challenge, go to www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/benarty-foodbank