Champion boxer wants to help knock out child poverty

Former featherweight world champion Barry McGuigan is working with a Kent food bank to try to remove the stigma around using food banks and boost donations.

He is supporting Canterbury Food Bank to help break what he says is a stigma around taking donated food and using charitable services.

“It’s a really tough time for people, for families, for single mothers not making enough to feed their children, and it’s humiliating for them as well you know?" said McGuigan.

“But if you’re hungry, come in and ask for help because there’s nothing wrong with the fact that people sometimes don’t earn enough to cover their food bills.”

The food bank says Easter is one of its busiest times, as the holidays mean children do not get free school meals.

It expects to feed 1,000 children over the two-week holiday, and supply enough food to make 6,000 meals.

Demand is higher than it has ever been, the food bank says.

David Holt, chairman of trustees at the food bank, said: “We provided enough food to make 135,000 meals last year and that was an 18% increase year on year.

“It goes up every year and every year we hope it’ll go down, and every year it fails to do so.”

The latest figures from the Department for Work and Pensions estimate that 4.45 million children live in households of relative low income, that’s 12% of children in the South East region.

The Trussell Trust found in its nationwide survey in 2024 that one in 12 working adults said they had used some kind of charitable food provision.

The government has previously said “around 550,000 children will be lifted out of poverty by 2030 – the biggest reduction in a single parliament since records began” with its new child poverty strategy.

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