OMA REPORTS PEAK IN FIRST-TIME REQUESTS AMONGST INCREASING BENEFITS RESTRICTIONS

In the first two months of 2025 alone, Oxford Mutual Aid received first-time requests for food support from over 65 households, totalling well over 110 unique individuals facing food precarity.

This doubles the average amount of new requests we tend to receive each month, marking a peak we haven't seen in over 2 years. Most of these first-time requests stem from those facing cuts to their benefits, or dramatic increases to their cost-of-living.

These new requests come on top of the existing 1000+ individuals we support every month with food parcels. Yet if these numbers continue to increase, we fear we will not have the capacity to support the growing number of those facing hunger and deprivation across Oxford. We are at our limit, and have already been forced to turn away those asking for help due to a total lack of capacity.

This surge in demand comes at a time when the UK government is looking to restrict and reduce welfare payments to the most vulnerable - yet they are needed more than ever.

The recent announcement that the government will be ‘cracking down’ on benefit fraud deeply concerns us, given that just 0.2% of PIP spending was linked to ‘fraud’. Rather, we fear that the proposed changes suggested by the government will rather remove pathways to support from those in genuine need, taking much-needed help away from those in genuine need of support.

We see the impact of the government’s hostile approach to benefits claimants every day, first hand. We are receiving increasing numbers of requests from families pushed off of their benefits over technicalities, who face continual delays and difficulties in receiving the most basic support they need from the government. The physical toll of being unable to heat their homes and feed their families is enough, yet it is compounded by the mental stress of having to “prove their innocence” against a backdrop of constant suspicion.

In this time of ever-increasing hardship and skyrocketing cost of living, we implore the UK government to focus on supporting those in need, rather than scapegoating disabled people and benefit recipients.

Every food parcel OMA delivers represents a success of a community coming together in mutual support, yet a simultaneous failure of a government failing to look after its own people. 

Now, more than ever, we need the community to come together in support of OMA and their neighbours - both as donors, to cover our core costs, and as volunteers, helping make sure food gets to those who need it.