CHURCHES will do all they can to address the cost-of-living crisis, MPs were told on Wednesday, but they need policymakers to step up to forge long-term solutions.

The remarks were made at a panel discussion in Portcullis House, Westminster, organised by Christians Against Poverty (CAP) and the Evangelical Alliance, and attended by the Conservative MP Danny Kruger and the Labour MPs Sir Stephen Timms (Interview, 30 July 2021) and Sarah Owen, who is the Shadow Faith Minister.

The founder of CAP, John Kirkby, said in a video message: “History will judge ever so severely those who chose complacency at a time when they had the power and the ability to help those unable to make ends meet.”

Speaking to church leaders and politicians, Mr Kirkby said: “We are relying on you — the nations needs you to step up to the plate.”

A poll commissioned by CAP in August suggested that 8.5 million people were already skipping meals (News, 30 September). CAP estimated that almost 20 million people had cut their socialising and leisure activity in order to cope with rising bills.

Part of CAP’s work is to help people with debt management. David Tilston, who is a beneficiary of this service, told those attending the event how rising bills were a threat to his hard-fought solvency, as the cost of living rapidly became unaffordable.

Mr Kruger, the MP for Devizes, said that he “felt the command [Mr Kirkby] gave us very strongly”. The “immediate imperative” was to help those who are struggling. More broadly, however, he said that churches should not be treated as “some sort of cheap alternative” to government, and emphasised the importance of “levelling up”.

He was not a member of the Government, however, and therefore could not comment on whether benefits would be increased in line with inflation.

Sir Stephen, the MP for East Ham who chairs the Work and Pensions Commons Select Committee, described the efforts made by churches in his constituency to ensure that people had food. He described the Newham Food Alliance, a partnership between local government and civil-society organisations such as faith groups, as a model for how such needs should be met.

“Churches are indispensable partners,” he said, and highlighted the work of the All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) for Faith and Society, of which he is a member. A “Faith Covenant” published by the APPG sets out principles for collaboration between faith groups and local authorities (News, 23 September). The Covenant, he said, helped to create mutual trust between partners.

In a panel discussion, the joint chief executive of the Gather Movement, Andy Frost, said that some secular bodies presumed that faith organisations were only involved in community work so that they could proselytise, which was not true.

The Gather Movement is a network of more than 8000 churches and charities that provide community services, including mental-health support. Mr Frost said that one of the benefits of churches was that they were a permanent fixture in the community, and not subject to election cycles.

The chief executive of Jubilee+, Natalie Williams (Interview, 25 June 2021), spoke about the difficulties that churches faced in addressing poverty when they themselves were under pressure from the increasing cost of living. Foodbank donations were down while demand continued to rise. Her own church had been forced to pick up a shortfall of several thousand pounds, an amount that was unsustainable.

CAP’s director of external affairs, Gareth McNab, said that churches should not shy away from getting involved in the national conversation out of a fear of being labelled “political”. Their involvement need not be in the form of street protests, he said, but meetings such as this, in which views could be shared with policymakers.

Ms Owen, the Shadow Faith Minister, highlighted the Churches’s contribution as a moral voice in society, citing the bishops who had criticised the Government’s plan to send asylum-seekers to Rwanda (News, 13 June). She asked whether a similar condemnation of energy company profits was necessary.

On the issue of direct action, the head of public policy for the Evangelical Alliance, Alicia Edmund, who chaired the discussion, said that there might be a time when protest became necessary, but that it was “important now to serve those most in need”.

Closing the meeting, CAP’s chief of people, Ellie Gage, said that there was a “tolerance” of poverty in some sections of the Church, but that “Jesus taught us to be radically intolerant of poverty”.