A FOOD bank has opened its doors in Brampton this week as the cost-of-living crisis continues to affect families and households across Cumbria.

Run at Brampton Community Centre, the foodbank was opened to help struggling households in the local area who were previously having to travel to the Carlisle food bank.

The new foodbank opened on Tuesday with volunteers describing the opening day as ‘very busy’ and they are expecting to get busier.

“We definitely feel there’s a need for a food bank here’ said food bank volunteer, Mike.

“Some of the more rural areas are just as needy as areas of Carlisle and some people may not necessarily think that Brampton is the sort of place that needs a food bank.

“The cost-of-living has hit everybody hard, and the shortage of food just won’t go away.

The food bank in Brampton is set to start offering food drop offs to those in rural locations where transport is difficult and take up of the scheme is set to be high.

Inflation currently sits at over 10 per cent with the Office for National Statistics estimating that inflation on food could be almost 17 per cent, with basic items like milk, pasta and eggs facing the highest price hikes.

The UK is facing some of the highest inflation across Western Europe with the government partly blaming the pandemic and the war in Ukraine for these steep price rises.

Price rises have caused food bank usage across the country to increase with Carlisle food bank `being ‘busier than ever’ and expecting to get busier.

“It's just not slowing down at all”, Carlisle food bank manager, Stephanie Humes, said.

"More and more people and more and more new families are coming in and just everyone is struggling at the moment.

“There’s no standard demographic of food bank user as it’s absolutely everybody – old, young, families with one kid, families with six kids, its just anyone.

“People are looking to feed their kids but also for toiletries, cleaning products and washing powder.

“Everything has gone up in price and people are really struggling.

The rise in the number of people struggling to afford to pay for their bills and food has also meant that there has been a decline in the number of donations to the food bank with Steph saying that donations in January had gone down.

READ MORE: Carlisle Foodbank teams up with app to help increase donations

Food banks are always in need of donations to help keep the services going with goods such as basic cupboard items, toiletries, cleaning products and pet foods.