‘Holiday hunger’: inflation adds to family strain as UK schools break for summer

Long holiday and surge in cost of living deepen difficulties as food banks report rise in demand but fewer donations

My eldest daughter really likes cooking things like pancakes but I've had to reduce the number of eggs we buy and watch how much milk we drink," says Victoria, a single mother of four school-age children, of the difficult choices she is making as food costs soar.

It sounds horrible but I have had to reduce everything," she continues. I've changed from using soft spreads, because they're so expensive. I find using block butter works out cheaper. What's in my cupboard at the moment is just pasta, cereal, baked beans and bread - most of it's from food banks."