Ex-Liverpool star Robbie Fowler backs communal dining scheme
- Published
Fowler, who helped to fund the trial, said the idea was "inspiring"
Ex-Liverpool striker Robbie Fowler has helped to launch a community kitchen that he said would provide "dignity as well as food" to struggling families.
The Scouse Kitchen project will offer people in Liverpool communal dining as an alternative to foodbanks.
It was inspired by Prof Bryce Evans' research into wartime social eating.
The Liverpool Hope University professor said serving fresh food in a community setting improved people's health and helped to combat fuel poverty.
Prof Evans said communal eating happened a lot during World War One and Two and people were "starting to recreate that history now" with the approach "we had in the 20th Century, of affordable, nutritious, and socially cohesive food-for-all".
He said the idea could be an alternative to foodbanks to help in the fight against food poverty.
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"Social eating allows you to serve fresh, healthy food in a community setting, which improves people's physical and mental health whilst also combating fuel poverty," he said.
He added that the first of three evenings to trial the approach, which was held at St Celia's Junior School in Tuebrook on Tuesday, had been "a great success".
The former Liverpool player, who provided some of the funding for the trial, said the idea was "inspiring" and he was "humbled to be able to help".
He said it was "completely unacceptable [that] families are really struggling to put food on the table".
The scheme has also been backed by the Labour MP for Liverpool West Derby, Ian Byrne.
Mr Byrne, who leads on the Right to Food campaign in Parliament and was a co-founder of Fans Supporting Foodbanks, said the approach represented a "dignified response to hunger".
He added that it gave "mums, dads and carers... who cannot afford to put food on their family's table [the opportunity] to sit down together as a family in a restaurant setting and eat a meal together in dignity, for free".
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- Published11 October 2022
- Published15 July 2022
