This nurse has been managing a donation bank "for children and babies" in the Hackney district for two and a half years.

And she would never have imagined such extreme poverty: "I've never seen anything like it here."

Britons have been struggling for months with inflation not seen in decades.

Supported first by energy bills, prices are now rising in everything from food to transport to rent.

"My phone is ringing all the time," said Ms Wester-Okiya, originally from Malaysia.

"I've lived here for 40 years and as a nurse I have a lot of contact with families. Last year was terrible and I'm scared for the next three months."

Children's clothes in a donation bank in the Hackney district, January 23, 2023 in London © Daniel LEAL / AFP

The crisis has put even more pressure on the country's 2,500 food banks, already well known to the poorest Britons, pushing them to offer other services such as baby clothes and help to apply for social benefits.

Depressed mothers

“We have suicidal mothers (…) children who have barely managed to survive the pandemic and who find themselves caught in this terrible crisis in the cost of living”, explains Ms. Wester-Okiya.

"Broken mothers, broken homes, broken families...Moms are depressed, children are crying all the time."

Created during the Covid-19 pandemic, its food bank helps both migrants arriving by the Channel and Ukrainians on the street.

But also, more and more, Britons who had never been so in need.

The cost of living in the UK © Jonathan WALTER / AFP

“We are no longer just talking about migrants, we are talking about middle-class people who have to sell their homes,” explains Ms. Wester-Okiya.

Due to demand, the baby bank has expanded and products for slightly larger children are now offered.

Hygiene products are particularly in demand.

"A 14-year-old wrote a terrible poem about being bullied because she can't wash herself," Ms Wester-Okiya said, explaining that the girl had told how her mother had cut soap into four pieces to give a piece to each member of the family.

Some 140 kilometers further north, in the city of Coventry, the situation is similar.

A food bank, January 23, 2023 in Coventry, United Kingdom © OLI SCARFF / AFP

In a huge warehouse, employees of the association Feed the Hungry pack parcels full of food not only for children in Nicaragua or Ukraine, but also for families who live a few kilometers away .

"Mom Don't Have Dinner"

In this central England town once known for its thriving car industry, "crazy" prices have prompted Hannah Simpson, a single mother of four, to walk through the door of a food bank for the first time.

The 29-year-old skips meals so her children can eat but says she feels "exhausted and drained".

A young woman picks up products from a food bank in Coventry, January 23, 2023 in the United Kingdom © OLI SCARFF / AFP

"I try to hide my difficulties for (my children)," she says.

"But my daughter said at school the other day that she was worried 'cause mum isn't having dinner with us and there isn't enough to eat'."

"It's a lot of stress," she adds.

The association Feed the Hungry, which manages the 14 food banks in the city, has launched several projects to help the most disadvantaged over the long term, with, for example, cooking workshops under development.

Another initiative makes it possible to buy for a modest sum a basket of food worth 25 pounds (28 euros), while offering beneficiaries assistance to receive subsidies and unclaimed social benefits.

"The only problem is that we have too many requests compared to what we can provide", explains Hugh McNeill, at the initiative of this project.

For him, the people he helps have "no financial resilience".

A man picks up products from a food bank in Coventry, January 23, 2023 in the United Kingdom © OLI SCARFF / AFP

"They have loans and sold everything they had," he says.

"You can go anywhere in the country and it's exactly the same, in every city, in every village."

© 2023 AFP