Hunger in an agricultural country where the shops and even the garbage bins are full of food seems too hard to believe, said Hamilton Bishop Denis Browne said on Thursday.
The NZ Herald reports Bishop Browne is calling on the Government to allow different policy options for food programmes in schools to be examined and debated.
“The debate about child hunger in New Zealand needs more than dismissive answers which categorise hungry children in struggling households solely as their parents’ responsibility,” Bishop Browne said.
Browne says New Zealand has the resources to ensure that no one has to go hungry and is calling on the Government to allow broder discussion on the matter by allowing the private member’s Education (Food in Schools) Amendment Bill to go a parliamentary Select Committee.
“What we lack is the compassion and the political will to make that happen”, said Browne.
Browne believes formal state policy options can be found to combine the goodwill and contribution of the community and business.
Citing examples of Catholic groups throughout the country responding practically to the hunger in their communities, Browne says the Church is pulling its weight in reaching out in love, concern and understanding, however it’s not enough.
Saying that St Vincent de Paul is struggling to respond to the increased demand for food, Browne says the number of hungry people seeing food at night in my diocese (Hamilton) has doubled in the past two months.
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