Welcome to another week, and a slightly sunny one at that. This week’s question though, is less cheerful.

A new report suggests that nearly 100,000 children are going without food as a result of benefit cuts. The article tells us that many of the cuts to families’ benefits come about as a result of family members being late for job centre appointments, giving rise to the notion that benefit provisions are being used to coerce and bully vulnerable families. The report also notes that more than 120,000 of those decisions which led to sanctions, were overturned on appeal.

Meanwhile, our Prime Minister David Cameron promised last year that all law and policy would be checked to ensure that it was family friendly and helped promote stability within these units. 

A spokesperson for the Department of Work and Pensions insists that benefit sanctions are only ever used on a tiny minority who refuse to accept the help on offer.

Our question to you then, is this: where policy or culture in place results in children going without the necessary food they need to survive, at what point can we hold the government responsible?