A QUARTER of food retail workers are skipping meals because rising household bills mean they cannot afford to buy what they sell to customers, the TUC rally heard.

Speaking in Parliament Square, Usdaw president Jane Jones said the union surveyed more than 5,500 workers, including essential workers in food retail.

She said the results “clearly demonstrate the very real consequences on low-paid key workers of rocketing prices, energy bills and fuel costs.”

Ms Jones said: “Last year, one in 20 of our members told us they skipped meals to pay the bills every month. This week, we found out that’s gone up to one in four.

“One in four of the people working hard to keep food on Britain’s tables are struggling to put food on their own table. 

“Instead of tackling this, the government is hamstrung by infighting, sullied by scandal, doing nothing other than trying to save themselves. While they play politics rather than governing, our communities pay the price.

“We need a pay rise and a new deal that gives every worker decent pay and secure hours. A new deal that transforms our social security system into a proper safety net. A new deal where working people can thrive, rather than struggling to survive.

“We cannot accept that workers are condemned to live on poverty pay; that they are not even guaranteed the working hours they need to get by from one week to the next. 

“Shop workers, distribution workers, manufacturing workers, in constituency after constituency, are watching. We need action and we need action now.”