Caritas Social Action Network has suggested proposals to further cut public spending, as announced in Wednesday's budget, the coalition's last before May's general election, will negatively affect the UK's most vulnerable households.
In his budget the chancellor said he planned to cut his forecast for a fiscal surplus by 2019-20 from £23bn to £7bn. This meant spending as a proportion of GDP would no longer fall to the time of the Great Depression, but to the level of 2000.
However, the independent Office for Budget Responsibility said Mr Osborne's plans implied "a much sharper squeeze on real spending in 2016-17 and 2017-18 than anything seen over the past five years, followed by the biggest increase in real spending for a decade in 2019-20", a pattern it described as a "rollercoaster profile".
Helen O'Brien, Chief Executive of CSAN, said: "Whilst the increased funds for children's mental health services and support for small charities through Gift Aid regulations are welcome, significant further cuts for welfare and public spending in this year's Budget Statement will fail to stop the squeeze on the most vulnerable.
"If you look beyond the headlines, recent tax and welfare changes - changes CSAN has questioned for some time - have hit the poorest households hard.
"For the CSAN member charities working on the ground, the impact of these changes on the people they support has been very real and very damaging. We hoped this Budget would be focussed on helping the poorest people who have found it increasingly difficult to make ends meet."
The number of families using foodbanks in the UK has risen dramatically, 913,138 people received three days' emergency food from the Christian based Trussell Trust foodbanks in 2013-14 compared to 346,992 in 2012-13
However, Conservative MP Jeremy Lefroy, a Christian, has defended the Mr Osborne's budget, suggesting the best way to get people out of poverty was to create jobs. Speaking to Premier, he said: "When people are in work, although there are people who are still in work who are using foodbanks, by and large it means they have the ability to provide for the needs of theirs and their families."
