ON Saturday I had a very encouraging visit to Salisbury’s Christmas Market, where numerous traders were reporting significant increases on last year’s sales.

I believe last week’s Autumn Statement announcements of reviews to business rates will further help our much valued retailers.

The week in Parliament kicked off with the launch of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Hunger and Food Poverty’s landmark report on food bank use in the UK.

Some eight months after we launched, we heard from more than 150 people in evidence sessions across the country.

I was particularly glad to welcome my colleague and chairman of the inquiry, former Labour minister Frank Field, to Salisbury in June.

The food bank debate had become too politicised. What was needed was a dispassionate reflection on the underlying reasons people were going hungry in the sixth richest country in the world and I am proud to have been part of a cross-party team that has made a wide ranging set of recommendations.

It is easy to present this as an argument largely about the welfare state in this country, but this does not do justice to the facts on the ground: our report made 77 recommendations to eight Government departments, whose roles have often been left behind previously.

We also do not shy away from criticising rip-off merchants who are denying the poorest in society a fair deal.

We also argue for greater co-ordination among civil society organisations, who do so much to assist those in need.

The reality is that there is no “quick fix”.

Even if every single one of the 18,000 benefit claims processed daily was handled perfectly, the truth is this would not address the needs of more than half of food bank clients who are there for other reasons. However, the Department for Work and Pensions has already responded positively to some of the report’s recommendations.

Although the Government has made significant progress tackling low income, by raising the minimum wage and taking three million of the lowest earners out of tax altogether, and created 1.7 million new jobs – 85 per cent of them full-time – there is still more to be done.