Celebration

“Our charity welcomes this news and is delighted to see action being taken on child hunger and school food quality. We have campaigned for more than five years to see Government leadership on this, as we have been confronted every day by the consequences of inaction. By extending eligibility for free school meals, children who were at risk of going hungry at school will no longer worry about what they eat at lunch. They are guaranteed access to nutritious food that will enable them to learn and thrive. I cannot understate the importance of this move.

Polling we carried out of teachers revealed the truth of hungry children resorting to borrowing food from friends or the school kitchen. Others pretending to have food in their lunchboxes because they were ashamed to admit their own were empty. We work every day alongside schools who had to cut teaching budgets to subsidise lunches for children who weren’t eligible for free school meals. We are face to face with these realities every day. All of these stories have no place in modern day Britain and this action will ensure they are confined to history.

We also celebrate the move to revise the School Food Standards. These were rolled out a decade ago and were a much-needed step forward then, but they have not kept pace with nutritional know-how. They have been too often ignored, misunderstood or bypassed. It is our collective responsibility to feed the future well and schools give us such a vital opportunity to teach every child about varied diets and good food. These two measures from the Government will go a long way to fuelling the future well. Chefs in Schools is committed to working to ensure that schools and the kitchen workforce are supported to implement these seismic changes to maximum effect.”

“This is just fantastic news, giving hundreds of thousands more children the food they need to learn and thrive. There is now robust evidence showing that giving children a proper cooked lunch improves academic attainment, as well as health and wellbeing. Hungry children can’t concentrate. They will fall behind. Too many children from hard-pressed families have been missing out on the nourishment they need, as well as the socialisation and pleasure that comes from eating a proper meal, together.

“I’m also glad the Government is finally updating the School Food Standards. I chaired the group that wrote them back in 2014. They were a big step forward then, but they haven’t kept pace with what we now know about nutrition. Worse, they’ve often been ignored or twisted to allow ultra-processed junk to creep back in.

“Feeding children well is the bare minimum. But school food can be so much more — a daily lesson in how to live well. This is a great step in the right direction.”