School leaders fear pupils are missing out on a healthy lunch and want to remove the stigma around free school meals
Headteachers across the country are campaigning for children to automatically get free school meals if their families are eligible for Universal Credit. The National Association of Headteachers has written to Rishi Sunak urging him to ‘make sure every child in the country has healthy meals.’
‘Let’s make sure that every child in the country has healthy meals, are fed and are able to learn and engage in schoolwork.’‘Remove barriers and stigma’ Currently, in England, only children in Key Stage 1 automatically receive free meals. These are funded by the Department for Education A small number of councils have already moved to an ‘opt-out’ model – which led to more than 2,500 children being registered, according to research by the School Food Review Group.
‘Let’s reduce the stigma, let’s reduce the barriers. Let’s just say that any family with universal Credit, those children automatically get free school meals.’ All children in state primary schools in London are receiving free school meals in 2023-24 and 2024-25.
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