School Milk

Debate between Lord Nash and Baroness Sugg

Wednesday 25th January 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Nash]

I entirely agree with the noble Baroness and I am very shocked to see how many pupils often arrive at school having not eaten. Some even do not necessarily use their dinner money to eat in school. All schools try to discourage this and try to get them to eat in school, but there are an increasing number of breakfast programmes, such as the Magic Breakfast, and we have announced in the Budget that we are providing further money to enable schools to provide breakfast clubs.

[Baroness Sugg (Con)]

My Lords, milk production and milk prices are slowly recovering. The market is still volatile and many British dairy farmers suffer daily losses. Can my noble friend explain what steps the Government are taking to support the milk industry?

[Lord Nash]

I can. The UK dairy industry is enormously important to us. We are working with it to encourage greater resilience in the face of global market volatility. There are examples, with the introduction of extended tax averaging, enabling many farmers to smooth their tax bills over a five-year period.