Universal Credit: Free School Meals

Baroness Sherlock Excerpts

Wednesday 14th March 2018 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Buscombe]

I have to take issue with the noble Baroness, because I feel that I have answered the question. I want to stress that the reality of this is that every child receiving free school meals now, and any child subsequently given free school meals while the universal credit rollout is under way, will have their entitlement protected until the end of the rollout or until the end of the child’s current phase of education, whichever is later. We want to ensure that, through the universal credit system, we are doing absolutely our best to give our young people the best possibilities in life; this is not the same as the old legacy benefits.

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

My Lords, perhaps I may put the question for the third time. At the moment, if someone reaches a certain level of income, they lose free school meals but at that point they gain working tax credit, which is worth much more. What the Government are proposing under universal credit is that, when a household’s earnings exceed a cash fixed point of £7,400 a year, once the system has been rolled out, a household in that situation will immediately lose free school meals for all of the kids. Someone could be offered an extra hour of work or a small pay rise and face the choice of either turning it down or accepting it and losing free school meals for all of their kids. While the Minister has said a great deal about the transitional protection during the rollout, when the system beds down, is not the noble Lord, Lord Kirkwood, right that this will fly right in the face not only of the quote from Iain Duncan Smith, but of the whole point of universal credit—at such huge expense and great disruption?

[Baroness Buscombe]

My Lords, I heard quite a lot of what was said in another place yesterday, and I am afraid that quite a lot of it is misinformation. One only has to look at Channel 4’s FactCheck, which looked at the claims made by the Opposition about children losing free school meals and was clear that the Government are not taking free school meals from the 1 million children who currently get them. I quote the article directly:

“This is not a case of the government taking free school meals from a million children who are currently receiving them. It’s about comparing two future, hypothetical scenarios”,


both of which are more generous than the old benefits system.