Free School Meals

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Wednesday 21st October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

I want to agree with two things that the shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Stretford and Urmston (Kate Green), said in her speech. The first is that no child should go hungry in this country. That is something that we all agree with in this House. The question is how we can ensure that outcome?

Before I was a Member of this House, I ran a charity working with children and families at risk, and I did a lot of work with schools, and I recognise that there is an important role for schools to facilitate social support for children and families. They can play an important role as a hub in the local community, as has been said, but it is not appropriate to make them a provider of welfare themselves. As we have heard from the shadow Secretary of State, there is a possibility of the proposal becoming permanent. That is not an appropriate use of schools. Now that schools are open again, it is not appropriate to make them welfare providers. That is a role for the welfare system. I pay tribute to the DWP and to the Ministers who have overseen universal credit. That system has been a great success, and without it we would be in a very serious way, That is the appropriate mechanism for delivering welfare to families.

More can be done and, of course, more is being done by the Government. We have seen a £20 a week uplift to universal credit, which will run through half-term, through Christmas and into next year. Free school meals are available for families with no recourse to public funds and, of course, extra money has been made available for local authorities to provide welfare to families, including £500,000 for my local authority in Wiltshire, which is very welcome. No doubt more can be done, and I echo my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool North and Cleveleys (Paul Maynard) in calling for a comprehensive strategy to support families and children during the school holidays. That is an absolutely pressing need, and we need to get it right.

My second point of agreement with the shadow Secretary of State is on putting aside party politics. She then went on to make one of the most partisan speeches I have heard in my short time in this House, with references to test and trace, consultants and even the Prime Minister’s personal finances, which is pretty unnecessary.

I will talk quickly about the motivation behind this debate and of Members in this House. I hope we can agree that rudeness of the sort we saw earlier from the Opposition Front Bench is completely unacceptable. I do not think robust language is unacceptable. It is quite appropriate to use robust language—we should not bleed these debates of any emotion—and it is completely acceptable and understandable if Opposition Members want to attack the Government on their competence. I do not agree, but it is fair enough to attack us on our judgment.

Obviously, mistakes get made, which is understandable; but to attack us on our motivation and our morality, as we repeatedly hear from Opposition Members, is completely unacceptable, because it demeans this House and the quality of debate. It does not serve the people of this country. I ask Opposition Members to desist from that, to keep the debate on policy and to stop the trolling they are engaged in at the moment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dr Kieran Mullan (Crewe and Nantwich) (Con)]

I welcome this debate today, as it gives us an opportunity to have a discussion on challenging issues around poverty in our constituencies. The causes of poverty are not simple. What is most important is sustainable solutions. Increases in the living wage, increases in the income tax threshold, decreases in absolute poverty and income inequality in the long term—those are the sustainable, long-term achievements of this Government. Have we solved everything? No. Could we all—individuals, communities, millionaire celebrities and supermarkets—have a role to play in doing more? Yes. But to pretend that further increasing the role of the state directly in feeding children is a solution is mistaken. Yet again, it sends out the signal that our communities do not have to look after each other.

Again and again, we reinforce the idea that taking money off people through the tax system to support people less well off is always good, but asking people to choose to be generous and support other people in their communities in need is somehow bad. I want to live in a society where our local communities look out for each other and provide support to those who are less well off. I am incredibly proud of the hard work and effort put in by local charities in my constituency that, with help from donations and support from local people and local businesses, support those in need. The Government do have a role to play, but our communities play a role, too. What is so wrong with that?

[Danny Kruger]

Does my hon. Friend agree that the charities he is talking about are able to be much more targeted, precise, sensitive and generous than a blanket state system?

[Dr Mullan]

Indeed, and they tend to provide support in a wraparound way. Rather than just giving out a meal, it tends to be part of a broader package of support for a family that tackles things in the longer term.

Why is it that when the state tackles a problem using taxpayers’ money—our money—indirectly, it is always the right solution, but when people choose to help solve a problem themselves directly, it must be a reflection of some kind of failure? The reality is that those on the Opposition Benches are advocating for us to live in a world where the state caters to every need and every challenge and mitigates every consequence. That is the logical conclusion of what they argue. That is not the kind of country I want to live in, where generosity of spirit, kindness and support for our neighbours are somehow surplus to requirements.

I ask high-profile campaigners on this issue to urge their hundreds of thousands of social media followers, who are signing petitions and retweeting, to put an equal amount of energy into encouraging their friends and family to volunteer for charities, to mentor young people, to help parents who are struggling and to donate money to local organisations to fight poverty. I want voices such as Courtney Lawes to be heard as widely as Marcus Rashford’s. The combined wealth of some of the individuals and businesses who think this can all be fixed with money means that they are very well placed to make that change themselves if they think it is necessary.

Do not tell me these problems only start and end with Government. The number of people living in relative poverty in the UK has been around 14 million for decades. I listened to the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) throwing accusations such as “shameful” at us. He is no longer in his place, but where was he under the Labour Government, when there were also millions of people, including children, living in poverty? It was not “shameful” then, but apparently when it is the Conservative Government, it becomes shameful.

This Government have acted, and they have played a role. Yes, we need to keep these issues at the heart of the Government’s agenda, and yes, we need to understand the impact of poverty and combat it, but our whole society has a role to play in contributing and helping one another to build lives, livelihoods and families and provide long-term solutions to these challenges.