Free School Meals/Pupil Premium: Eligibility

David Linden Excerpts

Tuesday 6th February 2018 Westminster Hall

[David Linden (Glasgow East) (SNP)]

I commend the hon. Member for Washington and Sunderland West (Mrs Hodgson) on securing the debate. It is a great shame that a significant number of people who wanted to contribute for longer than a couple of minutes could not. I encourage the hon. Lady to take the matter forward so that the debate can be continued under the auspices of the Backbench Business Committee, because it is clearly an important topic. As I intimated to you, Mr Hollobone, I will speak for only three minutes, as I wanted to reduce my time to allow others to get in earlier on.

I welcome the Minister and wish him well as he takes on his new role in the Department. Summing up, we have had excellent speeches from the right hon. Member for East Ham (Stephen Timms) and the hon. Members for Manchester, Gorton (Afzal Khan), for Brentwood and Ongar (Alex Burghart), for High Peak (Ruth George), for Eastbourne (Stephen Lloyd), for St Helens South and Whiston (Ms Rimmer), for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) and for Bedford (Mohammad Yasin).

As probably the youngest Member currently in the Chamber, when I saw that the debate was on free school meals it conjured up images of the mince and tatties and the custard that we had at Milncroft Primary in Glasgow. I should declare an interest, as I am married to a teacher, so I have first-hand experience of my wife coming home and telling me about the importance of free school meals and breakfast clubs. I pay tribute to my colleague on Glasgow City Council, Councillor Norman MacLeod, who has passionately argued for free school meals, and I echo what the hon. Member for Washington and Sunderland West said in that regard.

Before touching on a couple of things relating to Scotland—I know at this stage hon. Members normally groan, but unfortunately the third party summing-up rights mean that we have to take part in these debates, which is why I will try to keep my remarks brief—I will touch on three particular issues. The hon. Member for Chippenham (Michelle Donelan) made the point about money, and I think the same point was made by the hon. Member for Faversham and Mid Kent (Helen Whately). I took part in last night’s debate about the orders introduced by the Government, particularly on social security and pensions. In my time in the House I have already seen the Government pursue a benefits freeze, the 1% public sector pay cap, the barbaric rape clause and the medieval two-child policy. A number of hon. Members in today’s debate made the point that we should be looking after people on the lowest rungs of society, and the most vulnerable in society.

I am conscious of time, but I want to draw attention to the fact that in Scotland, with cross-party support, we have introduced legislation that enshrines a target for reducing child poverty by 2030. would like to see this Government do that as well.

I say to the hon. Member for Washington and Sunderland West to keep going on with this. It has been a good debate, but we need cross-party consensus. Today is the beginning of that, not the end.