Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many children in Lancashire were eligible for but did not claim free school meals in the latest period for which figures are available.

The Department for Education routinely collects information on pupils who are claiming free school meals. This information is published in the ‘Schools, Pupils and their Characteristics: January 2014’ Statistical First Release.[1] It is not possible to identify the number of pupils who are eligible for but are not claiming free school meals from the data the department collects.

However, the department has published a research paper ‘Pupils not claiming free school meals: 2013’[2] which presents estimates of the numbers and proportions of pupils who are entitled to receive free school meals but are not claiming. The paper compares registration rates for children aged between 4 and 15 and highlights regions and local authorities where under-registration rates are high. Figures from this paper show the under-registration rate for Lancashire local authority is 6% (1,600 pupils).

[1] www.gov.uk/government/statistics/schools-pupils-and-their-characteristics-january-2014

[2] www.gov.uk/government/publications/pupils-not-claiming-free-school-meals-2013