Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what estimate his Department has made of the effect of the National School Breakfast Programme on educational attainment.

The department is investing up to £26 million in a breakfast club programme, using funds from Soft Drinks Industry Levy revenues. This money will kick-start or improve breakfast clubs in over 1,700 schools. The focus of these clubs has been to target the most disadvantaged areas of the country – including the Department for Education’s Opportunity Areas – to help make sure every child gets the best start in life.

The programme will also deliver innovation projects with the aim of testing solutions to delivery and access barriers, and enhancing the health and education benefits. Innovation projects will seek to test out new approaches to enhancing the health, education or wider socioeconomic benefits and to overcoming delivery and access barriers.

We monitor management information from the programme on an ongoing basis and will also review the effectiveness of the programme fully once the programme concludes.