Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if his Department will make an assessment of the potential impact of increases in the cost of living on the number of children who will be both living in poverty and ineligible for free school meals in the next three years.

Through the provision of free school means (FSM), together with a further 1.25 million infants supported through the Universal Infant Free School Meal policy, the greatest ever proportion of school children, 37.5%, are now provided with a free meal at lunchtime, at a cost of over £1 billion a year.

The department continues to monitor the situation surrounding the rising cost of living whilst working with other government departments on support surrounding this issue. We do not have any plans to extend universal provision, but we will continue to review free school meal eligibility, to ensure that these meals are supporting the most disadvantaged, those out of work or on the lowest incomes. In setting a threshold, the department believes that the current level – which enables children to benefit, while remaining affordable and deliverable for schools – is the right one. Extending FSM eligibility to all pupils would carry a significant financial cost.

The department is also providing over £200 million per year for the next three years to provide healthy food in the holidays via our Holiday Activities and Food programme, providing breakfast clubs in thousands of schools, as well as delivering the School Fruit and Vegetable scheme and wider government schemes such as Healthy Start vouchers.