Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many children in the Folkestone and Hythe local authority area are in receipt of school food vouchers; and what the cost to the public purse is per month of providing that scheme in that area.

During this period, we are asking schools to support children who are eligible for and claiming benefits-related free school meals at home by providing meals or food parcels through their existing food providers wherever possible. Schools have continued to receive all their funding for benefits-related and universal infant free school meals. However, we recognise that providing meals and food parcels is not a practicable option for all schools. That is why on 31 March we launched a national voucher scheme as an alternative option, with costs covered by the Department for Education.

Schools are best placed to make decisions about the most appropriate arrangements for eligible pupils, and this can include food parcel arrangements, alternative voucher arrangements or provision through the national voucher scheme.

Edenred has reported that over £154 million worth of voucher codes has been redeemed into supermarket eGift cards by schools and families through the national voucher scheme as of Monday 15 June. Edenred has also reported that over 17,500 schools had placed orders for the scheme as of Tuesday 26 May. We do not collect data on the scheme at pupil level.

The number and proportion of students who qualify for free school meals is published in the ‘Schools, pupils and their characteristics’ publication and its underlying data files. We do not collect data at constituency level.

The 2019 publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/schools-pupils-and-their-characteristics-january-2019.