A million children 'face losing free school meals over the next five years' as protections end for parents moving on to universal credit
A million children face losing free school meals over the next five years as parents on legacy benefits are forced to move on to universal credit, it has been revealed.
Since 2018, there have been protections for existing claimants to continue to receive free school meals while universal credit is rolled out.
These transitional protections were initially due to end in March 2022, but have twice been extended to, firstly, March 2023 and then the end of this month.
According to The Times, the Treasury has been resisting calls from Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson to extend the deadline again.
The newspaper reported that internal Government estimates suggest a million children will be stripped of free school meals by the end of the decade when they go from primary to secondary school over the next five years.
But there is unlikely to be a major drop-off in numbers immediately, as those already receiving free school meals are protected until the end of their phase of education.
Government sources said a further extension of the protections was 'completely off the table' given the expected cost to the Treasury.
In 2023/24, 2.1 million pupils were eligible for free school meals - up from 1.1 million in 2017/18. Ministers have said the annual cost of providing free school meals is £1.5billion.
A million children face losing free school meals over the next five years as parents on legacy benefits are forced to move on to universal credit, it has been revealed
According to The Times, Chancellor Rachel Reeves has been resisting calls from Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson to extend transitional protections again
Earlier this month, a Labour MP called for all eligible children to be automatically enrolled for free school meals.
Peter Lamb, MP for Crawley, has introduced the Free School Meals (Automatic Registration of Eligible Children) Bill to the House of Commons.
It proposes the automatic registration of all children eligible for free school meals, with the option for parents to opt out.
Charities and campaigners, including celebrity chefs Jamie Oliver and Tom Kerridge, have recently hit out at the 'broken' free school meals system.
Barnardo's described current access to free school meals for most children in England as 'extremely restrictive', applying to families earning less than £7,400 after tax and excluding benefits.
The threshold is half that of Northern Ireland where families on universal credit with up to £15,000 in earnings after tax are eligible.
Wales and London have universal free school meals in primary education, while children in years one to five in primary schools run by local councils or funded by the Scottish Government are entitled to free school lunches during term-time.
Polling of 10,000 teachers across England last month for Food Matters suggested a quarter reported using their own money to feed children while two thirds said they supported introducing free school meals for all children.
Ministers plan to finish moving everyone to universal credit by the end of this year before closing the legacy benefits system by the end of March 2026.
A spokesman said the Government was 'determined to tackle the scourge of child poverty and break the unfair link between background and opportunity' and that 'wide-ranging action' had already been taken, including setting up a task force to tackle child poverty.
The first 750 schools will begin offering free breakfast clubs from April with £30million of investment, designed to boost standards, attendance and wellbeing, the spokesman said.
'This is alongside the free lunches for 2.1 million disadvantaged pupils and a further 1.3 million infants under our universal scheme,' they added.
'No pupil will feel any change as a result of the move to phase 2 of protections until after the summer and as with all Government policy, we keep our approach to free school meals under review.'
