Welsh Government Set To Vote Against Extending Free School Meals For The Fourth Time

Welsh Labour are set to vote down a proposal to extend free school meals to all children in poverty in Wales for the fourth time this evening. 

Currently around 70,000 children who live in poverty in Wales, over half the total number, do not meet the threshold to receive free school meals (FSM), even though their only household income is from Universal Credit. 

Welsh Labour MS for Cardiff Central, Jenny Rathbone, has said that she will vote against extending the provision because of concerns around the “capital expenditure required to expand school dining rooms, and what we are going to stop doing to pay for it.” 

She was responding to a letter from a constituent asking her to vote for the proposals. Some comments online contrasted the refusal to pay for FSM to the money Welsh Government has handed over to big business in recent years. 

But the cost of giving all children in poverty a free lunchtime meal is also contested by anti-poverty groups, who say it is affordable and must be a priority. 

In May, the Bevan Foundation said that extending free school meals to all school pupils of families on universal credit would only cost £10.5 million in term-time and £14.1 million if it was applied during school holidays as well. 

“To put that £10.5m in context,” said Steffan Evans of the Bevan Foundation, “that is less than 0.06% of the Welsh Government’s total revenue budget”

In contrast, the group said that making the change would save the poorest families in Wales an average of £1,280.59 per year, or £764.30 per child each year. 

The Welsh Labour Government has already voted down proposals to extend free school meals three times, but this is the first time it has done so since the party’s re-election in May. 

Following the Welsh Election, a coalition of anti-poverty groups wrote to the incoming government in Cardiff Bay and urged them to extend the provision. “Too many children who are trapped in poverty are denied access to FSM [Free School Meals] due to arbitrary eligibility criteria,” they said. 

Anti-austerity group People’s Assembly Wales, who have been campaigning on the issue and have organised protests outside The Senedd, are asking people write to their MS and urge them to back the proposed changes. 

The group has drafted a model letter for people to send which says that Welsh Government’s opposition to extending free school meals to all families on Universal Credit is now “untenable.” 

In addition, the group is calling for access to free school meals for those with no recourse to public funds, who are often asylum seekers, which it says will be a “powerful anti-racist statement” and pressure the UK government to do the same in England. 

Many of the organisations campaigning on the issues also want Welsh Government to begin planning for the implementation of universal free school meals, meaning every child will receive a lunchtime meal regardless of family income. 

They say that this would lead to improved public health and nutrition, reduced childhood obesity rates, better classroom concentration, improved school atmosphere, more social solidarity and would end stigma for children in poverty. 

Wales currently has the highest child poverty rate in the UK. 

Recently, the Trussell Trust reported that the crisis was so severe that over 54,000 food parcels had to be given to children in Wales between April 2020 and March 2021. This amounted to one parcel every ten minutes- a stark indicator of how many children in Wales face food poverty.

The vote this evening comes as the Wales TUC publishes new research that shows that over sixty thousand children of key workers in Wales are currently living in poverty. This amounts to one in four key worker children. 

The trade union group says that the main reasons for key worker family poverty are low pay and insecure hours, and that UK Government plans to cut Universal Credit will make the situation even worse. 

But Wales TUC also calls on Welsh Government to act as well, and that its Discretionary Assistance Fund which helps people in poverty has a low profile and strict eligibility criteria, meaning that many people who would benefit from it have been unable to access support.