Hayley Clarke & Nathan Standley
Education reporter
Hayley Clarke / BBC
School children are getting less meat, cheaper ingredients and smaller portions in their lunches as caterers battle rising costs, the new chair of a school food organisation has said.
Michael Hales, incoming chair of LACA, said schools were increasingly having to bridge the gap between government funding for free school meals and the rising cost of delivering dinner for all of their pupils.
It comes after the government said it would expand free school meals, which Mr Hales said was “welcome”, but added that more funding would be “essential”.
The Department for Education (DfE) said the “fully funded” expansion of free school meals was a “historic step to tackle the stain of child poverty”.
A spokesperson added the government would keep the meal rates paid to schools, which fund free school meals, under review.
In April, the government said those rates would rise by 3p in the next academic year, from £2.58 to £2.61 per meal – a rise which Mr Hales said was “inadequate” and “almost considered an insult”.
He said it meant caterers who were part of LACA and provided about three million school dinners a day, were having to make “really difficult decisions” over portion sizes, and the quality of ingredients they could afford.
He said it was becoming an “ever increasing challenge” to meet the government’s school food standards, which officials said they were looking to “revise” with input from sector experts.
In Stoke-on-Trent, head teacher Clare Morton said she was spending £45,000 per year topping up the money she received from the government to pay for free school meals.
That money could be spent on another member of staff at St Mary’s Primary School, she said, but added it was vitally important all the children were well fed.
“For a lot of our children, this is the only hot meal that they will get during the day,” she said.
“Without healthy food, without a full tummy, these children won’t be able to learn.”
Hayley Clarke / BBC
Head teacher Clare Morton says her school spent £45,000 this year topping up its free school meal funding
In England, the government will pay primary schools £2.61 per meal in 2025-26 to deliver its universal infant free school meals scheme, which makes all children from reception up to Year 2, regardless of household income, eligible for a free school dinner.
After Year 2, primary and secondary schools also get additional pupil premium funding from government for each of their pupils who gets a free school meal. Currently, children qualify for a free school meal if their family is on Universal Credit and earns under £7,400 a year.
In June, the government announced that it would be changing that eligibility criteria to make all children whose families are on Universal Credit, regardless of household income, eligible for a free school meal from September 2026.
The change would mean 500,000 more children qualify for a free school meal, the government said.
Ms Morton said it was “fantastic” more children would be eligible, but added the government “needs to acknowledge that there’s a gap between what the school are actually getting and how much it costs to feed the children”.
Currently, the money her school needs to fund that gap is supported by 72 parents who pay for their child’s school meal. As the free school meals scheme expands and more children become eligible, that income will be “wiped out”, she said.
The government’s 3p meal rate increase “really isn’t enough” to make up any of the school’s £45,000 food deficit, she added.
Mr Hales said a recent survey of its members suggested the real cost of delivering a meal was actually more like £3.45 – roughly 80p more than the £2.61 given to schools to fund free school meals in England.
LACA said it sent its annual cost of living survey to 500 members. The 67 who responded said they catered for a total of 5,689 schools with a total pupil population of roughly 1.3 million. Overall, England has approximately 24,000 state schools with an overall pupil population of just over nine million.
Ann Gannon / BBC
LACA chair Michael Hales said costs were rising more quickly than the 3p increase allocated by government could provide for
Of the 67 schools, councils and private catering firms who responded to the LACA survey:
- 17 said they had decreased some portion sizes
- 35 said they had cut some menu options
- 38 said they had reduced some meats with cheaper protein sources
- 56 said they had adjusted their recipes
LACA said its survey also suggested that, since March 2020, the amount paid for school dinners by parents whose children were not eligible for free school meals had increased by 20%.
Mr Hales said that could continue to rise if schools were unable to meet rising costs with increased government funding.
Mum-of-three Mandy Mazliah, from Cambridgeshire, said she had concerns about the nutritional value of her children’s school dinners.
The 45-year-old, who runs a food blog and is a parent ambassador for a children’s food campaign, said her children, aged between 10 and 15, have a mix of packed lunches and dinners provided for them at school.
She said the school food could vary between healthy, balanced meals and pizzas, cookies and donuts, and in some cases portion sizes had been getting smaller.
“What we need is proper investment from the government in healthy school meals, and in fact a whole school food approach to make it more affordable for schools to provide nutritious, appealing, healthy food for all of our children,” she added.
Trish Peters
Mum Mandy Mazliah says she wants the nutritional value of secondary school meals to improve
Provision of free school meals varies significantly across the UK.
In London and Wales, the offer of a universal free school meal has been extended to all primary school children up to Year 6.
Although the funding rate for most of England is £2.61, in London schools get a higher rate of £3. In Wales, the rate is £3.20.
In Scotland, all children in the first five years of primary school are eligible for free school meals, as well as all children from families receiving the Scottish Child Payment benefit.
Parents in Northern Ireland can apply if they receive certain benefits and are below an income threshold of £15,000.
Additional reporting by Rahib Khan
