An Early Day Motion (EDM) has been tabled in Parliament, expressing concern at the new government’s cancellation of plans to ensure that every primary school child living in poverty would be eligible for free school meals.
The government also proposes to scrap the pilot projects for free school meals for all primary school children in five areas.
You can read the EDM and see whether your MP has signed it here.
If they haven’t already signed, please write to your MP to explain your concerns and ask them to sign. You may want to use the information below to do this.
Take action by completing the following steps
1) Find your MP by visiting http://www.writetothem.com/ and entering your postcode.
2) Click on the name of your MP in the third column under ‘Your Member of Parliament’.
3) Enter your details and paste the text below. Feel free to edit this to make it more relevant to your own experience. Don’t forget to add your name at the bottom.
Dear MP,
Re Free school meals for low income working families
I am deeply concerned about the Department of Education’s recent announcement that plans for every primary school child from low income working families to qualify for free school meals will be cancelled. Currently, only children from workless households are eligible for free school meals, meaning that many children living below the poverty line miss out on a free healthy meal while at school.
School meals, which now have to meet high nutritional standards, have been shown to have a range of benefits, including improving classroom behaviour and helping children to develop healthy eating habits. Ensuring that the poorest children are able to take advantage of school meals can help to address the education and health inequalities that they face from a young age.
Losing entitlement to free school meals also represents a significant barrier to parents moving into employment, as primary school meals cost parents an average of £300 a year per child.
Please sign Early Day Motion 248 (Free school meals pilot scheme), which calls for government support for free school meals.
I look forward to your response.
Yours sincerely,
4) Finally, click on the link that is sent to your email account.
5) And that’s it! Please let us know if you receive a response, as this helps us to understand MPs’ interests and concerns. You can contact us on 020 7837 1228, christine@sustainweb.org or at Sustain, 94 White Lion Street, London, N1 9PF.
What you can do next
- Write to Education Secretary Michael Gove, asking him to reconsider the cuts
Use our online action here - Keep in touch - We’ll be sending email updates on the campaign each month.
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