Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, for what reasons the National School Breakfast Programme missed its target of reaching 2,500 schools in the 2021-22 academic year; and if he will make a statement.

The department is investing up to £24 million to continue the national school breakfast programme until the end of the summer term in 2023. This will support around 2,500 schools in disadvantaged areas meaning that thousands of children from low-income families will be offered free nutritious breakfasts to better support their attainment, wellbeing, and readiness to learn. The focus of the programme is to target the most disadvantaged areas of the country, including the department’s opportunity areas.

The enrolment process for schools joining the programme is currently ongoing, and we continue to see strong interest from eligible schools since we invited the expressions of interest. Throughout the current contract we will be working with our provider, Family Action, to monitor different aspects of the current programme, including data on pupil uptake. We will consider the best opportunities and will share information on the programme in due course.

In the context of the COVID-19 outbreak, we took the decision to extend our free breakfast provision beyond April 2022, enabling schools to receive free food until the end of July 2022. This means that any school signing up to the programme now can still benefit from up to two terms’ worth of free food. This is followed by a very substantial discount of 75% for the following three terms, making this is an attractive offer to schools.