Free School Meals: Coronavirus

(asked on 22nd April 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what plans his Department has to provide free school meal support to children during future school holidays that take place during the covid-19 outbreak.


Answered by
Vicky Ford Portrait
Vicky Ford
This question was answered on 5th May 2020

Provision for free school meals is ordinarily term time only. However, during the Easter holidays the department met the costs of offering free school meals to eligible pupils not attending school. This was in recognition of the unprecedented levels of disruption and uncertainty for schools during this time. We currently have no plans to extend the scheme into future holiday periods but will keep the situation under review.

However, the department remains committed to supporting children and families through our 2020 Holiday Activities and Food programme and continues to work with coordinators on appropriate provision this summer. On 16 March, we wrote to all bidders to let them know whether or not they were successful in their applications for funding and offered feedback to unsuccessful bidders. We are now in the process of negotiating grant agreements with the successful bidders and we will announce the successful bids publicly in due course.

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