Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if he will extend the Free School Meal entitlement to children whose families earn less than £20,000 per annum, as recommended in the National Food Strategy’s final report.

The provision of free school meals (FSM) to children from out of work families or those on low incomes is of the utmost importance to this government. Under the benefits related criteria the department provides a free healthy meal to around 1.7 million children, ensuring they are well nourished and can concentrate, learn and achieve in the classroom.

Under this government, eligibility for FSM has been extended several times and to more groups of children than any other government over the past half a century, including the introduction of universal infant FSM, and further education FSM. Generous protections in place ensure that no child will lose their eligibility during the roll out of universal credit

In addition to this, the temporary extension of FSM eligibility to some groups with no recourse to public funds that has been in place since 2020 was extended to all groups and made permanent, subject to income thresholds.

The government will fully consider all the evidence and recommendations of the National Food Strategy review and will respond formally in due course.