Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty's Government, further to the answer by Baroness Berridge on 14 January (HL Deb, col 882), what do they consider a reasonable maximum profit for a contractor to make on the new Edenred school food voucher scheme.

The government has taken unprecedented and substantial action to ensure that children do not go hungry as we take measures to tackle COVID-19, including in relation to free school meals.

Schools were free to decide the best approach for their free school meal pupils. They could provide lunch parcels, locally arranged vouchers, or the national voucher scheme.

The department does not comment on the commercial arrangements of third parties, but can confirm that we are only paying for the face value of goods delivered, which in this case is vouchers.