Universal Free School Meals is an initiative which is to help all children in “infants” (reception, Year 1 and Year 2) with access to school dinners. The contribution from the DfE (Department for Education) is £2.53 per child. Our school dinners are under the control of an external company (Edwards and Ward) and the dinner price is £2.83. Therefore, a very small charge of £0.30 per meal was having to be paid by parents for any pupils in infants having meals.
More recently, this was something as a school that we felt needing reviewing as we felt school meals for infants should be entirely “free”. Therefore, it was proposed to the FPGP (Finance, Personnel & General Purposes) Committee of the school’s governing body that the additional £0.30 per meal would be covered by the school budget. The committee have fully approved this decision – and we have been in touch today with ParentPay to change this amount for all children in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2. Once they have made their changes, this should be reflected when making a booking – and no additional 30p charge should be added to infant pupils’ bookings.
This does not affect pupils in KS2.