Southwark has had a universal primary free school meals offer for almost a decade, and are continuing to look at ways in which the offer can be improved and expanded.
Cost of Free Healthy School Meals
Southwark Council increased the price paid to primary schools per FHSM (per pupil) to £2.41 from £1.90, from September 2022-23 to bring parity with the government funded UIFSM funding. The increase was introduced to ensure schools to pay catering staff the London living wage and support with rising costs.
School Meals Transformation Programme
Alongside universal primary Free School Meals (FSM), Southwark has launched the School Meals System Transformation Programme to strengthen our school food system. The programme is led by Southwark Council in partnership with Impact on Urban Health (part of Guy's and St. Thomas' Charity), who are providing additional expert support as well as matched funding to the value of £525,000 over the four years of the programme. In total, approximately £1.2M will be invested to transform school meals in Southwark. Like many other parts of the country, Southwark’s local market for school food is fragmented and complex. The aim of the programme is to establish a more stable system that gives schools value for money; better control of their catering contracts; and supports Southwark’s environmental sustainability and climate emergency agenda. The programme will be achieved through four drivers of change:
- Targeted support and training for school business professionals
- Improving co-ordination by moving towards a centrally commissioned school food offer
- Putting into place effective governance and accountability mechanisms
- Supporting schools to share what works well.
Campaigning
Southwark has been actively campaigning to promote the benefits of universal school meal provision, asking the Government to make free school meals universally available to all primary aged children nationally, and to increase the FSM eligibility threshold to £20,000 for secondary aged pupils. This would support families with secondary school age children and teenagers; targeting the most vulnerable pupils just above the current eligibility threshold who are struggling to make ends meet and feed their families. The Council are also supportive of automatic enrolment for means tested free school meals, to ensure that all entitled children are claiming them and that schools receive associated Pupil Premium funding.