Debate contribution: Education (Holiday Meal Payments) Bill: Consideration Stage

Debate contribution by Mr Nick Mathison on 21 September 2026.

MLA: Mr Nick Mathison
Party at the time: Alliance Party
Date: 21 September 2026
Type: Debate contribution
Business: Private Members' Business
Heading: Education (Holiday Meal Payments) Bill: Consideration Stage
Assembly identifier: Official Report component 5742895

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I thank the Bill sponsor for that intervention. I put on record my thanks to Jonathan Redpath and the rest of the team in the Bill Office for their assistance and support in developing the amendments and throughout the process. It is important to note that not all Committee members supported the Bill in principle. In the closing stages of Committee Stage, David Brooks, Jon Burrows and Julie Middleton asked for their opposition to the Bill's underlying policy be recorded. However, it was decided not to divide the Committee on the individual decisions taken during the clause-by-clause scrutiny. The Committee recognises that Members may take different views on the Bill's broader policy merits, but the Committee's role at Committee Stage was to examine the Bill, identify concerns and improve the Bill where necessary. The Committee is satisfied that it undertook a thorough scrutiny process and that the amendments before the Assembly today address significant operational, drafting and scrutiny issues that were identified during Committee Stage. I will now speak directly to —.
Yes, I will.
I thank the Member for his helpful intervention. It was right to take a preventative approach and a public health-informed approach to this. As the Bill sponsor highlighted, we hope that, if the Bill passes into law, the Minister will be able to work with his Executive colleagues to secure the necessary finance. The Minister is good at coming to the Chamber and putting in big bids for money that he is seeking, and I hope that he will make the same robust and rigorous case in relation to this Bill.
Yes, I will.
Perhaps members will come in to clarify their positions. I certainly do not want to speak for them. There was no disagreement among Committee members that we want to ensure that children are well fed. There was disagreement from the members whom I mentioned about the appropriate mechanism to deliver that. They did not support the mechanism being put forward here. Again, I do not want to speak for those members, but the disagreement was largely on the basis of the financial cost. I am happy to give way to any members who wish to clarify their position.
I thank both Members for their intervention. Far be it from me to speak for any other party here on the issue. I come to the single group of amendments, and I will ask for Members' indulgence, because they are very much in the technical sphere, so it may not be the most riveting debate. Certainly, when we debated this at Second Stage, there was a lot of back and forth in the Chamber around the Bill's principles. I hope that today's amendments are taken in the spirit that they are technical in nature. Amendment No 1 to clause 1 leaves out "a financial payment" and inserts "financial payments". Most of the reason for that came from feedback that the Department brought to the Committee. The amendment serves to change that to a plural — "financial payments" — because the Department was clear that that would provide it with greater flexibility by enabling multiple payments to be made over a holiday period, rather than a single lump sum, which it did not feel would be the most appropriate delivery mechanism. Amendment Nos 5, 7 and 9 would make that same change to the terminology, making that a plural — "financial payments" — for the same reason: so that there would not have to be a single, one-off payment. Amendment No 2 to clause 1 leaves out everything from "who" through to the end. It attempts to remove potentially ambiguous language, which was flagged by the Department, about pupils who normally attend school. It would ensure that families were not disadvantaged where pupils attended school during a relevant holiday period. Schools tend to have varying opening dates, with some opening earlier at the end of the summer period in particular. The amendment attempts to build in flexibility for that. Amendment No 3 to clause 1 leaves out everything from the beginning of line 8 to the word "children" and inserts:
"Article 58(1A) applies to parents of pupils who".
That amendment serves to make the language of the Bill consistent; it would refer to "parents" instead of "people" and "pupils" instead of "children". Again, the Department was keen for the language to be consistent in the article that would be amended. I will not read out amendment No 4. Some of the amendments are quite long, but Members have all the amendments in front of them on the Marshalled List. The amendment sets out to ensure that pupils will receive a free school meal if they should return to school on a date for which a holiday meal payment has been made. That is to try to ensure that, if there are variabilities in school opening periods and dates, a child will not be declined access to a physical meal in the school by virtue of the fact that they had received a payment for the same date. Amendment No 5 to clause 1 leaves out "payment" and inserts "payments". I referenced the change to the plural — "payments" — earlier in my remarks, so I will not cover it again. Amendment No 6 to clause 1 inserts at the end:
"(1CA) If an eligible parent does not have access to a bank account, the Authority shall, in accordance with arrangements approved by the Department, make the financial payments by an alternative method."
The Department was quite clear, drawing on its experience of operating its previous scheme for making holiday meal payments, that it was important that alternative payment methods be available for parents who do not have access to a bank account. The number of people in that scenario is diminishing, but the Committee felt it important to build that in. Amendment No 7 concerns another leaving out of "payment" and insertion of the word "payments", which is consequential to amendment No 1. Amendment No 8 to clause 1 is about how payments would be defined and how the amount of the payment would be arrived at. It leaves out from the second "the" to the end of line 18 and inserts the phrase:
"a daily allowance specified by the Authority, in accordance with arrangements approved by the Department."
Amendment No 8 is based on feedback from the Department and attempts to establish a clearer basis for setting the payment amount by linking it to the daily allowance specified by the Education Authority, in accordance with arrangements approved by the Department. That is the language of the Education Order, which the Bill seeks to amend. The Department was clear that it felt that that was a cleaner and clearer way in which to define it. Concerns were raised about variability in school meal charges, particularly in post-primary settings where pupils have more choice when it comes to what they can or choose not to spend when selecting a meal. Again, the Department was keen to emphasise that a similar approach — this is not the Department's precise wording — would provide a practical framework for administration. I draw Members' attention to the fact that amendment No 10 is consequential to amendment No 8. I will highlight something at this stage, because concerns have been raised about this issue, and the Committee may need to return to it. With regard to how the payments will be arrived at, it is important to note that the Bill as originally drafted and the amendment contain the phrase:
"in accordance with arrangements approved by the Department"
when referring to the amount of the holiday meal payment. That creates a theoretical possibility that the Department could set the allowance for a holiday meal payment at a rate lower than that which is made available to a pupil for free school meals during term time. I am crystal clear that that is fundamentally not the policy intention of the Committee amendment, and I am clear that it was not the policy intention of the Bill sponsor in his original draft. What we have in the amendment today is an attempt to respond to concerns that were raised by the Department that the original draft was not clear on how that would be dealt with, particularly in post-primary settings where pupils have choice about how much they spend. The Department seemed to be reasonably content with it in a primary setting but not in a post-primary setting. I want to be clear, therefore —.
I will give way.
I thank the Bill sponsor for giving that commitment, and I re-emphasise that it is the Committee's intention that there should be no scenario in which the holiday meal payment would ever be set at a monetary value that is less than that which eligible pupils or parents have access to via the free school meals scheme during term time. It is important to get that on the record. It is my intention that, as the Bill sponsor mentioned, the Committee would re-engage with the Bill sponsor and the Bill Office to see whether further clarity could be brought at Further Consideration Stage to ensure that there is no wriggle room to create the possibility that we could be looking at a lower payment for the holiday meal payment than a pupil would be eligible for via free school meals in term time. Amendment No 9 is to clause 1 at page 2. It is another removal of "payment" and insertion of "payments" and is consequential to amendment No 1. Amendment No 10 is to clause 1, page 2, line 10 and is to:
"Leave out 'current school meal charges payable' and insert 'daily allowance specified'".
It is consequential to amendment No 8, which I just covered. Moving on to clause 2, amendment No 11 is to clause 2 at page 2, line 16. I will not read all of the amendment, as Members have the Marshalled List. It sets out a little more specificity on what the "holiday periods" are. The original drafting was a little open-ended, and the amendment provides a bit of clarity. There would still be some flexibility around schools. Article 58(1A) of the Education and Libraries (Northern Ireland) Order 1986, which would be amended by the Bill, provides that flexibility, but the amendment would serve to ensure the standardisation of holiday payment periods and avoid payments being made for different holiday durations in different school settings, which was deemed to be potentially inequitable and administratively complex; that is how the Department set it out. Amendment No 11 tries to bring a bit of clarity as to what "holiday periods" actually refers to. Amendment No 12 to clause 3, page 2, line 24 came through evidence that the Committee heard from the Examiner of Statutory Rules. It is proposed that "relevant period" be inserted at the end of that section and that it:
"has the meaning given in Article 2(2) of the 1986 Order."
The Examiner of Statutory Rules gave evidence that an amendment that had that effect would ensure that the relevant definition is included in the 1986 Order as opposed to being defined only in the Bill. She was clear that it needed to be included in the 1986 Order for legal clarity. Finally, amendment No 13 is to clause 4, page 2, line 35. It would insert a section at the end of the clause. Again, I will not read the amendment word for word, as it is available to Members. In that amendment, the Committee has brought forward a proposal to strengthen the Assembly's scrutiny of any subordinate legislation made under clause 4(4). The amendment will ensure that, in future, where powers are used to amend primary legislation, the affirmative resolution procedure would apply, whereas other provisions would remain subject to negative resolution. The Committee considered that to be an important safeguard and an appropriate enhancement of Assembly oversight. Those are the amendments.
With your permission, Mr Deputy Speaker, I will make some very brief remarks in my capacity as an Alliance MLA. To be clear, Alliance will be supporting all the amendments, as they are technical in nature and were produced collaboratively by the Bill sponsor and the Bill Office to respond to the drafting issues that the Department raised. Although the Department highlighted those concerns in its evidence, it might have been helpful if there had been further proactive engagement beyond that to help with the production of the revised text and of any amendments to give the legal clarity that it said was lacking and to address its concerns. If there is an attempt to look at any of those amendments in more detail in advance of Further Consideration Stage, I hope that we can get departmental engagement in that process. I fully appreciate that there are diverging views across the parties on support for the Bill, and there are legitimate concerns about the costs. We are not in a scenario in which we are awash with money. I hope that, in the debate, Members will identify the amendments as being technical in nature and will not feel the need to divide on every single one. I will finish by saying that it would have been good to have had the Minister in the Chamber to engage on the amendments. He has made his views very clear that he does not support the Bill in principle, but it would have been good to have had him here, even to bring a ministerial perspective to the question of whether the Committee amendments satisfactorily address the concerns that the Department has raised. I hope that, as the Bill progresses, we will perhaps see improvement in that engagement so that we can end up with a final text that delivers on the policy intent and provides the clear legal certainty that the Department is keen to see delivered.

2,323 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

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