Debate contribution: Free School Meals Provision

Debate contribution by Mrs Michelle Guy on 25 November 2025.

MLA

Mrs Michelle Guy

Party at the time

Alliance Party

Date

25 November 2025

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Opposition Business

Heading

Free School Meals Provision

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 5259060

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I wish that we did not need the motion. Echoing the comments of others, I feel confident that no Member in the Chamber does not want to see universal free school meals. The issue goes right to the heart of the pressures facing families and the pressures facing the education system. From the start, it is important to recognise that free school meals are not simply a welfare intervention; they are an educational intervention. They improve nutrition, enhance attainment and deliver long-term social and economic benefits, yet, in Northern Ireland, around 20% of children living in poverty are not eligible for free school meals. It should be a cause for alarm for every one of us that one in five children from low-income families is deprived of that support. Every MLA hears the same stories from parents in their constituency: families are doing everything that they can to cope with the cost of living and are still falling behind. The Department is investing in curriculum reform, literacy and numeracy initiatives and new approaches to teacher training and professional development. Those are worthy and have value, but none of them will achieve its full potential if thousands of children sit in classrooms too hungry to learn. The Education Authority's plan to increase the cost of school meals by 20% is simply not sustainable for families who are already on the brink. Minister, I was disappointed in your response to my question for written answer asking about your assessment of the impact of those increases on children who are just outside the threshold for free school meals. Signposting struggling families to Public Health Agency (PHA) guidance entitled 'Are you packing a healthy lunch?' feeds into the stigma that struggling parents are simply making bad choices. We could argue that successive Education Ministers have been the ones making the bad choices by not reforming our education system to ensure that we do not duplicate resources. I have no doubt that cross-departmental working will be crucial to expand free school meals, given the health and economic benefits that that delivers alongside educational benefits. We know that the cost to implement free school meals for pupils from nursery to P7 would be over £100 million extra. I am not so naive as to think that a programme of transformation would result in freeing up that kind of money in the short term or even within the 2030 timeline proposed in the motion, but we could make progress. We could bring more children within the threshold of free school meals. That would bolster the impact of the reforms that the Minister is introducing. Without that investment, the risk is that we undermine their impact. The children whom we are talking about are not abstract statistics; they are children across Northern Ireland and in our Lagan Valley constituency. The organisations working on the front line understand that. Lisburn food bank, for example, provided insights for the debate. It sees the direct consequences of food insecurity daily. The food bank highlighted the predictable spike in need every school holiday, exactly the gap that the school holiday food grant once addressed, and expressed its deep regret that that scheme had ended. It told me of an eight-year-old girl who receives free school meals during term time. With her mum working part-time, the loss of the holiday payment means an additional £20 to £30 weekly food bill. The result is meal rationing and snacks being stopped. Atlas Women's Centre stressed that universal free school meals would ease pressures on families at a time when food banks are overwhelmed and community groups are stretched far beyond their capacity. It emphasised the need to reduce stigma and to ensure that no child is made to feel different because of their family's income. The evidence supports what those organisations have told us. The free school meals pilot in England showed significant improvements in attainment: the equivalent of four to eight additional weeks of progress at Key Stages 1 and 2. That must be one of the most cost-effective education interventions on these islands. Minister, if you are serious about raising standards, tackling underachievement and giving every child a fair start, universal free school meals must be part of that vision. The motion calls on the Minister to work with the Minister of Finance to develop and:

"publish a funded plan, with timelines, to extend free school meals to all school children by 2030.".

That is ambitious — perhaps too ambitious — but ambition is what our children need.

755 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 13:55 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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