Free School Breakfast

IME it will be run by TAs who will be paid extra and many TAs want the extra hours becuase currently they work a max of 5 hours per day, which doesn't equate tona full time salary.

I'm not up in arms about families getting some help, but I can't help thinking this won't be beneficial for most. It is going to be cornflakes and toast, which isn't a great breakfast, although of course hugely beneficial for those who otherwise go without.

However, the reason it needs to be offered to everyone, is to remove the stigma for those who need it. Whether it does that or whether those who can provide a good breakfast at home continue to do so remains to be seen.

Another huge benefit, when we provided (school funded) breakfast clubs, is that it gets children from struggling families into school and in on time.

I'm 50 this year, grew up in a typical working & middle class suburb of Birmingham in 70's and 80's.

We had free milk (for a time), toast at break time, nit nurses, dentists in school showing us how to brush (using the pink disclosing tablets), and even a free holiday club in the community centre in the summer - my Mom and all her friends weren't going out to work, but they didn't have to pay and we went and had a lovely time doing sports and crafts etc..

It's like folks like this feel they had it particularly hard and no one else has struggled since. They tend to be bitter and can't see the advantages they had, or they don't want people to have things they didn't. My aunt (Reform voter) gets bent out of shape about parent and child parking, as when she had my twin cousins at the same age as me she didn't have this. She now, at 76, parks in them out of some kind of weird spite.

I have issues with the scheme, not kids getting fed, but everything else.

I suspect it is being funded the same way the “free” nursery hours are in that parents who already pay for wraparound care will have to pay more to subsidise those who are using the funded breakfast club.

The intention behind the scheme is to get parents working longer hours so they can get to work for 9am. Are employers now going to expect their staff to get in for 9am whereas before they were flexible for school runs? That doesn’t benefit the kids.

Who is staffing the clubs, are the school staff being paid extra or are they expected to volunteer for this? Does this mean they have less time to prepare for lessons, does it add to the high workload, do they have less time with their own kids as a result?

Finally, I suspect the kids who would really benefit from it - the ones who are genuinely not being fed - won’t be attending, so the scheme won’t reach the ones in need.

The “parents should feed their own kids” comments are missing the point - it’s not about the food.

Sadly lots of children do arrive at school late and hungry, not a great start to a day of learning.

YANBU. I think there are plenty of sensible arguments against the policy (not the best use of money, can it be staffed etc). But the argument “I didn’t get the in my day” is obviously bollocks.
What else shall we scrap because some people didn’t get it in the past?

not sure mine would have made it out of the door without breakfast - certainly they wouldn't have wanted to wait to get to school for it

Kids need carbohydrates for energy and glucose for brain function. Toast and cereal at school is absolutely great. Usually they provide fruit too.

Kids should not be hungry. I not high earner but happy for my taxes to pay for this. Like previous person mentioned I would prefer it to be something more nutritional than cereal and toast. Better than nothing I suppose.

I’d be concerned it’s mostly bland, processed crap which isn’t actually any good for the children. Seems more likely to be used by working parents as free childcare than the children that actually need a free breakfast though.

Like you, I can’t get that worked up about it though.