to be offended by a teaching assistant saying this:

[StripyPenguin]

That children who get free school meals would be going hungry if they didn't get a free school meal because their parents wouldn't be able to afford to feed them? Not a specific child, just children who have free school meals in general?

I don't add sake - nay feel like it at times- I add salt!

When, where and to whom did she say this?

X post soweeee

I'm another one who doesn't get why this is offensive

Well, I think it's hugely offensive however at primary school age quite a few kids who get FSM don't know they get them for free.

Also I would like to know what context it was said in.

I don't find it offensive and like other posters I think in some cases it's probably true but.....I suspect if my dc received fsm and someone suggested that without them they'd 'go without', it would upset me. I'd go without a great many things, food included before my dd went hungry. I think that's where the offence comes from. It's not that it's untrue but it is insensitive. I suppose it depends on the context and the audience.

If she wax speaking about how harsh the benefit reforms are and how the cuts are impacting on people, then she is correct.

Cut FSM's and we will see cases of malnutrition again.

Many families are being hit with Bedroom Tax and HB etc reforms, which means that they are topping up their rent, put that with the rise in fuel and transport costs and many are not just struggling, they are going without the basics.

There is a difference in saying that these funded services are vital or putting it that, claimants are feckless, inadequate parents.

Makemineapinot - yes, but those parents are CHOOSING not to cook their DC's a meal at night. They are choosing their own comfort, or extras like bottles of wine and nights out over feeding their DC's.

Like I said, priorities. I have a DC with multiple life threatening allergies. He is below school age, and I have been informed that even when he is school age, I won't get FSM's for him as his dietary needs are too complex. Does that mean I won't ensure he is well fed? Of course not!

It IS just a matter of priorities. I have been unemployed for over 5 years now, due to multiple disabilities. (No, I no longer get DLA...). It is about rethinking what is essential and where your priorities lie.

Mine lie in ensuring that all of my DC's have a healthy, balanced diet and are not underfed.

If other parents on benefits don't put that as their priority, then IMO, SS should be contacted - and I NEVER say that lightly, given my own past experiences with SS.

It is NEGLECT to not feed your DC's. Why do people just put it down to lack of money?

YES, I am lucky that I do not currently have to pay 'bedroom tax'. But I can assure you that if it came down to a choice between staying in the too-large house and paying 'bedroom tax' and NOT being able to feed my DC's properly, I would move as far away as it took, into as small a property as it took to ensure that my DC's were well fed AND with a roof over their head.

A bit of upheaval with school moves is infinitely preferable to malnutrition, no?!

I just DON'T get why people on a combination of IS and ChB and CTC say that they can't feed their DC's.

Now the REAL issue, in my mind, is those who get WTC, are working, have travel costs to get to work, Childcare costs over and above those that you get funded for (TC's only cover a MAXIMUM of 70% of your Childcare, up to 70% of £300 a week. It can be very easy in the SE for 2+ DC's to cost more than that), and food costs for themselves once at work.

And the minute you get ANY WTC, in my LA at least, you do not qualify for FSM's, which for 2 DC's would cost you £21 a week, just for Primary age DC's.

I think it's a travesty that THESE people are not getting FSM's.

Yes, I DO RELY on the FSM's to ensure my DC's have a balanced lunch to see them through the day, as I WOULD struggle to provide a decent evening meal if I also had to provide lunches. But the FSM's are what ENABLES me to provide a decent home-cooked meal in the evenings. Why can't other people on benefits manage that too?

A CUT in FSM's WOULD make it impossible for me to provide a decent evening meal.

I think that as it stands, there is NO excuse for those on benefits to say they can't give a decent breakfast or dinner though. You can buy ten eggs for less than £2. not particularly ethical eggs, but when you are poor your ethics have to take a back seat.

You can do breakfast for 5 with ten eggs and 5 slices of bread, with a glass of orange juice FFS.

If people are paying bedroom tax, then move!

I fully expect that I will have to do that once DS1 leaves home. It WILL be shit - It takes time to build up a support network when you AND your DC's have disabilities, and it's not going to be easy to find schools for DS3. But I would rather move than pay bedroom tax, if it left me unable to feed my DC's.

Maybe my priorities are my DC's health first, them being settled second, and THEN anything to do with me at the bottom of the list?

I still do stuff for me - I get Christmas presents as vouchers for the local craft shop so I can buy wool and spend the money on me as my family know all too well that cash would go on the DC's. I see friends who come to me - those that understand my disabilities know I can't get out and about. We still can have a laugh without spending money.

Yes, my boots are shit this year - blame Tesco. £20 pair of boots I bought with my Clubcard vouchers, and the first pair fell apart in 4 weeks, they replaced them, but this pair only lasted 10 weeks. Must be due vouchers soon, double them up and I have new shoes.

Couthy - I've read a lot of your posts over time and admire how you've dealt the various things life has thrown at you. I think that not everyone is as resourceful as you are though. Inability is not the same as laziness.

Many people start off life on benefits in severe amounts of debts, because they've been using credit (once freely available to them when they were working) to make up the shortfall when they first lose their job or suffer a relationship break down and are waiting for benefits to come through, for example. Servicing debts make a huge difference to any individual/family's ability to make ends meet on benefits.

What if your fridge/freezer/washing machine has just broken down and you're rejected for a budgeting loan or discretionary assistance loan? What if both your DC need new shoes in the same month because of a growth spurt or accidental wear and tear? What if your mum gets taken into hospital terminally ill and it's a £4.20 bus fare each day to go see her? There are all sorts of what ifs that go in life, often one after the other after the other - because life can be like that. If you start from an even keel you can usually absorb one or two, but if you start from a disadvantage or more than a couple of things happen in a row, it's easy to get into a great deal of financial difficulty, despite your best efforts, before you know what's hit you.

What then if you don't smoke, don't drink, don't go out, walk around in holey boots to prioritise your children and yet still don't have enough to feed your family?

Whether its true or not you should have better things to do than get offended by arguably misguided comments by a teaching assistant. Teaching is hard enough without the professionally offended getting on teachers' backs.

It's the point of FSM - to ensure children from the poorest families receive at least one hot meal per day. I am not sure what is offensive about saying that.

As others have said context is everything.
If she was arguing in a social context with another adult who was questioning the system of FSM and she was explaining exactly why some children need them, fair enough.
If she said this to children in school then totally unacceptable.

Agree context is everything.

Dahleen there are no loans anymore. You get told to apply to the food bank and save up with what you didn't spend on food, hence why we now have no washing machine etc, because they can stuff that even though I put in what I can, but if my children were going to go hungry, I'd go. I'd go out begging if I had to.
I'm with Couthy that there's rarely any excuse for just not feeding your children.
It may not be the greatest food, and you may end up slimline, but it's rare that there's a genuine long term inability to put something in their stomachs, 500 gms pasta is 20p, unit of power 6p. If you can run to it sauce 26p, failing that raiding tomato ketchup satchets is an old standby.
If your powers off it gets harder, but mums have been known to take 20p noodles in a pan looking for boiling water, claiming 'temporary power cut'.

JustGetting,

That's not strictly truedahleen is correct, budgeting loans still exist

JustGettingOnWithIt - I sort of agree with you because in the sorts of situations I'm talking about, children wouldn't actually go hungry because their parents would knock on doors begging if they had to. Most of us have friends who would rally around even when everyone's in a similar boat.

None of that takes away from the fact that it's a food bank or a friend or a kind stranger who is making up the shortfall - i.e. that the benefits isn't enough to feed the family.

Fortunately, for most families, the points at when life is that bad tends to be a short period only, rather than being like that month after month.

Sock really? Am I being lied to? I have been told they don't and I can be refered to the food bank for three weeks and use the money saved.

YABU - at least, without the context of who she was talking to, etc.
That is the whole purpose of FSMs. Can't understand why that is offensive

She's not said 'Nobody on FSMs would feed their children if it weren't for FSMs' or something which would be offensive.

Crisis loans/grants no longer exist.

Budgeting loans do but they have to meet strict criteria.

The Discretionary fund rules differ region to region and IME tend to have a greater likelihood of success if you apply at the beginning of the financial year and with significant agency referral.

And Dahleen sorry for correcting you if I'm misinformed.

Seems a perfectly sensible thing to say. If fsm are not needed, get rid of them?!

Who did the teaching assistant say it to? You? A child? A class of children? Some friends in a pub? Has the OP clarified this?

Yes it's offensive. I am on benefits, my children are not of school age yet and they get fed a nutritious diet of home cooked food. School meals are expensive so most low income families can't afford them but decent packed lunches and homecooked meals can be done quite cheaply. It's about priorities. If a family is claiming benefits they have enough money to buy food unless they're spending it on other less vital things. To suggest that kida would go without a meal is implying those on low income/benefits can't manage they're money properly and don't prioritise food, rent and bills above all else.

sadly she's right. some children arent being fed well at home. ensuring a hot meal five days a week is a small price.