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?

ShitOnAStick - are you arguing that FSM should be abolished because they aren't needed then?

She might be right, in some cases, but it' an awful generalisation to make - and not very nice for children who do receive FSM to hear that, whether it's true, or not.

Context please!

I have to say though, that unfortunately that those on fsm would not eat a balanced lunch if not funded. Sometimes that is the only proper meal they have per day.

There is also a strong correlation between those who qualify for fsm, and those who qualify for pp (usually don't achieve full academic potential).

If this makes anyone feel uncomfortable then we really need to look to our politicians - not feel outrage towards a TA telling the truth!

My dd would qualify for free school meals if she was at school just now (too young) and I would be extremely offended by this. I can still afford to put a hot meal down to her each evening.

Shitonastick, you seem to be suggesting that FSM aren't needed and people just need to budget more carefully. Shall we abolish FSM then??

Dahlen - I was a Care leaver that fell pregnant at 15, had my DD at 16, with no family support. I'm as left-wing as you can get, and don't believe the Tory guff that everyone can do well if they work hard enough, as it's just not true.

What I DO believe is that people who work on a low income and choose to use credit are bloody daft.

I've been in low paid shitty jobs, been made redundant with only 5 days notice, in dispute with IS with no payment for months because my employer owed me holiday pay, whilst TC's didn't pay due to a computer error that took my MP to sort out. I've been drowning in shit creek so far as to still be coughing up the shit lumps but I STILL fed my DC's first and foremost despite only being in receipt of Child Benefit. We lived in one room of the house, only using electric to cook dinner. But I STILL cooked dinner and gave them breakfast.

Priorities. And I have a separate account which I put money aside for shoes for the DC's and don't touch, no matter what for anything else. I take out insurance from D&G on my main appliances. Because I WOULDN'T be able to afford to replace them.

It's common sense. And I didn't get taught that at school, or by my (frankly useless) mother, dead father, or kinship Carers. I taught myself, very flipping rapidly. Because if you make a mistake once, you don't repeat it.

It just frustrates me that you hear of people saying that they can't afford to feed their DC's when they are on benefits. You CAN, but you often have to make hard choices about your priorities first.

I'm saying that FSM's SHOULDN'T be abolished. It's NOT that you can't afford to feed your DC's a healthy EVENING meal when on benefits (barring DWP fuck ups, which are another thread, really...). What the issue is is that those on benefits WOULD struggle to feed their DC's a healthy balanced lunch AND a healthy balanced evening meal.

You can do one or the other on benefits. I manage in the school holidays by saving up so that I have extra budget for food shopping in those weeks. If I had to provide healthy balanced lunches 365 days a year, I KNOW that the quality of their evening meals would suffer.

So yes, FSM's ARE ESSENTIAL IMO.

HOWEVER, I disagree with the assumption that nobody on benefits feeds their DC's an evening meal, as they can't afford to. It's just not true. FSM's are what ENABLE those on benefits to have enough money to feed their DC's a healthy balanced evening meal.

If they can't, barring DWP fuck ups that mean weeks without money, then those parents need to reexamine their spending priorities.

I think YANBU. It's an unhelpful stereotype (to say the least)

I've only ever personally known one person whose kids would definitely not have eaten if it wasn't for FSM- and she's since had since had them removed by SS.

I found being lumped in with parents like that incredibly bloody offensive when I was a single mum on benefits.

stripy why do you'think pupils get FSM and those pupils also get pupil premium?

I can assure you the TA has only quoted from what the government themselves have said about the reasons - yes it general but a lot of studies go into these things before decisions are made.

Of course there will be anomalies.

Tbh I would find this comment offensive !
We are on benefits at the moment, my two children receive FSM and I am grateful for that, when they aren't entitled to them they have packed lunches, otherwise it would cost me £22 per week for two school meals a day.

I make sure my children have breakfast on a morning whether it be toast or cereal, they never
Go to school on an empty stomach and I always make sure they have a meal at home too.
We may be on benefits but I have learnt how to budget shop.

With my children having FSM that frees up at least £15 a week for food for hot cooked meals instead of food for packed lunches. I can make good hot meals for £3 including spag Bol and chilli.

Children should feel equal to their peers in a school environment. This kind of comment could make child ren who receive free school meals as though they should be grateful and their friends may treat them differently. Yanbu, I think couthymow is right about this.

"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"

Despite FSM such a large majority of children at the (admittedly small, special) secondary school I work at are still going hungry for many different and complicated reasons that the school provides free breakfast club and breaktime snacks for all students too.

Why should we skirt around the kids though, even if the TA said it in front of them. Its the truth and exactly what they would hear on newsround, my dd has listened to news reports in the past that have covered lots of policies.

Because not all children are able to process that sort of information without feeling somewhat scared about the implications.

Iamgluezilla - it IS relentless. I'm sitting here thankful that my Ex can afford to buy DS3 some birthday presents, and kind enough to let me choose some of them, as I can't afford any more than a puzzle and an Imaginext police car this year. I've been unemployed through disability for 5 1/2 years now, and only received DLA for 1 of those years, and that stopped 5 months ago.

It is FUCKING relentless, and sometimes I get frustrated at how my life has turned out.

But I'm not sitting on my arse doing fuck all about it - I'm half killing myself to drag myself to College 2 evenings a week, to try to get some qualifications to enable me to get a job where I can work from home and earn a bit of money around my disabilities, to try to alleviate the fucking dismalness of it all!

(I know that isn't a real word, but YKWIM).

And I DO take offence to this TA's statement, because the fact that my DC's get FSM's does NOT stop me from cooking them a healthy dinner, because I don't NEGLECT MY DC's.

Which is what it is. Not providing those three meals a day, # however basic, IS NEGLECT. I can't see as how you can call it anything else.

Again, with my codicil that that statement DOESN'T include those parents dealing with a DWP fuck up, or an HMRC fuck up in the case of TC's, because these happen FAR TOO OFTEN.

If any business was to have the error rate of the DWP or the HMRC when it comes to Tax Credits, they would sack every staff member responsible for gross misconduct or something. The error rate is astounding - the problem is, the DWP and HMRC like to obscure the true rate of their errors by lumping that figure together with the fraud rates, which are INCREDIBLY low, far lower than that of the error rates.

This also gives a false picture to 'benefit bashers' too. If the error rate and fraud rates were published separately in newspapers, the whole country would be up in arms about it, and insisting on procedural changes.

Getting back to my earlier point, I find it distressing that I am lumped in with people who wilfully neglect their DC's by not prioritising their food above all else, simply because my DC's receive FSM's. It makes me quite angry, tbh.

It's a very lazy way of thinking, to generalise that because someone receives FSM's, they won't feed their DC's. I only knew one person in that situation who didn't, and as the PP said, her DC's were eventually removed because she prioritised alcohol over feeding her DC's. Which somewhat proves my point that it is a matter of priorities...

The true figures for error as opposed to fraud ARE googleable. (? Is that a word now?!)

But it's only for the DWP. The HMRC are yet to get back to my FoI request for the separate percentages, against total claimant numbers.

Maybe if the error rate for both these benefits was greatly reduced, and the lead time on a claim was reduced (there are ways to do that, in certain circumstances, you CAN insist on it being fast tracked if you have just left a relationship, for example, but the DWP and HMRC won't tell you that...), then far LESS people would be in the situation whereby they were unable to feed their DC's.

And don't get me started on DWP sanctions...

Barring GENUINE, short-term reasons for not having enough money to feed your DC's breakfast and dinner, I WOULD class it as neglect through misplaced priorities.