To ask why do people not working claiming FSM get this for free?

[Sprinkledusting]

I’ve just discovered if you claim FSM and even if you’re not working, you can send your child to morning/after school club for free. And not just in our school either.
There are also sports clubs and holiday clubs during school holidays that state they are free for those who claim FSM. To claim free school meals your income has to be so low that you’re not working full time or not working at all, which of the people I know, most are not.
But those who are working have to pay for breakfast club/holiday clubs.

Can someone explain to me the logic behind this? As I simply don’t understand it.

This. And you should be grateful that despite being low income you can still afford to feed your child lunch. You are employable and have a cognitive ability above a lot of the parents of the children that are being helped.

Of course there are outliers, there will be people who don't need fsm yet get them and there will be low income families who do their absolute best for their DC. Experience says this is not always the case though and if some people getting a FSM they could manage without or access to a club they don't really need helps 'catch' many of those who do, then I can't see the issue

FSM are for vulnerable children, FSM ensures all children are fed. The government uses benefits as a marker to define which children are most likely to be vulnerable . I am not saying that Children from working families are not vulnerable, they are sometimes and if parents are having trouble feeding their kids, there is help available for working families too.

As a parent, no matter what or how I am struggling I would never complain about a child having access to food no matter what background they are from.

check yourself

A lot of the reason is food. Meals before or after school and in the holidays. Having children on site means they are fed.
Also it’s some levelling up of access to things like sport. I taught many children who sit in their overcrowded flat 99% of the time they aren’t at school.
Emotions aside IT’s financially important to have children growing up with proper nutrition and access to sport and learning opportunities, or they grow into adults more likely to heavily use health services and require life long support.

£7400 threshhold.

Oh.. you know how much i earn on carers allowance? Bearing in mind you have to be caring for a minimum of 35hrs pw to qualify for it, so you can't work a paid job on top of that.

£3991 per annum.

THAT is all i get 'paid' for doing a full time carer role. so yes, i do need the benefit top up.

But y'all carry on being jealous that my kids get some help.

also, if someone earning NMW was doing the hours of care i do to earn £3991pa, would be getting paid £18kpa.

At my dc school FSM and pupil premium means :

-free school trips
-free breakfast club , after school club
-extra trips just for PP children
-supermarket vouchers for half term and holidays
-holiday clubs

One of my very good friends has dc on fsm/pp. the home life is warm and stable and living but the have more than one disabled child and are just on UC as they are both carers - for the dc without disabilities the above things are transformative - especially breakfast club - they get a calm start to the day as are dropped off before their siblings with SEN are woken and collected by their transport

Then quit your job, go on benefits and claim for this free stuff then.

Except you won't do that because you know deep down that that would be a far worse situation for you to be in. In which case there really isn't anything to be jealous about.

So won't those on the £7.5k also get UC making it up to at least £1400 - does that amount include rent or just living costs? That £1400 is the equiv of a £19k salary btw. Someone one earning £7.5k must be working part time as £19k is annual full time minimum wage.

I think it's sad that some here cannot see that many of these children would not eat during the school holidays without access to these programmes.
MIL works in a setting that now provides some of these programmes. A lot of these children's lives are pretty sad.
Yes, many on here are saying that it's another bill that they just manahe to pay.
Many of these families couldn't pay for the food their children would need to eat, let alone the activities.

I can't understand being pissed off that kids are being fed that wouldn't otherwise be.

Yes, life is tough for us all at the moment, but let's not add children frwquently havung malnutrition to the list of harsh realities were facing.

Wby don't you either get a better paying job or reduce your income to FSM level? Either way, jealousy of people poorer than you is a rubbish look 🤷‍♀️.

It's so sad to see so many on this thread give in to envy and resentment. It shouldn't be a race to the bottom. The solution is to adjust the threshold for getting help. The solution is to invest in childcare - not just before and after school but all childcare, making it always affordable for people to work and earn. The UK gets this very wrong.

Yes of course I have. I lived in some! My favourite was the one with subsidence where I could see through the crack in the wall into next door.

Anyway, the poster I was replying to was talking about social housing. Saying that some SA housing is poor is not the same as saying all private rentals are tip top.

All tenancies should be secure. But then private landlords would not be able to behave as some of them do, so it will never happen. Thank Thatcher for ending secure tenancies. Her policies have led to where we ate now with housing.

It's the people on the threshold I really feel for {I've never had housing benefit or any of the free stuff} .. workers CAN well be worse off than people on benefits, they have to pay Council tax, mortgage {Benefits don't pay mortgages as far as I know} - a pharmacist I knew said those who were on threshold were the strugglers.. they had no right to free prescriptions,&c and used to tell him that they were ''better off'' on benefits, especially if getting housing benefit, which seems insane.

I'll put my tin hat on:
The government uses benefits as a marker to define which children are most likely to be vulnerable
The government uses benefits as a method of propping up employers paying low wages and ensuring control over working people now forced onto benefits to cope, and then encourages you to fight among yourselves for who gets what, and question who is or isn't deserving instead of you questioning why they are running the country the way they are.

How many people on here have actually gone on entitledto, and realised how much they would be worse off on UC than living on the income they actually live off?

£2038.40 per month for my family of 4, if we had no other income.
The roof over our head alone costs £1200. Fuck, that'd be a tough life.

I'm a carer. I work 35 hours + a week as one for £76.75 a week. That's why we get FSM, that's why I don't legally work.

I mean, if you have a mortgage yes. If you pay rent then you'd get housing benefit and probably get your rent and council tax sorted (situation dependent).

Has it occurred to you that they are living on credit? Benefits really don’t pay that much, there’s no way people claiming free school meals would afford a car and the best clothes.

Housing is paid through UC these days. And they don’t cover all of the rent, just what the local housing allowance is. And everyone has to pay some council tax now, it’s really not as cushty as you seem to think.

Yes, includes rent and child element for 1 child.

£19k per annum is nothing. They're hardly going to be living a life of luxury on that. A single person with no children living on £19k per annum wouldn't need free school meals, and anyone earning that with children would be getting UC on top of that. If you're trying to raise children on £1400 a month, paying bills and rent out of that, you need FSM.

More likely working cash in hand or receiving decent amount of CM or have a motorbility car.

The unpaid child maintenance bill is in the BILLIONS.

Huh? I'm on UC, with full ct support and my housing gets paid. I'm a full time carer before you start.
Weird to state I think it's cushty when you have no idea of my own situation

@Pocoyoismyhomeboy but that is their earnings that are 'disgustingly low'
Not how much they have to spend. If means 20% of school age - children are in homes where noone is working over 15hrs min wage.

Once more free hours preschool care come in hopefully we will see the % fsm drop?

As 80% of childrens parent (s) and other taxpayers are funding both sets of kids.
its £493 per year here per child for every day lunches. So almost 1k for 2 kids.
then 700-800 per year for school bus...
then people have to fund kids possibly through uni.

so cost of having a child
£500x11yrs school lunches = £5500
swimming lessons (28/mth/3yrs)= £1000
£15 per school day before/after clubs
=£2925x5yrs = £14625
Food??maybe £2 per day for 18yrs =13140

school bus £700x7yrs = £4900

14 yrs school shoes trainers £1680
Uniform 14y. £700
School trips £50 per year. £700
But the majority of that wont be a cost to those on fsm

Have to say i didnt expect most of those costs to be so high. (Lunch 2.53 is a lot considering meal deal prices, school bus would have thought based on paying child fayres, breakfast club (its only 45min). School trips too as y6 trip was several hundred.

That may be so but many do get it paid regularly and in significant amounts..

And many more get nothing at all.