Every child deserves access to healthy, nutritious food, no matter where they live. But right now, this isn’t our reality.
As the cost of living soars, more and more of us are going hungry at school because we don’t have the money to get food. The fact we’re one of the richest economies in the world and young people don’t have access to at least one nutritious meal a day is shocking.
It’s a fact — more than 800,000 children living in poverty in England aren’t currently eligible for free school meals. We don’t think this is right.
We created this film to put a spotlight on young people’s true experiences of the food system, the cost of living crisis, and free school meals, including why it’s so important that the government extends the eligibility to all children living in poverty.
Please watch our stories — and sign our petition calling on the Prime Minister to act urgently.
Our New Report "More Than a Meal"
“By the end of the day you could visibly see who hadn’t eaten.“
Free school meals is all about young people - but our voices are often excluded from the discussion. Our new report provides real insight into the lives of young people who have experiences of free school meals, and those that really need access, but sadly don’t meet the hugely restrictive criteria.
Christina, 18
We’ve Done it Before!
In May 2020, we launched a petition to extend the provision of free school meals over the holidays. Almost 450,000 people signed the petition and we were featured prominently in the media including on BBC News, the Daily Mail, Sunday Times and Good Morning Britain among others.
In response the Government extended access to free school meal provision for various holidays until finally announcing measures to provide free school meals over the holidays until the end of 2021!
