Criterio restrictivo de Interpretación

Addressing inadequate nutrition in childhood by the use of provision of food in school is evident in many countries, in recognition of the importance of nutrition to childhood health and development (World Health Organisation 2000). In the UK, the provision of food in school has a long history, originally introduced as a result of a growing public empathy for hungry children; free school meals are viewed as a means of supplementing the diets of children from low-income families in order to ensure adequate nutritional status for healthy growth and development.

Understanding free school meal policy requires understanding of what is described as the ‘problem situation’, and this is achieved by exploring different stakeholders perceptions of the policy problem and locating the policy in relation to the socio historical and political context in which it has been developed (Hanberger 2001). There is agreement between both policy makers and stakeholders from across the UK as to the purpose of free school meal policy, which is to ensure that children from low income families were guaranteed to receive at least one meal a day.

“To ensure that most vulnerable families in terms of income are given the opportunity to have a healthy balanced meal at school each day” (Policy

Maker, Wales)

The need to address inadequate nutrition for some UK children acknowledges wider issues related to food poverty and food insecurity in the UK. Recent studies estimate that around 4 million children and adults in the UK are not properly fed by today’s standards (Gordon et al. 2013) and policy initiatives acknowledge children as a particularly vulnerable group (Dowler 2002). Policy documents acknowledge the contribution of free school meals to alleviating the worst aspects of food poverty by providing a ‘safety net’.

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“The benefits of free school meals are substantial, within low income families children cannot always rely on healthy, nutritious meals at home…The importance of free school meals in contributing to the nutritional

quality of the diets of these children…for many of them the school meal is a safety net, the one meal of the day that they can rely on” (School Meals

Review Panel 2005)

The UK policy response to tackling undernutrition in the UK population is to maintain an approach which presupposes individual rather than state responsibility for diet (Riches 1997; Dowler 1998). As a result, rather than increasing income levels to low income families, addressing issues of childhood undernutrition has resulted in a policy response of ‘feed the children’ (Nelson 2000) and the provision of a meal, rather than money is noted as a positive by stakeholders.

“Budgets are flexible, if there’s cash there’s many pressures on a household budget for low income families, it may be used elsewhere. You don’t receive cash, you actually receive the meal, so it’s kind of certain that those children

will receive at least one hot meal a day” (Stakeholder, School Food Trust)

In addition to tackling undernutrition, the school has been acknowledged as a setting with the potential to make substantial contributions to promoting healthy eating habits in children and adolescents (Rowe et al. 2010). Consequently, school food provision has been seen as a means of tackling rising levels of childhood obesity and widely publicised campaigns such as the one fronted by celebrity chef Jamie Oliver have exerted pressure for an improvement in the food provided within the school environment.

These campaigns coincided with a drive across the UK territories to reintroduce minimum nutritional standards in school food provision (Department of Education 2001; Scottish Executive 2002; School Meals Review Panel 2005; Welsh Assembly Government 2008). In Scotland, the reintroduction of minimum nutritional standards is underpinned by an

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acknowledgment within policy circles of the need to improve the eating habits of pupils.

“To try and instil better eating habits in children from a young age” (Policy Maker, Scotland)

In addition to contributing to nutritional adequacy and promoting healthier food choices, free school meals are acknowledged to have a wider role in addressing the impact of inequality by tackling the association between social class and health in its broadest sense (Black 1980; Acheson 1998). In addition, free school meals are noted as having a role in tackling differential educational achievement (Belot and James 2011) and within the data, the role of free school meals in tackling inequality, in terms of learning and achievement is noted.

“The purpose of free meals is to ensure that a nutritionally balanced main meal is available to those pupils who are most in need of it. It is one of a

range of antipoverty measures targeting non-working and low income families to help reduce barriers to learning and address inequalities” (Policy

Maker, Northern Ireland)

In addition to benefitting the individual child, it is acknowledged that free school meals also contribute to the family food budget, resulting in an improvement in the nutritional status of other family members (Acheson 1998). Stakeholders acknowledge the contribution that free school meals make to the family budget.

“It’s an effective way of reducing the pressure on those family budgets” (Stakeholder, CPAG)

Generally, there is consensus among policy makers and stakeholders as to the purpose that free school meal policy has in tackling inadequate nutrition among pupils from low-income families, addressing overnutrition by the promotion of healthy lunches and tackling differential achievement that results from inequality. However, while there is consensus in terms of the

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purpose of policy, there is dissensus in terms of the degree to which free school meal policy was effective at addressing the concerns identified.