§ 3.9 p.m.
§ LORD GARNSWORTHYMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
[The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will state the reduction in the number of children taking school meals following the increase in price to 12p and the number now receiving school meals free of charge.]
§ THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDER-SECRETARY OF STATE, DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE (LORD BELSTEAD)My Lords, a recent census carried out by local education authorities at the request of my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for Education and Science revealed that 4,161,000 or 53.8 per cent. of the pupils present at maintained schools in England and Wales took the school dinner on a day in May, 1971, compared with 5,148,000 or 67.9 per cent. on a day in September, 1970. Free dinners served in May numbered 753,000 or 18.3 per cent. of the total, compared with 627,000 or 12.2 per cent. of the total last September.
§ LORD SHACKLETONMy Lords, the noble Lord is being very helpful, but he is so anxious to get on with our business that I am not quite sure whether we were able to follow his figures.
§ LORD BELSTEADMy Lords, in answer to the noble Lord's first supplementary question, the figures show—
§ BARONESS SUMMERSKILLMy Lords, we could not follow them at all. Will the noble Lord repeat his Answer, only speaking more slowly?
§ LORD BELSTEADMy Lords, I wonder whether I might briefly elucidate for the noble Lord. The figures show that the drop is 19.2 per cent.—that is 987,000 as a percentage of 5,148,000—and that the increase in the number of free meals is 136,000, or a rise of 21.7 per cent., which by any standard is a remarkable rise.
§ BARONESS SUMMERSKILLSlow!
§ LORD GARNSWORTHYMy Lords, it is indeed a remarkable rise.
§ LORD GARNSWORTHYMy Lords, if I may ask the Minister a question, may I say—
§ LORD SHACKLETONThe noble Lord should ask a question.
§ LORD GARNSWORTHYMy Lords, does the noble Lord agree that there is indeed a very remarkable drop in the numbers taking school meals, since the figure is approximately one million? I should like to ask the noble Lord—and I hope he will not rush his reply because I think this is rather important—in view of the record drop (indeed the catastrophic drop) in the numbers of school children taking meals, do the Government still intend to impose the further increase forecast for next April in the"mini-Budget ", as stated in the other place in October, 1970?
§ LORD BELSTEADMy Lords, I am glad that at any rate the noble Lord who put the Question was able to pick up the terms of my Answer. I think it is fair to point out that the drop was already beginning as from last September. We do not know, and I do not think that noble Lords on either side of the House know, the exact reasons for that. We think there are various reasons, and that there may be different types of need in primary and secondary schools. At the moment we do not know.
The answer to the noble Lord's final question is that the Government's policy as set out in the White Paper will go forward because, although we do not have complete freedom of choice, we believe that the reallocation of resources which it allows, provides the best choice available to us.
§ LORD ALPORTMy Lords, may I ask my noble friend whether he realises that some of us on this side of the House are also governors of schools and we know perfectly well that the number of pupils taking school meals has dropped substantially since the increased cost was introduced, and that it is a great mistake, if I may say so, for the Government to try to gloss over this and prove a situation which does not exist?
§ LORD GARNSWORTHYMy Lords, I wonder whether the Minister would be prepared to accept from me that I have had a spot check made in one division in the county where I reside, and it shows a drop in meals taken by children attending primary school of 11 per cent., and a very heavy drop indeed overall of 20 per cent? Does he really think this is a problem that has been developing for some time, in view of the fact that the number of children taking sandwich meals has increased threefold in the last 12 months?
§ LORD BELSTEADMy Lords, the drop in fact began after the last occasion when the noble Lord's Party put up the price of school meals. That is a fact, My reply to the noble Lord, Lord Alport, is that the price of the school meals in relation to average earnings this year is approximately the same as it was 16 years ago. This is information given by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State in the House of Commons on July 8. It is because the Government were obviously worried about the nutrition of children that when the price was increased in April more generous remissions were introduced; hence, the increase of 136,000 or 21.7 per cent. which I have given to the House, in the take-up of free school meals that occurred between September of last year and May of this year. It is for the same reason that remissions will again be increased when social benefits go up in September, and that next month, when family income supplement becomes operative, it will be an automatic passport to free school meals.
§ LORD PARGITERMy Lords, is the noble Lord aware that the excuse given by the Minister of Education in another place, that this is necessary in order to provide the money for primary school improvements, is rather a poor one in this connection, and that we ought to be able to provide money for both purposes?
§ LORD BELSTEADMy Lords, the first school building programme which my right honourable friend announced will allow in the region of 460 primary schools to be improved or replaced, as opposed to about 190 primary schools improved under the last programme under the noble Lord's Government. This is a huge increase, and I would have thought 494 that the whole educational world was absolutely delighted when my right honourable friend the other day was able to announce a record three-year programme. This is something which has never been done before.
§ LORD PARGITERMy Lords, would the noble Lord please reply to the question whether it is necessary to charge more for school meals in order to carry through this programme?
§ LORD BELSTEADMy Lords, for the answer to that question I refer the noble Lord to the White Paper which my right honourable friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer published last October.
§ LORD DAVIES OF LEEKMy Lords, is the noble Lord aware that it is useless ululating about money being put in bricks and mortar when the creatures crawling there have rickets, are underfed and you cannot teach them at all? A good teacher can teach in any old building provided the children are healthy. Does he not—
THE LORD PRIVY SEAL (EARL JELLICOE)My Lords, I think I must ask the noble Lord, Lord Davies of Leek, to ask a question. He was getting into quite an interesting but long speech.
§ LORD DAVIES OF LEEKMy Lords, I beg your Lordships' pardon. All I wanted to ask the Minister was, does he not realise that the most important investment is in the nation's children?—and for God's sake! do not save on their nourishment.
§ LORD BELSTEADMy Lords, I think there are two things that perhaps the noble Lord is disregarding. One is the change in general feeding habits of children over recent years, particularly since the war; and secondly, the reasons, which I think have now become familiar to the House in our questions and answers, why certain children do not take the school meal during the summer months. I would ask the noble Lord, as I have asked him before, to wait until we undertake the second survey, in the autumn.
§ BARONESS SUMMERSKILLMy Lords, may I ask the noble Lord how he can possibly reconcile what he has told the House to-day with the fact that subsidising milk and food constitutes the 495 most important social service in this country? Is lie aware that he is his height and I am my height because we had adequate milk and food?
§ LORD BELSTEADMy Lords, I was referring in my answer, which the noble Baroness has picked up, to the sort of food which was eaten soon after the war; and I was simply suggesting to the House that people's eating habits have changed. I would have thought that to be common knowledge.
§ LORD WOLVERTONMy Lords, may I ask my noble friend this supplementary question? The school meal, I think, costs 12p now, still with a subsidy of 3p or 4p. The cost of taking two ham sandwiches to school is something in the neighbourhood of 10p; a slice of ham costs something like 4p to 5p. So an adequate meal costs 12p, and the sandwiches cost very nearly as much.
§ LORD BELSTEADMy Lords, my noble friend may be interested to know that snack meals consumed as an alternative to the school meal are not included in the figures I have given to the House. Of course it is not possible to estimate how many meals of this kind are currently being taken by pupils. I think what is worrying my right honourable friend is the reason why these snack meals have been taken. If I may say so, with respect, neither the previous Government nor this Government have managed to get to the bottom of this particular matter.
§ LORD TAYLOR OF MANSFIELDMy Lords, may I ask the noble Lord whether he will read the Second Reading speech when the Education Bill of 1944 was introduced in the other place? Mr. Butler, then the President of the Board of Education, now a Member of your Lordships' House, said that the purpose of the Bill was to expand the schools and the milk service.
§ LORD BELSTEADMy Lords, the noble Lord has every right to take me to task for something about which he is worried, but I would ask the noble Lord to realise that I am worried as well, and I would also ask the noble Lord to look back through Hansard—and I make no political point of this at all—to see that when his right honourable friend the then 496 Minister raised the price of school meals for the second time during the previous Government's Administration, he referred again and again to the reallocation of resources.
EARL JELLICOEMy Lords, it is now 21 minutes past three and we have dealt with only two Questions. We have a lot of business to-day, and I think that the House, as a whole, feels that our questioning tends to go on rather long. I would therefore suggest to noble Lords that this is a matter to which we can always come back, and that we should now move on to the next Question.
§ LORD SHACKLETONMy Lords, may I just say to the noble Earl, having been in the position that he is in, that I would endorse what he has said? There will be an opportunity to come back to this subject on the Second Reading of the Education (Milk) Bill. The position has been made a little more difficult for us by the enthusiastic floods we have had from the noble Lord, the Minister, but we shall have an opportunity to discuss this later. I would expect, since we have no Speaker here to control the proceedings, that the usual custom of the House should now prevail.