§ Mr. Gareth Wardellasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science if he will publish in the Official Report the percentage of school meals which have been provided free of charge to pupils in each education authority in England for each year from 1979 to the latest available date.
§ Mr. DunnThe percentage of pupils taking free school meals in primary and secondary schools in October 1984 are given in the following table. I would also refer the hon. Member to the reply I gave to the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish (Mr. Bennett) on 20 March at columns485–492 for figures for the earlier years.
310W
Number of free pupil meals as a percentage of pupils present Primary Schools 1984 Secondary Schools 1984 Authority per cent. per cent. Barking 17.4 10.9 Barnet 10.7 8.8 Bexley 9.5 6.6 Brent 20.4 13.9 Bromley 8.2 6.3 Croydon 10.0 7.6 Ealing 17.4 17.3 Enfield 9.9 8.7
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Primary Schools 1984 Secondary Schools 1984 Authority per cent. per cent. Haringey 22.5 21.2 Harrow 8.1 6.4 Havering 8.4 5.6 Hillingdon 10.3 7.2 Hounslow 12.5 12.7 Kingston-upon-Thames 7.9 6.0 Merton 6.0 6.8 Newham 18.5 13.5 Redbridge 7.2 5.8 Richmond-upon-Thames 7.6 11.1 Sutton 6.9 4.1 Waltham Forest 20.2 14.0 Inner London 37.8 27.4 Birmingham 35.5 27.5 Coventry 30.0 22.6 Dudley 18.2 12.0 Sandwell 29.6 20.9 Solihull 18.2 8.8 Walsall 29.2 19.8 Wolverhampton 23.9 21.4 Knowsley 46.8 41.8 Liverpool 38.0 31.8 St. Helens 22.8 19.6 Sefton 20.8 15.2 Wirral 27.3 22.4 Bolton 25.6 19.4 Bury 17.4 12.2 Manchester 48.4 39.7 Oldham 33.5 24.5 Rochdale 30.5 25.4 Salford 36.4 24.9 Stockport 18.3 13.4 Tameside 27.5 19.6 Trafford 16.5 12.7 Wigan 23.4 17.2 Barnsley 38.7 32.8 Doncaster 39.9 25.9 Rotherham 31.4 22.0 Sheffield 25.1 18.1 Bradford 34.5 29.3 Calderdale 25.1 19.4 Kirklees 22.0 19.5 Leeds 25.8 17.1 Wakefield 31.8 27.6 Gateshead 30.8 20.4 Newcastle upon Tyne 41.3 28.4 North Tyneside 25.2 19.6 South Tyneside 33.2 23.4 Sunderland 39.2 27.2 Isles of Scilly — — Avon 17.6 13.8 Bedfordshire 14.2 9.5 Berkshire 6.4 6.4 Buckinghamshire 10.3 6.8 Cambridgeshire 13.1 10.3 Cheshire 19.4 12.0 Cleveland 32.6 24.6 Cornwall 17.1 13.8 Cumbria 13.5 9.3 Derbyshire 20.6 18.1 Devon 15.1 11.0 Dorset 5.8 7.8 Durham 32.3 22.2 East Sussex 13.8 9.5 Essex 10.5 7.8 Gloucestershire 11.3 7.4 Hampshire 11.0 7.5
Primary Schools 1984 Secondary Schools 1984 Authority per cent. per cent. Hereford and Worcester 10.2 11.6 Hertfordshire 7.8 5.8 Humberside 28.3 11.3 Isle of Wight 15.6 11.8 Kent 11.9 8.0 Lancashire 24.3 18.6 Leicestershire 16.7 12.5 Lincolnshire 7.1 7.7 Norfolk 12.7 9.8 North Yorkshire 13.3 10.1 Northamptonshire 13.9 11.9 Northumberland 19.3 15.5 Nottinghamshire 23.6 16.7 Oxfordshire 8.8 6.9 Salop 18.0 14.1 Somerset 12.6 11.3 Staffordshire 15.1 10.0 Suffolk 10.4 7.8 Surrey 6.0 3.6 Warwickshire 12.0 7.9 West Sussex 7.4 5.2 Wiltshire 10.6 9.1 England 14.8 10.9
§ Mr. Gordon Brownasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science how many children in receipt of free school meals (a) are in families receiving family income supplement and (b) are in families in receipt of neither family income supplement nor supplementary benefit at the latest date for which information is available.
§ Mr. DunnIt is possible to estimate only the broad orders of magnitude, as there are fluctuations from year to year within the year in the number of pupils entitled to a free school meal and the proportion who take up the entitlement. At the time of the October 1984 school meals census in England an estimated breakdown of the main categories of entitlement would have been as follows (to the nearest 10,000):
Numbers (a) Pupils whose parents were in receipt of supplementary benefit 680,000 (b) Pupils whose parents were in receipt of family income supplement 170,000 (c) Other pupils 300,000 1,150,000
§ Mr. Gordon Brownasked the Secretary of State for Education and Science if he will list those local education authorities providing free school meals to children other than those covered by the statutory requirements; and what proportion of all local education authorities in England these represent.
§ Mr. DunnThe information requested on provision in England is available in book 2 of the report on the 1984 school meals census, a copy of which is in the Library.