HC Deb 18 July 1978 vol 954 cc117-8W
21. Sir A. Meyer

asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science if she will make a statement on the take-up of the EEC subsidy on school milk and milk products.

Miss Margaret Jackson

All local authorities which provide free milk for schoolchildren are eligible to claim the EEC subsidy. My Department has so far paid out just over £3 million to English authorities for milk provided during the period from May 1977 to the end of the 1978 spring term, and a further £500,000, not all of which has yet been claimed, remains to be paid out for that period. Payment of the EEC milk subsidy to Welsh authorities is the responsibility of my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Wales, under the general arrangements drawn up for the United Kingdom as a whole.