Feed the future: Public agree that government should extend free school meals, exclusive poll reveals

First national poll since our campaign shows strong rise in public support for extension of free school meals as child food poverty doubles in a year

The Mayor of London has unveiled an emergency scheme to extend free school meals to every primary school pupil in the capital for one year (Ben Birchall/PA) (PA)

Eighty per cent of the public in England now believe the government should extend free school meals to all children in households receiving universal credit (UC), up from 72 per cent when we launched our Feed the Future campaign five months ago.

The YouGov poll of 8,000 respondents comes as new data from the Food Foundation shows that the number of households in England with children in poverty has nearly doubled to 22 per cent, up from 11.6 per cent in January 2022, with 3.7 million children affected.

This poll – the first national modelling of support for free school meal expansion that also goes to the granular level of parliamentary constituencies – shows overwhelming support for government action in marginal “red wall” seats, some held by MPs with wafer-thin majorities.

Strong public support was also evident in constituencies represented by the prime minister Rishi Sunak (76 per cent), and key cabinet ministers, including the chancellor Jeremy Hunt, deputy prime minister Dominic Raab and the Northern Ireland minister Steve Baker where 82 per cent of voters say they want to see more children helped.

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The expansion of free school meals to children whose parents are on UC was the basic call of our Feed the Future campaign, in which we exposed how children whose parents earn £7,400 or more (after tax, excluding benefits) are not eligible for free school meals.

This led to the announcement by the Mayor of London last week to fund free school meals for all state primary school children in the capital, and was followed by Southwark Council, which already offers this, promising to use the windfall to extend free school meals to as many secondary school children in poverty in their borough as possible.

The poll, together with the London initiative, will put further pressure on the government ahead of the upcoming budget to reassess priorities. England currently lags behind Scotland and Wales, which are rolling out universal free school meals in primary schools, and behind Northern Ireland, where the income threshold is double that of England.

Anna Taylor, executive director of the Food Foundation, said: “The levels of food insecurity continue to be terribly concerning and point to big holes in the government’s safety net. These latest findings show the public is overwhelmingly in favour of greater government support for families suffering the worst effects of the cost of living crisis. By extending free school meals to more children in the next budget, the government could deliver a policy change that is popular with voters, targeted and timely.”