Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 15 June 2021
874. Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire asked the Minister for Social Protection the number of children availing of free hot school meals; the cost of same; and the cost per child and school of delivering same. [31169/21]
View answer875. Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire asked the Minister for Social Protection the estimated cost of providing hot free school meals to all children currently availing of free school meals. [31170/21]
View answer876. Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire asked the Minister for Social Protection the estimated cost of providing free hot school meals to all children attending DEIS schools. [31171/21]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 874 to 876, inclusive, together.
The school meals programme provides funding towards the provision of food to some 1,506 schools and organisations benefitting 230,000 children. The objective of the programme is to provide regular, nutritious food to children who are unable, due to lack of good quality food, to take full advantage of the education provided to them. The programme is an important component of policies to encourage school attendance and extra educational achievement.
Funding under the school meals (local projects) scheme can be provided for breakfast, snack, lunch, dinner, hot meals and afterschool clubs and is based on a maximum rate per child per day, depending on the type of meal being provided e.g. €1.40 per child per day where a cold lunch club is being provided, €1.90 per child per day where a dinner club is being provided and €2.90 per child per day where a Hot Meal club is being provided. Dinner clubs provide a hot meal, but are different from the Hot Meals clubs, in that they tend to be provided by schools with onsite cooking facilities whereas food for Hot Meals clubs is cooked offsite and delivered to the school.
As part of Budget 2019, funding was provided for a pilot scheme from September 2019, providing hot school meals in primary schools at a cost of €1m for 2019 and €2.5m in 2020. The pilot involved 37 schools benefitting 6,744 students for the 2019/2020 academic year and was aimed primarily at schools with no onsite cooking facilities.
In Budget 2021, I announced that an additional €5.5m would be provided to extend the provision of hot school meals to an additional 35,000 primary school children, currently receiving the cold lunch option.
There are currently 20,648 students receiving a hot meal in 2020/2021, at a cost of €4.4m. The cost per child per day is €2.90. The cost per school is dependent upon the number of pupils availing of the hot meal option in each school.
It would cost some €71m to provide a hot meal to every student currently availing of the scheme in primary schools. To provide hot meals to students availing of the scheme in secondary schools would cost just under €33m.
The cost of providing a hot meal at €2.90 to all students in DEIS primary schools would be €56.6m.
Changes to the level of funding of any scheme administered by my Department would have to be considered in a budgetary context.
I trust this clarifies the matter for the Deputy.
