Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 17 January 2024
932. Deputy Sorca Clarke asked the Minister for Social Protection the estimated cost of providing school meals to every primary school where there is established deprivation but no DEIS classification, by county, in tabular form. [57349/23]
View answerThe objective of the School Meals Programme is to provide regular, nutritious food to children to support them in taking full advantage of the education provided to them. The programme is an important component of policies to encourage school attendance and extra educational achievement. Following the expansion of the programme in recent years, some 2,600 schools and organisations, covering 443,000 children are now eligible for funding.
My department does not measure or collect information on deprivation at school level, so it is not possible to provide the estimates requested.
I am committed to continuing to expand the School Meals Programme and building further on the significant extension of the programme that has taken place in recent years. As part of this significant expansion plan, all non-DEIS primary schools were contacted last year and requested to submit an expression of interest form if their school is interested in commencing the provision of hot school meals.
Expressions of interests were received from over 900 primary schools in respect of 150,000 children and late last year these schools were invited to participate in the Hot School Meals Programme from April 2024. There will be an opportunity for the other primary schools who had subsequently expressed an interest, to do so formally during this year.
I trust this clarifies the matter for the deputy.
