Has the Government done enough on the school meals issue?

Mandatory nutritional standards will be the key to unlocking the Government's plans for better school meals, said caterers, food pressure groups and celebrity chef Jamie Oliver last week.

Prime Minister Tony Blair and Education Secretary Ruth Kelly last week pledged to commit £280m to improving school meals by setting minimum spending limits for ingredients, better training for dinner ladies and revised nutritional standards.

Despite an initial sense of victory for Oliver's campaign, doubts have emerged over the details of the Government's plans and what impact they will have on school dinners.

So far, the Government has refused to be drawn on the details of minimum nutritional standards with the Department for Education and Skills admitting that no group had yet been formed to look into the matter.

"The expert group of representatives from the catering industry and schools will set the minimum standards and look at which foodstuffs may be banned altogether," a spokesman said.

It is understood that the standards will be released by September to give caterers and schools time to implement them by the following school year.

Caterers and food pressure groups such as the Soil Association and the Health Education Trust (HET) remain concerned that without stringent guidelines, school meal standards will remain "open to interpretation".

"The introduction of more prescriptive and mandatory nutritional standards is the only way to achieve a uniform approach to school meal budgeting," said Neil Porter, chairman of the Local Authorities Catering Association (LACA).

"This will establish a clearly defined structure that all local authorities must follow in setting specifications and contractual agreements with school meals providers," he added.

This view was reinforced by Oliver, who also stressed that getting nutritional standards right was vital.

"The Government is obviously not going to ban the junk," he said at a press conference last week. "So our only chance is in the nutritional standards, which should make sure junk doesn't get on the menu."

But concerns don't stop at a lack of nutritional guidelines. There is still confusion over how the money will be distributed and spent.

"It is absolutely imperative that the Government engages with stakeholders to set out the detail of how these financial commitments will be implemented," Porter said.

Teachers were similarly concerned that the proposals might eat into existing educational budgets.

"We are glad the Government is at last taking notice of what children are eating," said Rona Tutt, president of the National Association of Head Teachers. "But our main concern is how much funding will be at the discretion of heads, and whether the proposals will be fully funded or if we will be expected to find the money to top it up."

Average meal costs… primary school
Where the money goes, based on a selling price of £1.45 Food: 51p
Cleaning materials/deep cleaning: 3p
Small equipment (cutlery, crockery, trays, etc): 3p
Equipment repairs: 2.5p
Refuse collection: 0.5p
Printing, stationery, marketing, phones, postage, etc: 3p
Direct wages: 60p
National insurance, sick pay, holiday pay, etc: 14p
Uniforms, laundry: 2p
Training/food safety/health and safety: 3.5p
Personnel-related costs: 2.5p

Not included, as they might be either caterer's or school's direct responsibility: Transport: 8p
Cash collection: 10p
Utilities: (gas, water, electricity) 8p

If the food supplier is a private contractor, it might spend less on food and labour, because of buying power and less-generous employment conditions. These savings would constitute its profit margin.
Information supplied by AVL Consultancy

Source: Caterer & Hotelkeeper magazine, 07 April 2005