Joe O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Senator for raising this important issue. As Chair of the food poverty working group, which includes representatives of government Departments and civil society, I am a strong supporter of the school meals programme and its recent expansion. The school meals programme provides funding towards the provision of food services to some 1,600 schools and organisations benefitting 260,000 children. The objective of the programme is to provide regular, nutritious food to children to position them 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. Budget 2022 provided €68.1 million for the programme with an additional €9 million provided to allow access to all new DEIS schools from September 2022. Additional funding for the programme has been provided for 2023 bringing the total to €91.6 million. This represents a 49% funding increase in the period since 2020.

In March 2022, the Minister for Education, Deputy Foley, announced an extension of the DEIS status to an additional 320 schools from September. In July, the Minister of State, Deputy Humphreys, announced that access to the hot school meal option would be extended to the 282 newly designated DEIS primary schools and that the cold lunch option would be extended to the 38 newly designated DEIS secondary schools from September, benefitting some 60,000 children. Funding under the school meals programme can be provided for breakfast, snack, cold lunch, dinner, hot school meals and after-school clubs and is based on a maximum rate per child per day, depending on the type of meal being provided. The current school meals programme was set up in 2003. The funding rates for the various meal options were set at that time. However, the hot school meal option was introduced in 2019, to facilitate the provision of hot meals prepared off-site to pupils attending primary schools which did not have cooking facilities on-site. The hot school meal rate of €2.90 per meal per day was set in 2019.

The Minister, Deputy Humphreys, and I are committed to continuing to expand the school meals programme and building further on the significant extension of the programme in recent years. In this regard, an evaluation of the school meals programme to review all elements of the programme, including the funding rates currently being provided for the various meal options, has been commissioned. The final report is due to be completed by the end of the year and will help to inform future decisions around this important programme. Issues regarding the funding rates will be considered in the context of this evaluation. I thank the Senator for raising this matter as it is a key and crucial to our work in the Department.