Gerry Adams (Louth, Sinn Fein)
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Question 257: To ask the Minister for Social Protection the total cost of the school meals programme operated by her; and the cost of same for each of the past five years. [29929/11]

Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour)
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The School Meals Programme gives funding towards the provision of food services for disadvantaged children through two schemes. The first is the statutory Urban School Meals Scheme, operated by local authorities and part-financed by this Department. The second is the School Meals Local Projects Scheme through which funding is provided directly to participating schools and local and voluntary community groups who run their own school meals projects. The allocation for the programme for 2011 is €35m. Expenditure on the School Meals Programme for each of the past five years is set out in the following tabular statement.

School Meals Programme Expenditure 2006 to 2010 YearUrban School Meals Scheme School Meals Local Projects SchemeTotal School Meals Programme Expenditure 2006 to 2010

YearUrban School Meals Scheme School Meals Local Projects SchemeTotal

2006 € 1.16m € 12.5m €13.6m

2007 € 1.16m € 27.04m €28.2m

2008 € 1.1m € 31.28m €32.38m

2009 € 1.2m € 33.64m €34.84m

2010 € 0.79m € 34.17m €34.96m