Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein)
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993. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the allocations made to the school meals programme in each of the past five years; the number of schools and students in receipt of same in tabular form; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [10958/20]

Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein)
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994. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the allocations made to the hot school meal programme since its inception; the number of schools and students in receipt of same in tabular form; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [10959/20]

Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 993 and 994 together.

The school meals programme provides funding towards the provision of food to some 1,580 schools and organisations benefitting 250,000 children.  The objective of the scheme is to provide regular, nutritious food to children who are unable, due to lack of good quality food, 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.

The statutory Urban School Meals Scheme for primary schools is operated by sixteen Local Authorities in some 300 schools and benefitting approximately 50,000 children.  It is part-financed by the Department which contributed just over €0.9m in 2018 and €0.7m in 2019.

The non-statutory School Meals (Local Projects) Scheme provides funding directly from the Department to primary schools, post-primary schools, special schools, local groups and voluntary not for profit organisations operating their own School meals projects.  The allocations made and the number of schools and students in receipt of same is contained in table 1 in the Appendix.

As part of Budget 2019, I announced that my Department would commence 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 involves 37 schools benefitting 6,744 students for the 2019/2020 academic year. 

The allocations made to the hot school meal programme since its inception and the number of schools and students in receipt of same is contained in table 2 in the Appendix.

Appendix

Table 1 - School Meals (Local Projects) Scheme Total Allocation, Number of Children benefitting and Number of Schools and Organisations benefitting for the last 5 years. 

Note:A breakdown of number of children benefitting and number of schools and organisations benefitting is only available for the last 4 years since the school meals scheme was migrated to the Department’s central IT Platform.

Table 2 - Hot School Meals pilot Total allocation, Number of Schools and Number of Children benefitting.

Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein)
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995. To ask the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection the costs associated with the extension of the school meals programme to cover youth services, early years settings and after-school programmes as part of a pilot programme; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [10960/20]

Regina Doherty (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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The school meals programme provides funding towards the provision of food to some 1,580 schools and organisations benefitting 250,000 children.  The objective of the scheme is to provide regular, nutritious food to children who are unable, due to lack of good quality food, 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.

In recent years entry to the School Meals Scheme has been confined to DEIS schools in addition to schools identified as having levels of concentrated disadvantage that would benefit from access to the School Meals Programme.  

Prior to the introduction of DEIS in 2005, all schools and organisations that were part of one of a number of Department of Education and Skills’ initiatives for disadvantaged schools were eligible to participate in the programme, which included Breaking the Cycle, Giving Children an Even Break, the Disadvantaged Area Scheme, Home School Community Liaison and the School Completion Programme.  These schools and organisations have continued to remain in the scheme. 

The funding currently provided by the Department to youth services, early years settings and after-school programmes is provided in table 1 of the Appendix.  The Department does not have a role in terms of oversight of the programmes referred to by the deputy and overall participant numbers would need to be established to calculate the cost of a pilot programme.

Any decision to extend the current provision would need to be considered in a budgetary context.  However, I am advised that the Department of Children and Youth Affairs in planning a pilot meal programme in Early Learning and Care under First 5, the Whole-of-Government Strategy for Babies, Young Children and their Families 2019-2028. 

Appendix

Table 1 - Total allocation to youth services, early years settings and after-school programmes in 2019/2020