Council to provide half-term food vouchers for 10,000 Brent children

 From Brent Council website today

Parents of children eligible for Free School Meals will be able to collect a £15 food voucher from Brent Council to help children get a meal every day next week.

The council is looking to provide food for at least 10,000 children in the borough and the support is set to cost around £150,000.

Parents are being contacted through their child’s school with more information about where they can collect their voucher.

Cllr Muhammed Butt, Leader of Brent Council said: 

It was deeply depressing to see the Government vote against free school meals for kids who desperately need them earlier in the week.

Brent Council fully supports the campaign by footballer Marcus Rashford MBE to end child food poverty and we hope that the Government will look to change their mind so that we support all children who need our help and support in these most challenging times.

Editor's note

The information arrived at schools just before they broke up for the half-term holiday but  office and other staff moved quickly to inform eligible parents of the arrangements for picking up the vouchers. 

The vouchers can be picked up on Wednesday, Thursday or Friday next week from either Willesden Green Library or Brent Civic Centre depending on the location of the school.  If families are suffering food hardship on Monday or Tuesday, Brent Council can assist with a Food Bank referral. Parents can contact Brent council on 0208 937 1234 for a temporary urgent food bank referral.

 

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Brent to devise a strategy for universal free school meals for primary pupils

Free school meals for all primary pupils in Islington - so why not in Brent?

Leader of Brent Council, Muhammed Butt, told a recent meeting of Brent Central Constituency Labour Party that council officers have been instructed to prepare a comprehensive strategy to provide free school meals for the 13,000 Brent primary pupils who do not currently receive them.

The strategy will draw on the experience of four London boroughs who already provide  free school meals to all primary children and will investigate a number of possible funding streams.

Graham Durham, a Brent CLP supporter of the proposal, has requested that the strategy and implementation dates be set out before the November CLP meetings.

Universal Free School Meals directly address issues of hunger and poor nutrition in children of low income families but also serve to remove any lingering social stigma associated with 'free dinners.' They ensure a steady income stream for school caterers and remove the school's administrative burden of collecting 'dinner money' and chasing up debts. The provision of a hot nutritious daily meal also aids a pupil's concentration in class contributing to closing the gap between the educational attainment of poor and better off pupils.

An  Islington Council paper setting out the issues can be found HERE

Brent Council confirms Birbalsingh Free School in Wembley Park

Arena House opposite Wembley Park Station

Cllr Mary Arnold, lead member for Children and Families announced that she had heard today that Katharine Birbalsingh is acquiring the ex-CNWL site at Wembley Park for her Michaela Community Free Secondary School.

Arnold said that the Council had not been consulted by the DfE. Although the school will have to apply for planning position the Council has no powers over it.  However she said that the Council was concerned about teaching and learning, equalities and conditions of employment in the school. They would have talks with the providers in order to try and apply the Council's free school criteria.

Cllr Michael Pavey (Labour Barnhill) said that he shared Cllr Arnold's concern.  As Chair of Governors at Wembley Primary he said that his school did not educate its pupils in order to hand them over to unqualified teachers at a Free School. Free Schools had an average of 9% of children on free school meals whereas Wembley Primary had about a third. Schools should be run to nurture and educate children, not for private profit.

To applause, he urged the Council to take a strong and principled stand on this issue.

The school will be subject to planning permission but this is unlikely to be a problem given the very lose regulation around Free Schools and the buildings previous use as a further education college.  Play space will be limited but I suspect a deal may be done with the Ark Academy which is just across the road and has extensive playing fields.

Coalition's 100 days: Poor and vulnerable hit by cuts, says TUC

Given the high number of unemployed people and the record number on the housing list Brent is going to be badly hit by the coalition cuts and benefit changes. The TUC has today set out the implications of decisions made in the Coalition's first 100 days:

Some of the UK's poorest families have been hit by more than 100 unfair spending cuts during the first 100 days of the new Government, a TUC analysis of departmental spending reveals today
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The TUC research, published in advance of the 100 day anniversary of the coalition Government tomorrow (Thursday), shows that cuts which impact more on the poorest families in the UK have been made across the board in services including education, health, housing, welfare and social care.
Examples of cuts the TUC believes are unfair include:

• Free school meals - The cancelled measure would have extended entitlement to free school meals to about 500,000 families in work on low pay from September this year. Cost £125m.
• Every child a reader - This programme to provide early support to children with literacy difficulties (focussed on inner-city schools) will be cut by at least £5m and its future is not guaranteed.
• City Challenge Fund - This programme aimed to provide extra support to under-performing children in the most deprived areas, but has been cut by £8m this year.
• Building Schools for the Future - This scrapped programme was the biggest-ever school buildings investment plan. The aim was to rebuild or renew nearly every secondary school in England. Cost £7.5bn.
• Housing benefit - Nearly a million (936,960) households will lose around £624 a year as a result of changes to housing benefit. Londoners will be worst hit.
• Homes and Communities Agency - Cuts to programmes including Kickstart (for restarting stalled house building programmes), affordable housing, gypsy and traveller support and Housing Market Renewal (improvements to housing in deprived areas). Cost £450m.
• Young Person's Guarantee - £450m has been cut from the Guarantee, which will be abolished in April 2011. This Guarantee promised unemployed young people access to a job, training or work after six months of unemployment.
• Working Neighbourhood Fund - This fund, which aimed to help unemployed people in deprived areas to move into work, has been cut by £49.9m.
• Domestic Violence Protection Orders - Scheme to create two-week banning orders so that victims of domestic abuse can look for protection in the safety of their own house.

The TUC is calling on the Government to reconsider its plan of swingeing spending cuts to public services, and focus instead on other ways to reduce the deficit, such as a Robin Hood Tax on financial transactions that could raise up to £20bn a year.

The TUC is also a member of a coalition, which includes Barnardo's, Oxfam and Save the Children, who want the Government to guarantee that any future budget cuts will be put through rigorous fairness testing - or a Fairness Test - by the Treasury, to ensure that vulnerable people, low-paid workers, women and children are not left to bear the brunt of spending cuts.