Free school meals scrapped

Families in Rochdale are likely to be affected by government plans to scrap free school meals.

Half a million children will be denied free school meals as the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition has scrapped a Labour scheme to widen entitlement.

Under the proposed plan all children of families earning below £16,190 would have received free school meals.

Imran Hussain, head of policy, rights and advocacy at Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG), said: “The support of free school meals would have lifted 50,000 children out of poverty, according to the Treasury. Suspending this support is the same as an income-tax hike of £600 a year for a working poor family with two children.

"This is the equivalent of at least a 1% income-tax hike per child for the families it was meant to help.

"We were told by the Work and Pensions Secretary it is wrong that families trying to move off benefits face effective tax rates up to 95%, so we are stunned the Government is shelving plans to address this problem.

"It is completely at odds with the coalition's commitment to end child poverty by 2020.”