School meal rules drive kids away

Pupils are refusing to eat in school canteens following the introduction last autumn of “bland and ideological” rules governing meals provision, according to new research by McCain.

The research supports data from caterers such as foodservice giant Compass that highlights falling sales to the education sector after the launch of the School Food Trust’s food-based standards for school lunches in September..

McCain's survey of local authority catering staff, secondary school pupils and policy makers in England found that school meals uptake fell by 6% in November and December 2006 compared to June and July 2006.

Local authorities also experienced substantial losses (up to 20% of revenue) after the switch and complained of a lack of guidance over what constituted ‘manufactured’ foods, which are now restricted.

The latest standards ban fizzy drinks, confectionery and crisps, and restrict the sale of manufactured meat products and fried foods, regardless of their nutritional content.

This permits some high fat foods, while restricting healthier, oven-baked versions of children’s favourites such as McCain oven chips, which were fried during manufacture, said corporate affairs director Bill Bartlett. “Children are faced with foods that they don’t like and they don’t recognise, so they are snacking on junk food brought from home, or visiting local bakers selling pastry products instead.

“Our chips have less than 5% fat and less than 1% saturated fat, but they are demonised as ‘junk’. The argument makes no sense from a nutritional point of view. It’s just cultural snobbery. School menus are becoming bland and ideological. What works in Notting Hill doesn’t work in Nottingham.”

The real drop in school meals uptake was probably closer to 10% as McCain’s survey compared winter figures with summer figures, when good weather lowered uptake, Bartlett claimed.

But McCain was not advocating putting junk food back on the menu in order to boost its bottom line, he insisted. “This is the frustrating thing. The products we are talking about would have green traffic lights if they were in stores, and they also comply with the nutrient-based standards for schools [which will come into force in 2008 in primary schools and 2009 in secondary schools].”

Irene Carroll, chair of the Local Authority Caterers Association, said McCain’s findings came as “no surprise whatsoever”. She continued: “We are doing our own national research at the moment, but anecdotally, we’re hearing exactly the same things.

“In primary schools, it’s a little different because they are a more captive audience, but in secondary schools, if children don’t like what’s on offer, they vote with their feet.”

While research into the impact of the new standards conducted by the School Foods Trust would, no doubt, identify the same problems, the SFT was “stuck on a white line now” and would “not go back”, she predicted.

An obsession with buzzwords such as ‘local’, ‘fresh’ and ‘organic’ was simply diverting attention from the real issue of improving nutritional standards, she added. “It drives me bonkers. The £220M [pledged by Whitehall] is not enough to drive fundamental improvements in school meals provision.

“The money has to cover labour and equipment as well as ingredients, so it doesn’t actually amount to very much at all. If you are going to have fresh meat, that’s all very well, but you need kitchens to prepare it, fridges to store it and so on.”

Scolarest, a subsidiary of Compass, said a lack of resources was compounding problems.

Its spokesman said: “We have noticed that where schools and local education authorities have increased their specification and funding, we have seen uptake of school meals holding or increasing. In areas where there has been little support, uptake is declining and many children are opting for packed lunches.

“We are beginning to see a decline in school meal uptake in secondary schools but will not be able to assess the full impact until after September 2007” - when further guidelines regarding foods other than lunches are implemented, she added.