Credit: This story was first seen on The Guardian
Jeremy Corbyn will announce plans today to fund free school meals for all primary school children by adding VAT to private school fees, The Guardian reports.
The Labour leader will make the commitment during a visit to Lancashire for his party’s local election campaign, saying the policy would benefit children’s health while ending a subsidy for the privileged few.
Corbyn will also highlight research by the National Centre for Social Research and the Institute for Fiscal Studies, which has shown that offering universal access to free school meals improves pupils’ productivity and enables them to advance by around two months on average.
An expansion of free school meals to all infant pupils was brought in under the coalition, a policy led by Nick Clegg, the Liberal Democrats former deputy prime minister. But the government faced criticism for failing to fund it properly and consider the extra costs to schools, such as the construction of new kitchens. The extension was supported at the time by Labour and child health campaigners such as the celebrity chef Jamie Oliver.
Corbyn will say the provision of free school meals has been proven to enhance the health of pupils through better nutrition, with more than 90% of pupils eating a school lunch with food or drink containing vegetables or fruit, compared with only 58% of pupils who eat packed lunches.
“By charging VAT on private school fees, Labour will make sure that all primary school children, no matter what their background, get a healthy meal at school,” Corbyn will say. “The next Labour government will provide all primary school children with a free school meal, invest in our schools, and make sure no child is held back because of their background.”
The government has been criticised for cuts to school budgets through its shakeup of education funding, which will see money redistributed from urban areas to schools in more rural areas that have historically been underfunded.
Mike Buchanan, the chief executive of the Headmasters’ and Headmistresses’ Conference, which represents private school leaders, claimed the policy would lead to a “net cost to the state” as parents take their children out of private schools.
He told Radio 4’s Today programme that it was based on “dodgy myths and misunderstandings and it will be counterproductive”.
Speaking in Nottinghamshire at the launch of the Conservative local election manifesto, Theresa May was pressed on whether it was a good idea to put VAT on private school fees to pay for universal free school meals. She dodged the question and claimed Labour wanted to “level everything down and say to parents: take it or leave, it doesn’t matter if the school is good or bad”.
“Just look at Jeremy Corbyn’s economic policies. They would bankrupt Britain. Schools would find themselves in a parlous condition if Labour were in government because of the way they would be running the economy,” she added.