Oldham’s Liberal Democrat Councillors have backed a call from the National Education Union to the government to end school summer holiday hunger.
The councillors have co-signed a letter to the Prime Minister seeking the return of a special payment to poorer families of £15 per week for each child normally in receipt of means-tested free school meals. This is to provide families with extra food to compensate them for the loss of free school meals for that child during the summer holidays.
Commenting, Councillor Howard Sykes MBE said: “Last year, the government finally listened to the many voices, including ours, calling for an end to kids going hungry over the summer and did the decent thing by introducing this payment whilst Britain was in the grip of the COVID pandemic.
“We are not out of the woods yet and things are still very tough financially for a great many people, especially in a poor place like Oldham. Making these payments again this year would not only be the right thing to do – it would be the humane thing to do as well. If the Prime Minister is serious about ‘levelling up’- Britain, then he needs to start by making sure none of Britain’s children goes hungry”.