Calls for packed lunches to be banned in the East Midlands
Packed lunches blamed for children in the East Midlands not eating right
There are calls for lunch boxes to be banned in schools in the East Midlands so that children are eating better.
Dame Prue Leith, known for her role on The Great British Bake Off, expressed a desire for all children to receive free school meals and for these meals to become mandatory.
Her comments come ahead of new eligibility for pupils from families on universal credit to access free school meals starting in September.
'Getting food right'
Leith remarked: “It’s the first time in my long life of campaigning for better school food that I’ve actually felt there’s a Government that is at least a little bit interested in getting food right in schools.”
She emphasised the importance of providing children with tasty, nutritious food, noting its benefits for health and as a source of enjoyment.
“If children eat junk and they don’t like healthy food and they’re not given healthy food they will not be healthy,” Leith said. She added her belief that school kitchen staff play a vital role in educating children on nutrition and encouraging them to try new foods.
Leith offered a bold suggestion to eliminate packed lunches, stating that the contents of lunchboxes are not adequately monitored.
“It’s very hard if you’re a mum walking around a supermarket with your child, and a child wants to have that chocolate bar and whatever in their lunchbox,” she remarked.
“It’s really hard because it’s an easy way of sort of pleasing a child, and it’s an easy way of almost buying love.”
'You cannot do a blanket ban'
Louise Mercieca is an early years nutrition consultant in Leicester. She is not convinced this is the best course of action: "You cannot do a blanket ban on lunch boxes because there are children with narrow eating habits who need food that feels safe to them.
"There are children who have other commitments at lunchtime and do not have time to wait in the dinner queue.
"If the queue for an amazing menu is 25 minutes long, they are literally standing for the majority of the free time that they have in a queue. Then by the time they get to their food, they will have to eat it really quickly.
"Unless the wider lunchtime issues are addressed, you are going to have the same problems. The ambition is good and for the right reasons, but I just do not think it will achieve," she said.
Current standards...
Findings by Bite Back, a food charity initiated by Jamie Oliver, exposed breaches of current standards in over three-quarters of menus analysed from state secondary schools in England.
These breaches frequently involved offering less healthy options like burgers and nuggets more frequently than guidelines permit.
One in three children are leaving primary school overweight or obese, with tooth decay remaining the leading cause of hospital admissions for children aged five to nine.