Issue - meetings
FREE SCHOOL MEALS UPDATE - TO PROVIDE AN UPDATE ON PROGRESS IN DELIVERING HOT SCHOOL MEALS AT SCHOOLS ACROSS THE BOROUGH AT KEY STAGE 1 (INCLUDING GROVELANDS PRU).
Meeting: 16/10/2014 - Children, Education and Families Budget Sub-Committee (Item 30)
30 FREE SCHOOL MEALS UPDATE 
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Minutes:
Report ED15112
The Sub-Committee considered a report providing an update on progress made across Bromley schools to implement the Free School Meals for Infants Programme.
On 17th September 2013, the Government announced that every child in Reception, Year 1 and Year 2 in state funded schools would receive a free school meal from September 2014, for which there would be revenue funding of £2.30 for each meal taken by pupils who were newly eligible for free school meals as a result of the policy. Meals for pupils who were eligible for free school meals under the current criteria would continue to be funded through existing arrangements.
To deliver this new requirement, the Local Authority was allocated £386,780 capital funding for Local Authority Maintained schools and £30,824 for Voluntary Aided schools for 2014/15. To support the allocation of these funds, a sufficiency audit of the kitchen provision in Local Authority Maintained and Voluntary Aided schools across the Borough was undertaken to identify and prioritise those kitchens that required capital investment. The outcome of this audit was received in June 2014, and Officers had worked with the Bromley Primary Consortium Group and individual schools to agree the principles behind capital investment to ensure that all eligible Bromley schools were able to deliver universal infant free school meals from September 2014. The Free School Meals for Infants Programme was successfully rolled out across the Borough from September 2014, but work continued with Local Authority Maintained and Voluntary Aided schools to identify and prioritise kitchen improvements.
The Head of Strategic Pupil Place Planning advised Members that the Government had just announced a further £20m capital fund available for Local Authority Maintained schools to bid for funding for kitchen improvements to support the delivery of the Free School Meals for Infants Programme. A similar capital fund would also be available to academies.
RESOLVED that progress in implementing the Free School Meals for Infants Programme from September 2014 be noted.