Meeting of the Parliament 11 September 2024
The Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills said that she wanted some context and to engage with the Opposition. Like Willie Rennie, I will take her back a bit in the journey. I will talk specifically about how opinions have changed over time.
When I was first elected to the Parliament, in 2007, the first committee session that I went to on the Education, Lifelong Learning and Culture Committee was a debate about whether free school meals were necessary and, if they were, on what basis. We took extensive—and I have to say, very interesting and, in some cases, surprising—evidence about whether that was the right thing to do. It came not just from Scotland—I remember a big study from Hull City. What was then called the Aberlour Childcare Trust warmly welcomed the committee’s engagement, but the trust said that it was “yet to be convinced” about universal school meals.
Barnardo’s said the same, and Tam Baillie, who was the Commissioner for Children and Young People at the time, said:
“I am not at all sure that introducing free school meals would be the best way of achieving the desired objective amongst our most vulnerable children.”
He also said that many felt that the problems that the committee was trying to address would be far better addressed by giving assistance to those in the earliest years and not necessarily to those who were further into their primary school years.
That was then, and this is now. Fourteen years on, my very strong view is that tackling the problems of unhealthy eating among our schoolchildren—for all the reasons that Brian Whittle set out—should be a major priority during this session of Parliament.