Labour commits to free school meals for all primary school children

Today, Jeremy Corbyn, Leader of the Labour Party, and Angela Rayner, Shadow Secretary of State for Education, committed the next Labour Government to providing free school meals for all primary school children.

Labour will fund the policy by introducing VAT on private school fees. Labour’s policy will benefit the educational attainment and health of all children while ending a subsidy to the privileged few.
Research confirmed by the National Centre for Social Research and the Institute for Fiscal Studies has shown offering universal access to free school meals improves educational attainment through improvements in pupils’ productivity, enabling primary school pupils to advance by around two months on average.


The provision of free school meals also has been proven to improve the health of pupils through better nutrition - with over 90 percent of pupils eating a school lunch consuming food or drink containing vegetables or fruit (including fruit juice) compared with only 58 percent of pupils who eat packed lunches.

At the launch event in Lancashire, Jeremy Corbyn, Leader of the Labour Party, said:
“No child in the UK should go hungry at school. By charging VAT on private schools fees, Labour will make sure all primary school children, no matter what their background, get a healthy meal at school.


“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.”

Angela Rayner, Labour’s Shadow Education Secretary, said:
“The Government’s cuts to the school budget are making school meals worse and limiting the number of children that can be fed. This decision affects the educational attainment and health of pupils.

“While the Conservatives offer tax giveaways to their billionaire friends, they are cutting the schools budget and threatening the health and futures of all our children by denying children the basic right of a healthy lunch at school. By investing in our education system and providing free school meals for every primary school child, we will remove the stigma attached to free school meals, and improve health and attainment for all children.“

Labour Pledges

We all know that Farage and UKIP want to privatize the NHS because he has publicly said so.  David Cameron and his on-the-run Tories aren't so upfront.  But they want to privatize just the same.  They want to flog off the last of our national crown jewels for a short-term gain and long-term pain.  And the rubbish Health and Social Care Act (HSCA) is their vehicle for doing so.  Never heard of it?  No, Tory newspapers like the hideous Daily Mail and media like Sky haven't exactly been headlining it.

For the avoidance of doubt, let's be clear: Labour is pledged to repeal HCSA.  It really is that simple.

Labour's Cost of Living Contract

Last week, Labour would have delivered a Queen’s speech to help Britain be better off 

Parliament should be making real progress to address the public’s discontent and chart a new direction for Britain. Labour’s Queen’s Speech would have included: 

 

• A Make Work Pay bill to reward hard work with a higher minimum wage.

 

• A Banking Bill that backs British business with a real British Investment Bank and new regional banks.

 

• A Consumers Bill to freeze energy bills until 2017 and reform the energy market

 

• A Housing Bill with long term reform to increase supply to 200,000 homes by 2020, and measures to end rip-off letting fees and make three year tenancies the norm.

 

• A Communities Bill to give people a say over pay day lenders and betting shops on their high streets.

 

• An Immigration Bill, to stop workers being undercut through enforcement of the minimum wage and banning recruitment agencies that only use overseas labour.

 

• An NHS Bill, to put a stop to its privatisation and improve access to GPs. 

 

To make that happen we need a different government, a Labour Government.

 

Labour will take immediate action to deal with David Cameron’s cost-of-living crisis:

 

• Freeze gas and electricity bills until 2017, as we reform the broken energy market to prevent customers being ripped off.

 

• Get the next generation into work, with expanded apprenticeships and a compulsory jobs guarantee for young people unemployed for a year or more – with a real paid job they’ll have to take or lose benefits.

 

• Introduce a lower 10p starting rate of tax to help make work pay and cut taxes for 24 million working people on middle and lower incomes – funded by a mansion tax on homes worth over £2 million.

 

• End the abuse of zero hour contracts and strengthen the minimum wage.

 

Labour will make big long-term changes so that hardworking people are better off

 

• Get 200,000 homes built a year by 2020, creating up to 230,000 construction jobs.

 

• Make work pay with 25 hours free childcare for three and four year olds with working parents paid for by an increase in the bank levy.

 

• Improve school standards, by guaranteeing that all teachers must be qualified, and transforming vocational education for the 50 per cent of young people who don’t go to university with gold-standard technical qualifications at age 18.

 

• Repeal David Cameron's NHS changes that put private profit before patient care – and we will give patients and the public a say when changes to local services are proposed.

 

Only Labour can make Britain better off, putting hardworking families first with a plan to tackle the cost-of-living crisis and earn our way to higher living standards for all.

Housing Benefit - the facts

The number of working people claiming housing benefit has increased by 60 per cent costing taxpayers an extra £6 billion because of David Cameron’s cost-of-living crisis. 

400,000 more working people are claiming housing benefit costing the taxpayer an estimated extra £4.8bn in housing benefit over the course of this Parliament. 

Every single local authority in the UK has seen an increase in the number of people in work claiming housing benefit, the biggest increase in the country was in Croydon which has seen an astonishing 1100 per cent rise since 2010. 

The maths is simple: landlords profiting from ridiculous rents are likely to vote Tory; tenants paying those rents (and going without in other basics to make up the shortfall in benefit) are not.

Labour has pledged to limit rent increases, extend the length of tenancies and stop letting agents charging both landlord and tenants for their so-called services.  The rent-for-profit industry is up in arms.  Yes, in the country which built railways and cars and ships and wove fabric for the world, renting property now counts as an industry.

Helping Generation Rent - a new pledge from Labour

The up-coming elections see Labour setting out plans to deal with the cost-of-living crisis. The message is simple: Hardworking Britain will always be better off with Labour.

David Cameron can’t solve the crisis because he stands up for a privileged few not working people.  The Liberal Democrats are part of the problem not part of the solution.

 

Take for example the spiralling costs of private rented accommodation which are draining welfare budgets, increasing homelessness and preventing an entire generation from saving enough money to get themselves on the housing ladder.

 

Generation rent is a generation that has been ignored for too long. Ed Miliband has today set about putting that right, with Labour’s fair deal for rented housing in Britain.  Labour will bring back long-term tenancies and stable rents so that people can settle down, know where their kids will go to school, know their home will still be there for them tomorrow.

 

That's the pledge.  Here are the facts:

• The costs of renting are part of the cost-of-living crisis: Renters are now paying on average £1020 a year more in rent than in 2010 and letting agents charge average fees of £350 every time someone moves house.
• The private rented sector has changed: 9 million people now rent privately including over 1.3 million families with children and almost 50% of private rented households are over the age of 35.
• The sector doesn’t work for these families: Under the current legislation renters are locked into short term tenancies with only 6 months of security and half of all families renting say that they are worried about unaffordable rent increases.
• Labour will act: We will introduce legislation to make 3 year tenancies with stable rents the norm in the market and to ban letting agents’ fees for tenants, saving families £350.