There will be a boost for fresh fruit and vegetables and deep-fried food will be banned in what the government has called the biggest shake-up to school dinners in England in over a decade.
Will it include samosas, onion bahjis and gulab jamun as well as the fish and chips then? I wonder…
Under new school food standards, fibre and wholegrains will also be increased, and breakfast clubs will have to follow nutrition rules for the first time, with schools also being monitored.
That’s not going to be cheap, unless they plan to add it to OFSTED inspectorate tasks…
The Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) welcomed the changes, but said they hoped the new rules would not become "another stick with which to beat head teachers".
The changes will come into effect from 2027 and be funded with existing money for schools, the government said.
Then they DO plan for OFSTED to take it on, instead of creating another inspection regime.
Education Secretary Lucy Powell said they were "once-in-a-generation changes" which would "transform school food for children across the country".
I’m sure we all expected a government to busy themselves with that, instead of protecting the country’s borders, when we entered the ballot box, didn’t we?
Pepe Di'Iasio, ASCL general secretary, said parents would feel "reassured" that schools were providing children with a healthy diet.He said schools needed "more investment" in catering facilities and in the "professional development" of school chefs to develop menus that "meet the ambitions" of the government.
The ambitions of this particular government? One would hope they would be a little more statesmanlike, but in vain…
Breakfast clubs will undergo one of the biggest changes. Historically, there has been no guidance on what they should provide, but from next September pastries and fried-eggs will be off the menu and there will be a sugar cap when it comes to cereals.The government said Coco Pops would no longer be an option and chocolate spread was "not permitted".
No croissants, that’s not very European of us, and whatever happened to ‘Go to work on an egg’?
3 comments:
Nobody expects the Nourish Inquisition.
"I’m sure we all expected a government to busy themselves with that, instead of protecting the country’s borders, when we entered the ballot box, didn’t we?"
Well, not that, exactly. But I did look at their election promises and expected them to do something completely different. (Continuing the Monty Python theme. :-) )
I'm pretty much the definition of a boomer, born in 1958 just thirteen years after the end of WW2. I was too young to have been aware of the tail end of rationing. The attitude of the Powers That Be back then was that the proles were all undernourished and really needed fattening up, school dinners tended to reflect that position. My dear old mum only had a rudimentary education but seemed very aware of the need to feed her kids a balanced nutritional diet, based on the knowledge of the time. She certainly seems to have more idea than the confidently wrong ignoramuses that make up today's government.
My only criticism of the wisdom of that generation would be their love of white bread. Why anyone thought that removing all of the flavour and most of the nutritional content from your bread was a good idea eludes me.
My actual point. The current politicians think that they know better than people who grew up with food fried in lard but are still alive and kicking in their late eighties.
I'm 68 now and I can swim 1,100 metres in thirty minutes. I've just finished a challenge to walk a million steps in three months with eight days to spare.
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