School lunch changes will mean only a ‘snack’ for some pupils, Hipkins says
Under the Government’s proposed “cut-price model” that would drop to about $3, he said.
“In reality that’s not going to give the kids the free, healthy, nutritious meals that they have been used to,” Hipkins said.
“For many schools, it will be a snack that they get.”
There is however no planned change for an interim period through to 2026 for Years 0-6, while the Government works on a full re-design, according to the policy announcement earlier this month.
For secondary schools the budget now was around $8 to $8.50, and that would also drop to about $3, Hipkins said.
“I don’t think that schools are going to be able to meet the needs of their student communities on that kind of a budget,” Hiipkins said.
He criticised the Government’s intended tax cuts, saying it was not the right time. Instead it was a time to ensure public services were funded appropriately, that programmes like the school lunches programme as it was now were continued, and for driving inflation down and getting the economy back into balance.
Chippy drops the hammer and sickle on ACTs Trojan horse food in schools scheme!
David Seymour started the week attacking ‘Woke Food’ so that no one would notice he was cheapening the free food in schools program to annihilate the 3000 jobs created by making hot food so that he could hand the contract over to one of the bullshit private poverty contractors…
School lunches: Principals disheartened by menu changes, lack of funding for staff
Changed menu ‘disappointing’
Principal of Aorere College in Papatoetoe Lianne Webb said that was not enough for students who relied on lunch as their main or sometimes only meal of the day.
“That is really disappointing because the hot meals are a lot more enjoyable for the students than the sandwich, the sandwich is the least attractive option.”
Of the 1650 students at the college two thirds take part in the lunch programme.
Next year’s scheme will be focused on reducing waste, however, Webb said at the end of the lunch break there was nothing to spare.
“We often have kids come at the end of the day asking if there’s any food left over, so waste is not the issue.”
Aorere College works with external provider DJ’s Catering, who provide four staff to come in, set up and deliver the lunches.
But the onus will now be on schools themselves to manage the ordering, storage, preparation, and distribution of the food.
Webb said the college simply did not have that capacity.
“We don’t have the facilities for doing that, we don’t have the staff for that. We don’t even have enough teachers, are we supposed to hire someone specially to do it without the funding to do so?”
Ōtāhuhu College principal Neil Watson echoed this concern.
“That comes at a cost in terms of staffing time, and we would have to look at how we manage that and how we do that in such a way which doesn’t detract from the students in the classroom too.”
Eighty-six percent of students at Ōtāhuhu College opt for the lunches scheme, provided by external company Kiwi Canteen.
Watson said there were no leftover lunches, but with the menu changing he was worried that might change.
“If you had a choice between a hot hamburger yeah and two muesli bars probably the hamburgers would have a higher uptake than two muesli bars.”
Parents RNZ spoke to said that while a hot lunch was best, especially in winter, free kai and a full puku were still life changing.
“That’s alright, as long as the kids are fed, I guess the sandwiches and the fruits are just as healthy as the hot meals,” one person said.
“I think the hot meal was good, very good, but even sandwiches for kids that will be okay too, they will eat healthy,” another parent said.
The finer details of the new Ka Ora Ka Ako programme for year 7-13 will be determined later this year with the assistance of an expert advisory group.
Educators will be hoping it will have the right outcomes for their tamariki.
…it will be less nutritious food served by a private contractor who gets a sweetheart deal.
Rymans is involved FFS and they are a special kind of evil.
The sweetheart deal David has cut these poverty pirates will also see 10 000 kids at ECE get covered as well, which is fascinating because none of those ECE parents will be getting cheaper early child education fees, he’s just handed an enormous corporate welfare cheque to private education providers and called that a social policy win!
Let’s be clear, Seymour hates feeding kids at school, his libertarian pretensions despise allowing Parents off the hook for feeding their kids, he has been forced into this position because the optics of taking food out of kids mouths while he gives the richest Landlords a $2.9billion tax break is too much for even ZB listeners.
He is downgrading a food system and destabilising it enough to hand the lot over to a private contractors like Rymans.
To gloss over the fact they hadn’t culled the program, ACT felt the need to shit on woke sushi as some sort of petty culture war sick burn on their awfully childish Twitter feed.
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Do you think there’s actually a reason the likes of EeeOrrr Seymour, Oliver Hartwitch, Karen bore Chore and various otherings don’t just fuck off to the U.S of A, rather than trying to bring their ideology to lil ‘ole’Nuzullin that punches above its weight?
Ego of course plays a big part in it all, as with various other populists, but you’ve got to wonder what Seymour’s agenda is – other than a frustrated virgin (saving himself until marriage) pissing around as a big turd in a little pond because he hasn’t been able to cut it with the bigger dicks.
And then there’s this thing about Winnie. Jesus H Christ! Does He fantasise aloud over Shane after a Johnny Walker and a few Marlborough cancer sticks?
It’d be as funny as a Trumpian fart swimming around in a nappy if it wasn’t serious.
The harder they rise ……………..
I think that in Seymour various aspects of nature and nurture have come together into a clever tool suitable to be aCT leader. Recognising and grooming him for the task was an act of machiavellian proportion. I wonder who was it wot did it?
Greywarbler. ACT’s a small party and Seymour probably got to be leader simply because scum rises to the top. Someone like lack-lustre Luxon leading a big party like the Nats is where the Machiavellian forces come into play, and they are the ones calling the shots. Seymour is moderately intelligent, but ill-educated and gauche with elastic principles, such as they are. His nonsense about woke food was clearly a clumsy diversion from the real issue of doing what is best for school children and recognising that every child counts.
Feed all the kids at all school s or none. Some of these kids parents getting Free lunch s drive very modern vehicles.
“Some of these kids parents getting Free lunch s drive very modern vehicles”
Where? When? Love to see actual evidence, please provide….
Basic for school lunch? With about 20 slices of multigrain, high fibre bread in a $4 loaf, 2 pieces would cost 40c, a pat of butter would be say 50c, and a pre-sliced cheese topping 50 cents, equals 40c, 50c , 50c = $1.40, followed by ? (And remember that hard up people may not be able to afford $4 for a loaf; the cheap ones may be 99c but the ingredients are lesser quality, probably white flour and lacking in goodness.
Packed by volunteers, so price is down. (NZ doing things for themselves without some egregious business with its hand out.) The volunteers to be given vouchers for a supermarket and a cup of tea and cake at locally owned cafe for every 10 times of assistance.
Information on food costs has been faithfully amassed by Otago University each year, and probably ignored by determinedly uninterested politicians and administrators who don’t want to know facts in favour of emotional assertions about people and personal management.
I wonder if Mr Hipkins has more than glanced at it, along with his advisors?
https://www.otago.ac.nz/humannutrition/research/food-cost-surveyThe most recent food cost survey for 2023 is available from the Otago University Research Archive. This document describes how we collected and analysed food costs, as well as our survey results!
Reports from previous years are also available for download.
If you have any questions or concerns, please contact Dr Claire Smith.
Also below:
https://tgabudget.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/OtagoFoodCostsSurvey.pdf
Otago researchers call for national health food policy …
NZ Doctor
https://www.nzdoctor.co.nz › article › undoctored › ota…
The researchers will recommend establishing a nationwide healthy food policy for all schools, building on the healthy food policy that District Health Boards …
University of Otago. School of Home S… | Items
National Library of New Zealand
https://natlib.govt.nz › records
University of Otago. School of Home Science Extension Service :Plan your meals. Published for Famine Emergency Committee by Economic Information
A taxpayer funded snack is better than nothing. Where are the parents?
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