Dotty G

Hi, I am on Universal Credit at present, and don't work at the moment. I have a 7 year old son, who currently receives Free School meals.

He has his breakfast at around 7am, and then his school dinner at around 11.30am, which means that after his breakfast, he doesn't get to eat for 4 and a half hours. Within this nearly 5 hour window, my son is burning off loads of energy at school both mentally and physically, and hence, when it comes to lunch time he is usually really hungry.

However, whilst I am grateful that my son does get free school meals, he often tells me that the meal he received was in no way filling, and that the portion sizes of the food are fairly small, hence he is still hungry after the meal, because it is not fulfilling enough.

Because of this, what I have started doing is making sure that I arrive at the school gate at home time with a homemade sandwich, a piece of fruit, and anything else I can pack for him in my handbag which is compact enough for me to take with me to the school-run, because he is usually still very hungry at this point. The food I bring tends to satisfy his hunger enough until we reach home.

My son really appreciates my new strategy, and is always super excited to see me at home time because he knows that I'll be armed with food for him.

The only downside, is that throughout the day, I often worry about how hungry he is, and wished I could do more to help him during the school day, like provide him with some extra food to take with him in the morning, which he can also eat alongside his free school meal, but currently the school do not allow this. Children are either on a packed lunch because their parents work, or they get free school meals because their parents don't work, or can also get them if their parents work but, they have to pay £15 per week per child, which I think is quite expensive, especially if the parents are on a low income.

There is no in-between. Hence, I think that Free School meals do make a difference because at least our children don't starve whilst they are at school, but, I think that parents should be given more choices regarding what their children eat at school lunch time, whether they are working or not.