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School Meals Initiatives Welcomed

Tuesday 15 November 2005

“Andrew Dougal, Chief Executive of the NI Chest Heart & Stroke Association welcomed the initiatives by the Minister. We particularly applaud the re-introduction of nutritional standards and the fact that schools will be encouraged to change the content of vending machines. It is extremely good news that additional money will be available for the purchase of the content of the meals and that resources are being set aside for the training and development of school meals staff.”

“Andrew Dougal, Chief Executive of the NI Chest Heart & Stroke Association welcomed the initiatives by the Minister. We particularly applaud the re-introduction of nutritional standards and the fact that schools will be encouraged to change the content of vending machines. It is extremely good news that additional money will be available for the purchase of the content of the meals and that resources are being set aside for the training and development of school meals staff.”

The NI Chest Heart & Stroke Association has campaigned that the Caroline Walker Trust Guidelines should be used for the 14 nutrient standards i.e. energy, protein, total carbohydrates, non-milk extrinsic sugars, fat, saturated fat, fibre, sodium, vitamin A, vitamin C, folate/folic acid, calcium, iron and zinc.

9 food-based standards to maximise healthier foods, e.g. fruit and vegetables, oily fish, and reduce the availability of less healthy foods e.g. deep fried products.

The increased allocation of funds to the purchase of meals should not be passed on to pupils. If this happened elasticity of demand would indicate that fewer pupils would take up school meals.

It is our belief that hot meals should, where possible, be cooked on site and they should be cooked from fresh and seasonal ingredients.

It is our duty to protect also pre-school children. We must have similar standards applied to non-lunch food provision.

I realise the Department feels that it may not impose a requirement on schools to withdraw unhealthy products from vending machines. However, schools should be required to provide returns as to the volumes of different products sold from vending machines. The Education Boards and the Department should have a monitoring role in regard to this. It is welcome that school meals are going to be subject to inspection. Such inspection should apply to other forms of eating in the schools.

Healthy choices should be available to the end of the lunch-time service and not just be a small number of portions available at the start of the lunch break.

Fresh chilled drinking water should be available throughout the school day.

It would be advantageous if the procurement of food was consistent with sustainable development principles.

It is essential that the ambiance and decoration of school meals canteens are positive. The research carried out by the NI Chest Heart & Stroke Association indicated that the ambience and noise levels were major factors in pupils’ attitudes to school meals.

All schools should develop, implement and publish a whole-school food and nutrition policy. What is practiced in school meals should also be taught in the curriculum.

All children should be taught food preparation and practical cooking skills. There should be more emphasis within the curriculum space currently devoted to food technology at key stage 3. There should be supply links to local producers and schools should be strengthened. There should be steps taken to ensure that low income families are not adversely affected by price increases. It has been shown by research in the past that free school meals are a most effective way of redressing imbalances in the diet and in the health of children from deprived backgrounds.

The existence of long-term contracts must not be allowed to affect adversely the health of pupils.

Andrew Dougal paid tribute to the tremendous work which had been done over the years by school meals staff who had worked in very difficult circumstances and with very constrained resources.

Could I again say how pleased the Association is about the re-introduction of nutritional standards and we urge those to be up to the level of the Caroline Walker Trust standards.

“It is the fervent hope of NICHSA that this today begins a process of continuous change and advancement in the quality of food served to children in our schools and at home.”

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