Atherstone MP issues statement about why he voted against free school meals for children

In a statement of Facebook yesterday, MP for North Warwickshire Craig Tracey explained why he voted against providing free school meals for children.

The parliamentary vote this week came after Manchester United and England striker Marcus Rashford, and many others had been pushing for free school meals for children during half term and beyond.

The labour-led proposal would have given eligible children a £15 a week food voucher even during the holidays, but was defeated by 322 votes to 261 - with a majority of 61.

Only five Conservatives rebelled against the Government to vote for feeding more than 1.4 million children during school breaks.

They did not include the Craig Tracey.

In his statement he began by stating the context of the proposal, "Simply put, they [the proposals] are there more for discussion than to change the law and even if voted through, not only do they not automatically become law, but actually rarely ever do."

He then spoke about how the house discussed the issue of child poverty, "It was good to see much common ground on these genuine issues. These are things that Government has agreed to look at and already does so as part of their "levelling up" agenda."

The bulk of the statement then addressed whether the government should be responsible for providing free school meals for children.

"There has already been unprecedented levels of support for families disadvantaged as a result of this crisis with an additional £9bn put in to the welfare system to directly help them and a further £63m given to councils to target families in need.

"Locally, in the last 24 hours, North Warwickshire Borough Council has been awarded an extra £250k & Nuneaton & Bedworth Borough Council £464k un-ringfenced funding to support our own communities. This is without costing in the furlough scheme which has protected an unparalleled amount of jobs and enabled families to continue to receive an income.

"During the pandemic, Universal Credit has also been temporarily increased by £1,000 per year, which has a far more direct impact on tackling food poverty than a blanket issuing of free school meals, as the acceptance criteria is much wider."

"We should also not underestimate the role that Holiday Clubs play in supporting low income families. There was a £9m boost to summer holiday funding of these schemes in some of the most disadvantaged areas and whilst providing food, they also provided activities for children, thus boosting their wellbeing.

"On top of this, we also need to consider whether it is actually beneficial to create a state of dependency for Government to feed children. In my view it isn't. Taking away responsibilities from parents cant be right and I doubt that such state intervention would be welcomed in other areas of children's lives.

"Whilst these measures were initially proposed as being temporary, we can already see that the longer they go on, the harder they are to take away, without actually doing anything to solve the issue at hand."

Mr Tracey then concluded his statement by suggesting a different approach to the issue.

"But that does not mean we turn our backs on those in need and is why I felt than rather than a blanket roll out of FSM, a more targeted, local level approach, taking in to account the support measures already in place would be far more effective in tackling the issue, particularly when we consider that children in the majority of the most disadvantaged households, where no parents are working for example, will not have seen a drop in their income levels as a result of COVID19."

To read it in full, please follow this link.