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Hundreds to lose hot school meals
HUNDREDS of Peterborough pupils could have their hot school dinners axed in September.
HUNDREDS of Peterborough pupils could have their hot school dinners axed in September.Currently, every primary school child in the city is able to get a hot lunch for under 2.
But now one school – and potentially three others – have been forced to cancel their hot meals provision from next term after their catering provider increased prices.
St Botolph's Primary School, in Orton Longueville, confirmed it has been forced to pull the plug on hot meals, a move that will effect 90 children, after prices rocketed from 1.90 to 3 per child per day
Parents were sent a letter saying the current service will be replaced by a packed lunch, consisting of a roll, baked pudding, piece of fruit and a drink.
But headteacher Jenny Daniels said the decision by governors had been "incredibly tough" as they could not ask parents to fork out an extra 1 a meal and stressed this was only an interim measure.
Mrs Daniels said: "We wanted to let parents know as soon as we could what was happening with the dinners.
"We were told our annual meal provision cost would leap from 32,520 to 49,210 which is a more than 50 per cent increase.
"We considered this increase was far too large to ask parents to pay and the school was not in a position to subsidise the meals to that extent so the governors made the difficult decision to cancel our contract with them."
But despite a search, the school has been unable to find supplier to provide hot meals at an affordable price so will receive packed lunches from the nearby Orton Longueville School kitchen.
Concerned parent Christian Hogg said he would have liked the parents to have had a choice over the meals.
He said: "I think that the provision of meals is very important and although it would be a shame, I would rather see money spent on that, rather than, say, music.
"For some children it's the only hot meal they get all day and I think this is crucial.
"I will be supporting the packed lunches with my child just to ensure the school receives support."
Cambridgeshire Catering and Cleaning Service (CCS), which provides hot meals to the school, said the decision to put prices up was a hard one but followed the non-profit council-run service suffering a 75,000 loss last year.
Head of CCS Richard Ware said that of the 16 Peterborough schools they catered for, 10 were remaining with them, but four had since pulled out and two schools' futures remained uncertain
Mr Ware said: "We had to change the way our contracts were set up, which for some schools has meant an increase of just 5p or 10p.
"But, unfortunately, St Botolph's numbers meant they received the biggest increase of 1 per meal and decided not to renew their contract."
Financial restrictions have also meant Peterborough City Council has been unable to help, with Mike Heath, commercial services director, saying: "The price requested by the school for us to provide hot lunches is not commercially viable.
"The council's catering service operates on a commercial basis and cannot provide a service at a loss."
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Sunday 12 February 2012
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