Feeding futures: Policy in Practice welcomes Free School Meals extension
Deven Ghelani Published on 05th June 2025
The government today announced that Free School Meals are being made available to all children in families on Universal Credit.
From September 2026, over three million school age children on Universal Credit will get a Free School Meal, boosting take up and lifting over 100,000 children above the poverty line as a result.
This is fantastic news, and something Policy in Practice has been calling for since it was founded in 2012 when Deven Ghelani gave evidence to the SSAC on the rise in annual earnings needed to compensate for losing entitlement to FSM.
Deven Ghelani has called for extending FSM to all UC recipients since 2012
We are delighted to see the government expand free school meals to all children in families on Universal Credit. This move will help both 'pockets' and 'prospects', as families no longer have to pay for a school meal, and aren't penalised for going above the income threshold.
Deven Ghelani, Policy in Practice
One of the key reasons to make Universal Credit the criteria for free school meals eligibility is its impact on work incentives.
People losing eligibility when still on Universal Credit, at an income level above £7,400, have to then buy their child’s meal from their post tax, post Universal Credit withdrawal income.
The table below shows that meals costing £490 per year per child would need to be paid for from gross earnings of £1513. The impact is even greater for people with two or more school age children.
To be fair to past governments, the transitional protection in place, which meant families continue to get Free School Meals up to the end of the current phase of schooling, mitigated against the worst potential impacts. But the government’s announcement offers a permanent solution.
When people are no longer on Universal Credit, the increase in earnings they would need is much lower, at £681 to compensate for the loss of free school meals.
| Number of children | Daily cost of FSM | Annual cost of FSM | Increase in gross earnings needed to make up for withdrawal of FSM on UC | Increase in gross earnings needed to make up for withdrawal of FSM not on UC |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | £2.58 | £490.20 | £1,512.96 | £680.83 |
| 2 | £5.16 | £980.40 | £3,025.93 | £1,361.67 |
Although the announcement doesn’t say anything about auto enrolment, we are delighted and grateful to the dozens of local authorities we have worked with to show the government that auto enrolment is possible.
The impact of auto enrolment is clear. Lambeth, Lewisham and Wandsworth councils helped over 1,500 children access free school meals, using the LIFT platform to support auto enrolment.
We hope to see the government adopt auto enrolment nationally, enabling councils like these to focus on other take up and poverty prevention efforts.
