Kids, staff fear effect of lunch cuts
Children with little food at home are concerned their energy levels and ability to learn will be hurt if the Government takes away one of the few guaranteed meals they see each day.
Associate Education Minister David Seymour has confirmed he is looking to cut funding to the government-funded healthy school lunch programme, Ka Ora, Ka Ako, by up to half as part of a review ahead of the Budget.
Staff at Chisnallwood Intermediate School in Avondale, Christchurch, fear taking away student’s lunches will only create food insecurity and hungry children unable to concentrate – and the students agree.
“I believe that the lunches should stay mainly because that is a lot of students’ meal for the entirety of the day ... most people don’t have food at home,” said Ryder, who is in year 8.
Before the lunches were introduced in 2022, Ryder said he struggled to learn “because my brain just got like, ‘oh, I’m so hungry’. “After I ate the lunches I’d always have energy to do stuff.”
Felix, also in year 8, said his favourite Ka Ora, Ka Ako lunch was butter chicken.
“I think we should keep the free lunches because I can’t afford lunches and a lot of other people cannot afford lunches, and they also make my day,” he said.
A healthy, reliable meal each day created an immediate uplift in energy levels, happiness and willingness to learn at schools like Chisnallwood, said relief teacher Miko Franzmayr. Removing the plan would be a “gross failure [for] our kids”, he said.
“Parents are having to make hard decisions on what to prioritise – is it food, is it medicine, is it seeing the doctor, is it new clothes ... to take this way further destabilises our most vulnerable.”
Chisnallwood principal Justin Fields said having the meals had not only created “alert and productive” students but improved attendance, as parents ensured
their children got free nutrition. Fields questioned whether cutting the scheme would align with the Government’s education priorities. “It’s also part of the wider hauora wellbeing for the kids around your pastoral service, providing kai as well as other services for kids, making them feel wanted.”
Sport Canterbury, which works with 86 primary schools around health, physical activity and nutrition, was also sceptical that cutting the programme would be beneficial.
“We work with a large number of schools who have benefited from Ka Ora, Ka Ako and we’d struggle to find a school that hasn’t seen a demonstrable positive shift in the overall wellbeing and, in turn, learning of their tamariki,” said healthy active learning regional lead Dean Roulston.
Save the Children New Zealand has called for continued investment in the “crucial policy”, while Health Coalition New Zealand wants the programme doubled. “This is a case of much-needed Government investment that directly benefits the far too many children in Aotearoa going to school hungry, yet expected to learn,” said Save the Children advocacy director Jacqui Southey.
“The Government must shift their perception from cost cutting to investment in positive child outcomes.”
Health Coalition Aotearoa pointed to the latest data from the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment, which showed students who missed meals just once a week scored significantly lower than their peers who never went hungry. Health Coalition Aotearoa co-chairperson Professor Boyd Swinburn told RNZ on Tuesday the organisation was seeking a meeting with Seymour to try to secure the programme’s future.
ACT leader Seymour justified the potential cuts with a Treasury report from 2023 that found as many as 10,000 lunches a day were left over – about 12% of those provided to 995 schools.
However, at that time of the report, then-Education Minister Jan Tinetti said most of the leftovers were sent home with children – as is the case at Chisnallwood.