Listen to someone who received free meals Offering hope and prayers for the future

A vital imperative and concern for the council is the ongoing education and learning for all children.

The necessity of lockdown measures has required a return to online learning and teaching for the majority of children.

Over the last few weeks, I have been attending online lessons and meetings with teachers from our schools across the Royal Borough.

I have been super impressed with the agility and flexibility of all our schools to roll with the situation and the remarkable professionalism, dedication and commitment of all teachers and staff. A massive thank you.

We as a local authority will continue to support all schools with planning, delivery and future risk assessments.

I will also be writing to the Education Secretary with a list of requests to better enable future planning and delivery.

On vulnerable children, every child remains a critical priority and our excellent education officers have worked with every school to ensure every child is accounted for.

This includes free school meals and using the winter support scheme.

Thus, I want to correct some unacceptable misinformation presented in a Liberal Democrat leaflet. It claims it is

‘campaigning to end child hunger’ and ‘1,351 children in the borough need our help’. There is then a link to a politically charged petition.

These claims are deeply misleading and I wish to set the record straight.

As a Conservative administration and as the responsible cabinet member, we have deliberately implemented a continuation of our policy to help all vulnerable children.

In RBWM, schools and their catering companies have worked hard to respond to the national lockdown by providing food or vouchers for families who benefit from free school meals.

We as a council have provided an option for free school meal vouchers since the start of this lockdown and continue to provide it for schools who need it.

We have planned to ensure that free school meal support continues in the February half term through the provision of vouchers.

This is further to my original support for free school meals and the council’s decision to underwrite any vouchers given by schools prior to the Government change of policy; a policy I campaigned to change.

Rather than sign some political and pointless petition, I urge anyone concerned to please contact me on cllr.carroll@rbwm. gov.uk

Children must never become a political football.

As someone who used to receive free school meals for a portion of my childhood and having discussed with my parents, I can assure this political game playing is offensive and terribly ill-judged.

The decision to send such a leaflet is beyond egregious.

Not only is most of its content incorrect, hyperbolic and vacuous, but it conveys a complete lack of compassion and ethics.

Ed Davey and his colleagues have got this horribly wrong and sadly will have to account for these crass and cack-handed decisions.

We have sadly seen the local opposition employ these tactics before as I know all too well personally.

This is the time for unity regardless of political temptation and desire. I wish to thank some of the independent group with whom I continue to work constructively with.

Every single bit of our focus should be directed on getting through this pandemic and coming together. Politics can wait.

Cllr STUART CARROLL Lead member adult social care, children’s services, health and mental

health

There was a period last summer when ‘the new normal’ came into being and it was possible, within limits, to socialise with care.

Some of the best times were getting together with family and friends or neighbours for a good catch up and a meal together, sometimes outside in a back garden or in a bar or restaurant.

Those happy memories are really something to treasure as we work our way through the current difficulties.

Prior to the pandemic, there was a wellestablished system of providing meals for local people in our community, including the homeless.

Not only did these deliver excellent nourishment, but they also enabled the socialising that is so important for our mental well-being.

Of course, the meals had to stop when coronavirus raised its head and it is doubtful whether any of them will be able to re-start for some time.

For our part, despite some initial hopes that things might be OK, we had to cancel the annual Christmas Day Lunch at SportsAble in Maidenhead for people who would otherwise have been alone and we decided to deliver Christmas hampers instead.

We know the hampers were well received and my sincere thanks go to the team of wonderful people who made this happen and the organisations that supported us financially and in other ways including The Louis Baylis Trust (Maidenhead Advertiser) along with Copas Traditional Turkeys, The Cherry Pickers (formerly Kaffirs) of Cookham Dean, Waitrose Maidenhead Community Matters, The Lions Club of Maidenhead, The Rotary Club of Maidenhead Thames and last, but not least, The Fabulous Shirtlifters.

We thank them all very warmly for their vital support and wish them well.

It is hard to know when we might get back to the kind of normality that we used to take for granted, or when the social gatherings for those in our community that need help and support may be reinstated.

However the various vaccines give great cause for hope and we keep our fingers crossed for steady improvement and an exit from the restrictions that prevent us from meeting up in the ways we used to do.

Let’s hope and pray that we won't have too long to wait.

TONY WEEKS On behalf of the Christmas Lunch Team

at Churches Together in Maidenhead