DD2655 Universal Free School Meals: Monitoring meal uptake and policy impacts

1.1.    The Mayor of London believes that all primary school children in state funded schools should have access to a free school meal. In February 2023, the Mayor announced an historic £135m emergency, one-off funding plan to help families with the spiralling cost of living by ensuring that every primary schoolchild in a state funded school across London will receive free school meals in the next academic year. MD3103 approved the Mayoral budget for 2023-24, which included £130m for the Universal Free School Meals (UFSM) programme.
1.2.    The cost-of-living crisis means families and children across London are in desperate need of additional support. This funding will help up to 287,000 primary school children in state funded schools in the capital receive free school meals and save families around £440 across the year. This policy will ensure parents are not worrying about how they are going to feed their children during the school day. 
1.3.    This emergency funding is for one academic year only – the 2023-24 academic year (which spans two financial years). By funding a one-off scheme, the Mayor will directly impact thousands of children this year.
1.4.    MD3146 approved the expenditure of up to £100,000 (outlined in Decision 4 of MD3146) to conduct monitoring and evaluation of the UFSM project. The programme objectives for the monitoring approach can be found in section 2 below. 

1.5.    Monitoring impact and insight via primary research will be gathered across a range of key audiences including head teachers, parents and pupils. Insight will be valuable in demonstrating the impact of the policy in the early stages of the implementation, provide an opportunity to identify challenges and best practice and demonstrate listening. Early insight will be provided to the Mayor’s Office and will inform communications throughout the year. Ongoing monitoring and evaluation will inform future policy decisions and lessons learnt. 

1.6.    Both strands will be informed by the UFSM Equality Impact Assessment (EqIA) (see Appendix A); Theory of Change (see Appendix B) and the Integrated Impact Assessment (IIA) due to be published on the GLA website in September/October 2023. This work will draw on the EqIA through analysing differences in religion, socioeconomic status or children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). The Theory of Change identified four impact areas: household financial circumstances; child and family mental health and wellbeing; child and family physical health; and educational attainment. Research will draw on this Theory of Change model. The GLA monitoring will also connect with partner evaluations led by Impact on Urban Health and Education Endowment Foundation. Together all three pieces will complete the monitoring and evaluation for the Mayor’s UFSM programme.
 

2.1.    Up to £100,000 has been allocated for the UFSM programme evaluation, the primary objectives of which are to: 
•    understand within the 2023-24 academic year, both the quantitative and qualitative impact of the Mayor’s UFSM scheme, with a focus on cost of living
•    determine the extent to which the guiding principles & grant conditions for the policy were adhered to during implementation
•    understand the experience of pupils with protected characteristics 
•    inform ongoing communications with boroughs, schools and parents
•    collaborate with and complement wider partner-led evaluation approaches.

Monitoring impact and insight  
2.2.    GLA led primary research will be informed by the Theory of Change model which identified the potential impacts of the policy (see Appendix B) developed in May 2023; the EqIA (Appendix A) and the IIA which is due to be published on the GLA website in September 2023. 
2.3.    GLA led primary research will provide early impacts during implementation and inform communications and messaging. Gathering insight from head teachers, parents and pupils will address the following objectives: 
•    collect ongoing evidence to understand the successes and potential challenges of the policy
•    understand differences in groups identified in the EqIA e.g. faith schools, children with a religion or a belief, ethnicity and SEND
•    gain early insight on implementation to inform best practice and help identify opportunities to support schools
•    identify unintended benefits and build the wider story
•    ensure policy review and refinement is informed by schools and families.
2.4.    Research would be collected through a variety of methods including interviews with headteachers, parent polling, and qualitative research conducted with parents. This work would be led by the GLA’s Opinion Research team. 
2.5.    Research will produce a number of outputs, including:
•    identified potential policy impacts on beneficiaries over the year, highlighting differences in subgroups (pupils with protected characteristics)
•    policy insight to share with partners and boroughs in the form of testimonials, case studies or quotes
•    key London-specific statistics e.g. family finances, food choices, improvement to mental health and all other unintended benefits
•    insight that can be built into communications to share learning
•    examples of children and parents’ voices and reactions to the policy
•    Lessons learned to inform future policy direction.
 

3.1.    Section 149(1) of the Equality Act 2010 provides that, in the exercise of their functions, public authorities – of whom the Mayor is one – must have due regard to the need to: 
•    eliminate discrimination, harassment, victimisation and any other conduct that is prohibited by or under the Equality Act 2010 
•    advance equality of opportunity between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic and persons who do not share it 
•    foster good relations between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic and persons who do not share it. 
3.2.    Relevant protected characteristics are age, disability, gender re-assignment, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex and sexual orientation. 
3.3.    The Mayor’s Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Strategy sets out how the Mayor will help address the inequalities, barriers and discrimination experienced by groups protected by the Equality Act 2010. In this strategy the Mayor of London has gone beyond these legal duties; and contributed to addressing wider issues such as poverty and socio-economic inequality, as well as the challenges and disadvantage facing different groups in London including young people.  
3.4.    By ensuring all children who are living on the poverty line have a nutritious meal once a day during term time the scheme will work towards tackling the underlying determinants of ill health – including food poverty and cost of living. While this scheme could lead to wider benefits relating to the improvement of the health and educational outcomes of children, it is fundamentally framed as an emergency cost of living intervention. This will complement the Mayor of London's funding for Holiday Hunger .  
3.5.    In London, more than 2.3m Londoners live below the poverty line and 33 per cent of adults have skipped meals to save money so that their children can eat. 13 per cent of Londoners say they have been unable to buy food and other essential items in the last six months or have had to rely on outside support such as food banks. This policy seeks to improve this, with evaluation processes embedded to understand impact.  
3.6.    The monitoring approach is being informed by an IIA which will be published on the GLA website in September/October 2023. The EqIA has been completed and recommends that monitoring is undertaken during the first year of the policy to understand the number of children; difference across children with a religion or a belief or SEND and take up of UFSM (Appendix A).
 

4.1.    Key risks and issues 

Links to Mayoral strategies and priorities
4.2.    This programme links to the Mayor’s delivery of the Robust Safety Net Recovery Mission, which aims to ensure that, by 2025, all Londoners can access the support they need to avoid and alleviate financial hardship. Provision of FSM through this programme will ensure children have at least one meal a day and reduce financial burden on parents. 
4.3.    It also contributes to the delivery of the Healthy Place, Healthy Weight Recovery Mission which aims to ensure that, by 2025, all London’s families find it easier to eat healthy food and be active where they live, learn, shop, work and play. This programme provides an opportunity to promote whole school approaches to supporting the health of London’s families through a set of agreed grant principles and engagement with boroughs and schools. 
4.4.    The programme will also promote best practice in relation to food waste, transportation and share procurement practices, to facilitate tackling the climate emergency where possible. 
4.5.    Primarily this programme seeks to reduce the impact of the cost-of-living crisis on low-income families, which is a priority under the Getting London Back on its feet Mayoral priority.
4.6.    Evidence suggests that the provision of FSM has a positive impact on children’s physical and mental health. Both of which are priorities within the Mayor’s Health Inequalities strategy and the partnership Vision for London’s Health and Care. The learning from this one-year programme has the potential to inform an additional role out of free school meal provision which would help work towards the Mayor’s goal of London becoming the world’s healthiest and fairest city. 
4.7.    There are no conflicts of interest to note for any of the officers involved in the drafting or clearance of this decision.
 

5.1.    Approval is sought for the expenditure of up to £100,000 to conduct primary research into the impact of the UFSM programme.
5.2.    MD3146 (see Decision 4 of MD3146) approves the expenditure of up to £100,000 to conduct monitoring and evaluation of the UFSM project with details to be provided under a DD.

5.3.    This expenditure of £100,000 would be funded from the 2023-24 UFSM programme budget. 
 

Power to undertake the requested decisions
6.1.    The foregoing sections of this report indicate that the decisions requested of the Executive Director of Communities and Skills (the “Director”) concern the exercise of the GLA’s general powers and fall within the GLA’s statutory power to do such things considered to further or which are facilitative of, conducive or incidental to the promotion of social development within Greater London and in formulating the proposals in respect of which a decision is sought officers have complied with the GLA’s related statutory duties to:
•    pay due regard to the principle that there should be equality of opportunity for all people
•    consider how the proposals will promote the improvement of health of persons, health inequalities between persons and to contribute towards the achievement of sustainable development in the United Kingdom
•    consult with appropriate bodies.    
6.2.    In taking the decisions requested, the Director must have due regard to the equality objectives under the Public Sector Equality Duty; namely the need to eliminate discrimination, harassment, victimisation and any other conduct prohibited by the Equality Act 2010, and to advance equality of opportunity between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic (age; disability; gender reassignment; marriage and civil partnership; pregnancy and maternity; race; religion or belief; sex; sexual orientation) and persons who do not share it and foster good relations between persons who share a relevant protected characteristic and persons who do not share it (section 149 of the Equality Act 2010). To this end, the Director should have particular regard to section 3 (above) of this report.
Procurement
6.3.    The decision, above, seeks approval to procure monitoring services and qualitative research.  Officers are reminded to comply with the requirements of the GLA’s Contracts and Funding Code when undertaking the procurements.  Officers are reminded also to enter into appropriate agreements with the relevant service providers, before the relevant services commence.
 

7.1.    Direct award of £100,000 for Monitoring impact: Primary research.

Appendix A - UFSM EqIA 
Appendix B - UFSM Theory of Change