New library of historic children's food policies chronicles heyday of welfare state

 New library of historic children’s food policies chronicles heyday of the welfare state

A unique new resource launched today by The Food Foundation offers journalists, campaigners and researchers a comprehensive library of historical changes in government legislation and attitudes to childhood nutrition and poverty going back to the 19th century. 

The library, which is the only database of its kind, has been funded by the Nuffield Foundation, and is a catalogue of all the key initiatives aimed at improving children’s nutrition since 1879. 

It brings together numerous acts of parliament, policy documents, research studies and other materials to catalogue more than 180 key policy developments and will be freely available to anyone who wants to access it.  

It provides a stark record of how Britain’s current generation of older adults benefitted from an unprecedented wartime and post-war drive to improve childhood nutrition regardless of social class and income. 

Initiatives triggered by the Second World War included much more expansive provision of Free School Meals as well as free school milk. In the late 1940s, both Free School Meals and school milk were made available to all school children. 

The Welfare Food Scheme which was introduced in 1940 also distributed milk and other nutritious foods such as free cod liver oil and orange juice to all children aged under five. 

Universal provision of the free school milk scheme continued until 1968, and the Welfare Food Scheme remained available for all until the 1960s. 

The library also documents more recent initiatives including the reintroduction of school cookery classes in 2014, the advent of the Holiday Activities and Food Programme to support low-income children in accessing nutritious food during the school holidays, and the introduction of the School Fruit and Vegetable Scheme which provides free fruit and vegetable snacks. 

Despite these developments, the new database shows an overall trend towards more piecemeal nutritional support for more recent generations of children from both Conservative and Labour governments, with the loss of all of the universal nutritional schemes which existed in the 1940s and 1950s. 

The Children’s Food Policy Library will sit alongside the Food Foundation's Children’s Right2Food Dashboard which provides a comprehensive picture of data indicators on children’s food including eligibility and uptake of Government schemes such as Free School Meals, what children eat, and the impact of diets on health diet-related health outcomes. It includes trends over time, as well as showing how children’s health is linked to regional location, social deprivation and ethnic group. This dashboard is similarly available to any journalist or researcher. 

Anna Taylor, Executive Director of The Food Foundation, said: "This new library shows the evolution of children's food policies and casts new light on today’s policy decisions.

"For example, it shows that Free School Meals were first introduced when we realised that poor nutrition in childhood meant that our soldiers didn't have the physical strength to fight in the Boer war.

"It shows that in 1949 and in 1986 free school meals were cut back so that many of today's older adults who benefited from Free School Meals as children would no longer be eligible now.

"Poor nutrition in childhood has once again become a national priority - with unhealthy weight and poor diets affecting more than one in three 11-year-olds.

"It's time to rethink whether we have the right policies in place and urgently extend free school meals to prevent the long-term impact of the cost-of-living crisis on children's health."

A spokesman for the Nuffield Foundation said: "This new resource provides an extremely valuable window on the past and the progressive decisions that contributed to better health for previous generations.

"We are pleased to have funded it as part of the Food Foundation’s work to extend the evidence base for the important contribution government policy can make to children’s health and well-being."

Food Foundation Young Food Ambassador Mirzan Kama, 16, from Hendon, North London, who is studying for his GCSEs, said: "It’s amazing to see all that these policies have achieved, but we still need political parties to back the schemes and new policies to improve childhood nutrition.

"As a Young Conservative, I believe there are many things that my party could put in place to help to ensure the policies are just as comprehensive as the ones in the past."

About the report:
This is the first comprehensive Children's Food Policy Library of its kind and is intended to offer a unique, easy to access historical record which will be freely available to anyone who wishes to use it. The Food Foundation is grateful to the Nuffield Foundation for providing the resources to make this initiative possible.

NOTES TO EDITOR
Please contact:     
Lois Rogers - The Food Foundation - 0203 576 1045 or lois.rogers@foodfoundation.org.uk 

About the Nuffield Foundation:
The Nuffield Foundation is an independent charitable trust with a mission to advance social well-being. It funds research that informs social policy, primarily in Education, Welfare, and Justice. It also funds student programmes that provide opportunities for young people to develop skills in quantitative and scientific methods. The Nuffield Foundation is the founder and co-funder of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, the Ada Lovelace Institute and the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory. The Foundation has funded this project, but the views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily the Foundation. Visit www.nuffieldfoundation.org

About the Food Foundation
The Food Foundation is a charity working to influence food policy and business practice, shaping a sustainable food system which makes healthy diets affordable and accessible for all. We work in partnership with researchers, campaigners, community bodies, industry, investors, government and citizens to galvanise the UK’s diverse agents of change, using surprising and inventive ideas to drive fundamental shifts in our food system. These efforts are based on the continual re-evaluation of opportunities for action, building and synthesising strong evidence, convening powerful coalitions, harnessing citizens’ voices and delivering impactful communications.        
Registered Charity Number 1187611    

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