All Bedford school meals will be "hot, delicious, nutritious", urges council

On Monday night (September 2) the Children’s Services Overview and Scrutiny Committee was told that Bedford Borough Council historically offered schools an opportunity to buy back a managed school meal service through council commissioned contracts.

But Chris Morris, chief officer for education, SEND and schools infrastructure, said the number of schools taking part in the scheme was reducing, therefore so were the benefits available within the contract.

He said: “The 25 schools that were part of the contract were then supported to go and seek their own way of providing school meals. 17 of those schools have successfully procured their own arrangements for September 2024.”

The council will use a 12-months contract extension period to support the remaining eight schools to successfully procure their own solutions for 2025/26.

A report to the committee said there are plans in place for each affected school, however this involves capital works to create an additional production kitchen.

So there was “insufficient time” to implement plans for the 2024/2025 academic year, hence the extension to the existing contract.

Mr Morris added: “Children who are entitled to their free school meals will be getting free school meals. I am pleased to say that here we are on September 2 and all those schools who are part of the contract are ready to go. And will be serving hot, delicious, nutritious meals from this week.”