South Shields MP visits The Beacon Centre to see their breakfast club provision

Shields Gazette

Emma Lewell, South Shields MP, Lindsey MacDonald, chief executive of Magic Breakfast, and Kelly Hudson, senior manager at The Beacon Centre all speak about the school's breakfast club provision.

Transcript

00:00Magic Breakfast is a charity we've operated for over 20 years and on a given day we provide

00:06breakfast to about 330,000 children and young people across England and Scotland. The reason

00:12why we exist is because this morning about one in five children walking through the school gates

00:16are at risk of being too hungry to learn and the learning that's lost because of that is just

00:21you know an absolute outrage and we are able to provide the support through charitable funds

00:27and support several schools up in the northeast and ensure that children get the right and best

00:34possible start to their day. Magic Breakfast provides a range of food items we call it our

00:39magic menu so everything from bagels to cereal, porridge, baked beans and we also provide schools

00:45with the advice and support that they need to optimise and deliver a stigma and barrier-free

00:50breakfast. We know that schools have so many things that they need to think about on a daily basis

00:54and so we're able to hopefully take some of the burden of organising and planning off their plates

01:00quite literally and help them to think about portion sizes, making sure the school is

01:05healthy, nutritious, complies with school food standards and as I say importantly means that

01:10it's not stigma or barrier kind of creating for families and children so it's always free

01:16and it's delivered in ways that work for the local schools. So I've been wearing my magic

01:20breakfast for as long as I can remember now and they were strong supporters of my school breakfast

01:25bill way back in 2021 and at that point we had over two million children in the country

01:33going to school hungry without a breakfast. The previous government's school breakfast programme

01:37missed around 86% of those children. Magic Breakfast have filled that gap consistently

01:44and through campaigning we've managed to get the government to roll out school breakfast

01:50later this year but people will have seen that I tried to get the government to even strengthen

01:55that further recently in the children and schools well-being bill because I think we need all kinds

02:01of models of breakfast provision because not all children fit one mould so Magic Breakfast can

02:06provide you know that variety and that kind of well for example the school we're in today

02:12you know not all children in this school or primary school age in the current school breakfast

02:18provision that the government's proposing to roll out is all for primary schools

02:22so we don't want SEND schools or PRU schools missing out on that school breakfast provision

02:29as well so we're always going to need that extra support from Magic Breakfast and other organisations

02:34so I'm just really pleased that the government have listened they're rolling this out but I think

02:38there's always room for improvement and I'll never stop until every single child that wants a school

02:43breakfast gets one regardless of their age and regardless of their geography. So what happens

02:47on the morning here the students all come in at the dining hall we'll have also provisions in

02:51classrooms for other students because sometimes it's a bit noisy in there so we like to have

02:55different classrooms the breakfast available staff sit with the students it's the first

03:00soft landing on the morning we check in with them check that there's been any issues any breakfast

03:06is available sometimes the students help each other making it and then we'll do on a night time

03:11on an after school club we make the overnight oats so that's prepped for them so on the morning

03:16they come in they know that's there so when they come in and they will chat they'll chat the staff

03:21they'll chat students because we know sometimes there's issues that happen outside of school

03:25so this on a morning they can get everything off the chest before they go into the classroom and

03:29deal with any issues but we'll also pick up if there's any issues that staff need that action

03:34or just reach throughout the child before they're going to learn.

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