More than 20 local businesses in Lincolnshire have come together to provide free meals over the October half-term for the region’s 22,000 children who are entitled to free school lunches during term time.
This comes after 320 Tory MPs voted against providing free meals to children during the holidays in a controversial parliamentary vote last week.
A national #EndChildFoodPoverty campaign, fronted by the Manchester United football player Marcus Rashford, has prompted businesses around the country to offer free meals to school children from low income families for the week that they are not in school.
The Lincoln fish and chip shop, Elite on the Bail is one of many of Lincolnshire’s food shops taking part in the campaign to feed school children up to the age of 16.
Russell Kelly, the businesses manager, said: “We’ve seen the MPs voting against it and we were just talking about it in general saying, ‘how can anybody vote against giving a child a free meal?’”
Elite on the Bail usually offer children’s meals for £6, but this cost will be waived when children visit the restaurant from 11:30am to 6pm from Tuesday, October 27 – 30.
Mr Kelly said: “We never thought it would get the attention on social media it did. The support it’s gained is fantastic, Marcus even retweeted it on his own twitter.”
The City of Lincoln Council is also offering help in the community by providing £10,000 worth of support, mainly with food vouchers to be used exclusively in Co-operative stores around the region.
Councillor Rosanne Kirk, the Council’s Portfolio Holder for Reducing Inequality said: “No child, or adult, should have to go hungry, and the city council has worked at speed to create a way to provide potential hungry children with fresh food during this half term.”