news analysis - school meals
WORKERS, NOVEMBER 2003 ISSUE
IF YOU can't kick a dog, kick a school meals worker. School meals are often criticised for being of poor quality, made on the cheap for profit. Much of the criticism is ill informed, like that of the Soil Association, whose spokesman recently compared the cost of a school meal with a prison meal (adults' portions!) Hardly comparing like with like.
In fact the quality of school meals, certainly for children of primary school age, is closely regulated. Nutrition standards have to meet government guidelines, which mean that chips can only be served once a week, for example. Safety standards, while set locally, have to be met by temperature control and sampling.
Price
The price of the meals is laid down by local councils, and varies, somewhere around the £1.50 mark in Southeast England, for example. Where the service has been contracted out, it is not subsidised, contrary to popular belief. Instead it has to provide a profit both for the local council and for the contractor. This is not actually a business in which it is easy to make a quick buck. How many cafes or restaurants can turn out a nutritional meal for less than £1.50?
In addition, within the price constraints and rules on nutrition and safety, the school meals service has to see that the food will attract the young customers. Otherwise the company or in-house service provider may well lose the contract.
Misconception
Another common misconception is that the abysmal pay and conditions endured by the cooks and kitchen assistants have been imposed by private contractors. In fact it mainly happened when councils brought in Compulsory Competitive Tendering during the Thatcher era.
CCT was in theory supposed to get rid of unnecessary middle management, but councils often found it easier to attack the frontline workforce, by abolishing their National Joint Council pay and conditions. This was often done in the name of keeping the service in-house, against some real or imagined cheap bid by some "demon" private contractor.
There is no doubt that school meals staffs, far more than those they feed, have a raw deal. Although most of them are driven by their own version of the so-called public service ethic to do a good job despite poverty wages, they are hardly recognised as public service workers. Within the unions they are largely ignored, though many are members, and most have to negotiate local agreements on pay.
When strikes by any of the teaching or local govern-ment unions affect schools, as in the recent London weighting strike, they are locked out and lose their little pay without benefiting from any gains which might be won. This, plus the infantile poaching activities of the unions involved in local government, could be a recipe for anti-unionism among these workers. It is time to stop ignoring, or merely wooing, the school meals service. Have a little respect.