A growing number of financially vulnerable families are struggling with the increasing costs of food, leading to more children going to school with empty stomachs, according to Save the Children, the Red Cross, the Renters’ Association and Majblomman. In response, the four organisations have demanded a range of political measures, including mandatory school breakfasts, free public transport, increased child allowance and reformed housing allowances. The Red Cross Youth Association, which operates breakfast clubs in areas with weak financial profiles, has reported an increasing demand for support. The four groups have also presented an opinion poll showing that families are under financial pressure, with single parents and those on low incomes worst affected. A recent seminar on child poverty organised by the groups saw MPs from a range of parties respond to demands that school breakfasts be made compulsory.
The fact that some children are forced to go to school with rumbling stomachs has already been noticed before. But the rampant inflation and increasingly expensive food have increased the pressure on financially vulnerable families with the result that more and more children are now affected, according to the Red Cross, Save the Children, Majblomman and the Renters’ Association.
The four organizations therefore come together in four demands for politics. In addition to compulsory school breakfast, they demand a reformed housing allowance, increased child allowance and free public transport.
Can concentrate
The Red Cross Youth Association, which is also behind the demands, has been running breakfast clubs at schools in areas with high unemployment and many children in households with weak finances for ten years.
This means that volunteers hand out sandwiches to children and young people once a week. In Gothenburg, they offer cheese rolls at the Sjumilaskolan in northern Biskopsgården every Wednesday.
According to Lotta Schneider, chairman of the youth association, the needs are increasing. From the country’s breakfast clubs, volunteers report sandwiches being eaten in no time and children making sure to arrive at school a quarter of an hour before the distribution starts, to be sure to get breakfast before it runs out. It is usually the same child who appears.
Making it compulsory for everyone to have breakfast, as the school lunch has been since the 1940s, would be a good way to even out differences between children and their opportunities to assimilate the teaching, she believes.
– The students themselves say that they find it easier to concentrate if they have eaten breakfast and the teachers think that it is calmer in the classrooms.
The Red Cross, Save the Children, Majblomman and the Renters’ Association demand that free breakfast be made compulsory at school. The organizations see an increasing need for support for financially vulnerable families.
At the same time, Lotta Schneider emphasizes that the needs are significantly greater than what the voluntary organizations can handle. Her association receives many requests from schools that want the breakfast club to come there, but the number of volunteers is not enough.
– It shows the importance of schools and municipalities taking their responsibility and ensuring that there is free breakfast every day.
Worst for single people
This week, the organizations also presented an opinion poll showing that many families are under severe financial pressure, the worst being for single people with children. They also arranged a seminar on child poverty, where politicians from the parties in the Riksdag were invited, among others.
On the stage at Kulturhuset in Stockholm, the politicians had to answer questions about how they stand up to the organizations’ demands. The Social Democrats, the Left Party and the Green Party said yes to making school breakfast compulsory in Sweden. The Moderates, the Sweden Democrats and the Liberals did not want to vote, while the Center Party and the Christian Democrats said no.
Politicians from the Riksdag’s eight parties participated in a seminar on child poverty on Wednesday. This is what some of them said there:
Camilla Waltersson Grönvall (M), Minister of Social Services:
– As a teacher, I know how important it is to get through the school day with food in your stomach and what the school day looks like if you don’t have it. So this is an important issue, but this is a municipal responsibility. What we can do is ensure that there is general money.
Magdalena Andersson (S), party leader:
– We have introduced this in several of the municipalities where we govern. But in order for municipal politicians to be able to do this, it is based on receiving enough state subsidies from the government in the budget, and that was not the case this year.
Christian Carlsson (KD), Member of Parliament:
– No, I don’t think it should be compulsory to have school breakfast. There are schools that do this today and they should be allowed to do that, but the children who live in economic vulnerability are affected in different ways. Then I want the school’s resources to go to things like extended homework help, smaller teaching groups and student health, for example.
Märta Stenevi (MP), spokesperson:
– We talk about turning over all stones, but we have not turned over a single stone that is sufficient when it comes to child poverty. Now we can’t even agree that it would be quite good if it were a requirement that all children actually have food in their stomachs when they come to school in the morning.
READ ALSO: Parents take out loans – to buy food and winter clothes
READ ALSO: Inflation makes school children eat more: “Parents want them to eat breakfast at school”
READ ALSO: Inflation forces new groups to seek help
Do you want to know more about how GP works with quality journalism? Read our ethical rules here.