Kim Johnson

Kim Johnson

Labour — Liverpool Riverside

Speaking in the House of Commons on 11 June 2025

Debate

Child Poverty and No Recourse to Public Funds

Contribution

I appreciate my hon. Friend taking my intervention, and the things that he just mentioned are great. In London, Scotland and Wales, there are universal free school meals. However, schoolchildren from my constituency sent postcards to the Prime Minister last year, asking, “If you have them in London, why can’t we have them in Liverpool?” Breakfast clubs are great. I have one of the poorest constituencies in the country. One school in my constituency has free breakfast clubs, and the only reason why it can do that is that it has been doing it for a long time. Setting up a breakfast club is a problem for a lot of schools; it costs money, time and effort, in terms of changing school rotas. So although breakfast clubs are great, we need to go further. We need to be big and bold. The Sure Start programme was big and bold, and we need to do something similar.

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