(iv) There remains the only logical conclusion, the provision of a meal for all school children, as part of the school curriculum. Such a provision need not necessarily be compulsory, though it should be so in all cases where the School Doctor recommends it. From every point of view, the psychological, the medical and the educational, the advantages to be gained from such a course would be enormous. General provision for all would do away with all pauperising discrimination between the necessitous and the non-necessitous. On the medical side it would be difficult to over-estimate the benefits to be secured. On this point the Chief Medical Officer of the Board of Education has recently pronounced in no measured terms. "From a purely scientific point of view," he declared, "if there was one thing he was allowed to do for the six million children, if he wanted to rear an imperial race, it would be to feed them.... The great, urgent, pressing need was nutrition. With that they could get better brains and a better race."[[539]] The beneficial results already observed in the case of children who have received a regular course of school meals would be extended to all. Then, again, the common meal would serve as an opportunity for the exercise of many little acts of consideration for one another. The teachers would be brought into more intimate relations with the children, for they get to know the children better at meal time than in any other way. The school meal would serve as an object lesson; taken in conjunction with the teaching of housewifery and cookery in the schools, it would speedily raise the standard in the homes. There would be another advantage. Adequate rest after the meal could be insisted on, followed by healthy play in the open air in the playground instead of in stuffy rooms and backyards. In the rural districts, as we have already shown, it is imperative that dinner should be provided for all who want to stay. Numbers of children are unable to return home, and it is almost impossible for the parents to provide suitable cold food for them to take with them; even when they can go home to dinner they frequently have a long walk, with the consequence that the meal must be eaten hastily and the children hurry back to school immediately afterwards.
If general provision is made, ought the parents to be required to pay or should the meal be free to all? The first plan has much to recommend it and has been advocated in many quarters. At the recent conference at the Guildhall on School Feeding, for instance, there appeared to be a general agreement in favour of this course. The experience of the Special Schools for Defective Children, and some of the rural schools, where a midday meal or hot cocoa is provided, shows that numbers of parents are able to pay, and there does not appear to be much difficulty in collecting the payment.[[540]] And in the ordinary elementary schools, where little provision is made for paying cases, it would appear that there does exist a certain demand for such provision.[[541]] On the other hand, it must be admitted that it is a question whether any large number of parents would voluntarily pay for their children's meals when it was known that provision was made for all and that other children were receiving the meal free. The payment would have to be left to the parent's conscience, for any attempt to try to decide in which cases payment should be insisted on and in which it should be remitted would introduce again the evils of the present system, with its demoralising enquiry into the parents' circumstances—though in a somewhat mitigated form, since no distinction would be made between the paying and the non-paying children, and the latter would not be marked off as a separate class as at present. Another difficulty, though a minor one, would arise in the fixing of the price to be charged. In the more prosperous districts the dinner might be self-supporting, but in the poorest localities it would hardly be possible to charge an amount sufficient to cover the cost of the food.
The provision of a free meal for all would obviate these difficulties. It will be objected at once that such a plan will undermine parental responsibility, but, as we have shown in the previous chapter, communal provision of other services has not had this result. And against this lightening of parental burdens must be set the continual increase of duties which are being placed upon them. A more serious objection lies in the expense. Taking the cost of a school dinner at 2-1/4d. per head,[[542]] the provision of one meal a day for five days a week during term time for all the six million school children in England, Wales and Scotland would cost about £12,500,000. This is, of course, an outside estimate, for it would probably be found that a considerable number of parents would prefer to have their children at home to dinner rather than send them to the school meal; and the provision might be confined to schools in poor districts. To the actual cost of supplying the meals there must be added the initial outlay incurred in providing dining-rooms and appliances.[[543]] On the other hand, there would be a great saving of time and energy which is now consumed in making enquiries. And the provision of school meals would tend to diminish the amount which will otherwise have to be spent in the near future on medical treatment. Food, as Sir George Newman has pointed out, is of more importance than drugs and surgical treatment, and if regular meals were provided there would be much less need for school clinics.[[544]] The expenditure on the provision of school meals would, indeed, be nationally a most profitable investment; it would be amply justified by the improved physique of the rising generation and by the consequent increase in their efficiency. It would be far more productive, in fact, than much of the money which is now spent on education, than the outlay, for instance, on the erection of huge school buildings, an outlay the necessity of which is becoming more and more questionable in the light of the proved superiority of open-air education.
Unfortunately the general provision of a school dinner will not be a complete solution of the problem. There will remain the children for whom one meal a day will not be sufficient, while the discontinuance of the meals during the holidays will cause them serious suffering. Experience has amply shown the necessity of the meals being continued during the holidays and power must be given to the Local Education Authorities to make this provision when it is required. They must also be allowed to provide an additional meal for those children for whom dinner alone is not sufficient. Any proposal to limit the provision to one meal could not, indeed, be seriously entertained, for numbers of Local Authorities are already supplying this extra food and would resist any curtailment of their powers in this respect. But when we come to consider for what children this additional provision shall be made, we are face to face with all the old difficulties of selection. Obviously it cannot be made for all. Perhaps the best method would be to provide for all children who liked to come, whilst attendance should be obligatory on those for whom the School Doctor ordered extra nourishment. Such a prospect would be viewed with alarm by many, but the numbers to be provided for would probably not be excessive, if it was understood that this extra provision was intended only for necessitous or delicate children. It is found that the attendance drops off considerably during the holidays, and that it is always less for a breakfast than for a dinner; it requires more exertion to come in time for breakfast, while the fare provided is not so popular. Probably the danger would be rather on the side of too few children being provided for than too many.
No plan that can be proposed is free from disadvantages. And this brings us back to the point at which we started in this chapter. From the nature of the case, no attempt to deal with effects only, while causes remain untouched, can be wholly satisfactory. Provision must be made for the present generation of school children; their necessities must be relieved and future inefficiency due to underfeeding in childhood must be prevented. But at the same time, and above all, a determined attack must be made on the evils which lie at the root of the children's malnutrition. Industrial conditions must be so organised that it is possible for every man himself to provide for his children at least the requisite minimum of food, clothing and other necessaries.
Summary of Conclusions
1. That, so long as economic conditions remain as they are, the provision of school meals is a necessity.
2. That no method of selection of the children who are to receive the meals can be satisfactory, and that all attempts at picking and choosing should, therefore, be abandoned. The meal should be provided for all children who like to come, without any enquiry into their parents' circumstances. Attendance should be compulsory if recommended by the School Medical Officer.
3. That the meal should be regarded as part of the school curriculum and should be educational. It should be served, as far as practicable, on the school premises, in rooms which are not used as class-rooms; the plan of sending the children to eating-houses or to large centres should be discontinued. Some of the teachers should be present to supervise the children, who should be taught to set the tables and to wait on one another. The meal should be served as attractively as possible.
4. The dietary should be drawn up in consultation with the School Medical Officer, with a view to the physiological requirements of the children, special attention being paid to the infants.