MORE than 100,000 children in Wales are living below the poverty line.
New analysis from Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG) found that more than half of those children were not entitled to free school meals.
Of the 129,000 school-age children living below the poverty line in Wales, more than 70,000 are not eligible, mainly because their parents are in jobs which, while low-paid, still take them over the eligibility threshold.
In addition, nearly 6,000 children in Wales are not normally eligible because their families have no recourse to public funds.
CPAG is calling for urgent action to extend eligibility for free school meals to all families receiving Universal Credit.
Expanding eligibility would help struggling families to cope, improve educational outcomes and tackle in-work poverty, they say.
Families on universal credit are eligible for free school meals if their family income is below £7,400.
When families reach a certain number of working hours (17 hours a week at the national minimum wage) they lose their eligibility.
So families can end up worse off if their earnings increase, as they lose out on free school meals worth over £400 per child per year.
Missing out on free school meals also means missing out on other benefits such as the Pupil Development Grant - Access (PDG-A) which helps families buy school uniform, equipment and sports kit (worth up to £125 a year, and £200 for Year 7 learners).
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The charity wants universal provision of free school meals for all pupils, which would cost £130 million per year.
In the interim they are calling for the Welsh Government to expand eligibility for free school meals to include all families receiving universal credit. CPAG estimates this would make 145,000 children in Wales newly eligible and would cost £60 million a year.
The want to extend free school meals entitlements to families with no recourse to public funds. This was introduced on a temporary basis during school closures.
Alison Garnham, chief executive of Child Poverty Action Group, said: “It’s not right that in a classroom of 25 pupils in Wales, seven children are living in poverty, and four of them are not even eligible for free school meals.
"School should be a happy and inclusive experience for all pupils, but worrying about the cost of eating at school can put a great strain on children and families.
"It can cause children to experience shame and stigma, and put additional pressure on parents already struggling to pay their bills or rent on precarious incomes.
"The financial impact of the pandemic has hit low-income families particularly hard.
"Providing free school meals is an effective way for the Welsh Government to help hard-up families cope with the financial pressures they are facing.
"Now is the time to support families with children and give them one less thing to worry about by introducing universal provision of free school meals, or at a minimum, ensuring provision of free school meals to all families on Universal Credit or with no recourse to public funds.”
The Welsh Government last week guaranteed free school meal provision for all school holidays up to and including Easter 2021.
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