School meals to increase by 15 pence

In addition to this, a further rise of 15 pence will be proposed in November. To promote local sustainability the school meals service is promoting the use of regional ingredients. Low quality high processed food is off the menu and has been replaced with high quality home cooked menus. The meals are proving to be an extremely valuable contribution to improving the health and wellbeing of pupils across Derby. There's currently a 39% uptake in school meals - an increase of 2.5% last year. The cost of providing a healthy school meal has risen by 19%. This has led the School Meals Service to run at a substantial loss with the service estimated to lose £358,000 in 2008/09. Mike Carr, council member for Direct and Internal Service, explained: "It's regrettable to have to increase the cost to parents but we think the rise is reasonable and we hope that parents will see the benefits of continuing to provide their children with high quality and affordable meals that have been made from regional ingredients and with high nutritional value."