Children in Low Income Families Miss Meals and Can’t Afford Five-A-Day

Children living in low-income homes aren’t getting enough fruit and veg, eating fewer meals and missing breakfast.

According to a poll of 2,000 parents with children aged 4-16 years, 18 per cent of children living in a family earning £10,000 a year or less, had just one piece of fruit and veg a day.

Poor parents are branding the five-a-day campaign unrealistic and struggle further when children are on holiday and are not getting free school meals.

A total of four in ten children in these homes were not always getting three meals a day with more than half saying they often left without eating anything for breakfast.

Children living in homes with a family income of £40,000 or less, managed to eat an average of three portions and those with an even higher income consumed four.

The findings came form a study commissioned by the Mayor’s Fund for London as part of a social campaign to increase food and activity clubs in London.

“All parents want the best for their children, but it seems there are many struggling to give their children the diet they need,” Matthew Patten, Chief Executive of the Mayors Fund for London said:

“There are 220,000 London children entitled to free school meals during term time, but there is nothing to help ensure they receive nutritious meals during the 170 days that they are not at school.

“It is not acceptable in a city as prosperous as London for children from low-income or disadvantaged backgrounds to be eating a worse diet than those in more well-off homes.

“We want to try and ensure all children have access to healthy food, regardless of their background.”