They were not involved in the procurement. It was positioned very much as they were now under an employment contract, with the food supplier, for the second half of the day where they were with the school for the first half. We said that we do not want that to happen either.

I just want to move on to the level of waste. I heard what has been said in terms of waste. I have spoken to a number of teachers and they will contradict the figure of 18% wastage of lunches left over. I spoke to a teacher yesterday. She said about 50% of school lunches go uneaten. The other part is that the kids have to bring the lunches home and that the supplier will not take the leftover lunches, so much so that the provider, which I imagine is within the top five suppliers, has provided each pupil in that school, and I am conscious that there are other schools as well, with a highly branded lunchbox to bring the uneaten school lunches home. Is Mr. McKeon aware of that practice?

My colleague will answer.

No, is the short answer to that particular example the Chair has quoted.

Would highly branded lunchboxes be acceptable?

Absolutely not. Very clearly, in the contract, the supplier has responsibility for the management of waste and within that, specifically, food is not to be brought home for food safety reasons.

Yes.

These meals that have been heated up should not be reheated.

Absolutely. Is it appropriate that branded material would be given out to every pupil in the school by the supplier?

As I say, I have not heard about that so that is something we really need to investigate.

The main issue that the Chair has raised is about the food being brought home. We would not support that. Perhaps the Chair can bring that to-----

I will make two points. One, it is obviously a saving for the supplier that they do not have to deal with the excessive waste packaging - I will touch on that separately. It is a saving for them making kids bring any leftovers, waste or whatever you want to call it home. The second issue is giving highly branded material, in this instance lunchboxes, and I am conscious this affects more than one school, to facilitate them and encourage them-----

Yes.

-----to make a saving for the supplier by bringing leftovers home.

I do not want to talk about any particular supplier because of what you said earlier.

No, and I am not going to name them.

If that is happening, if the Chair brings it to our attention and the attention of the school procurement unit, we will follow that case up. We have not seen it in our inspections. If that has started to happen, we will stop it. I ask the Chair to bring to our attention.

It has happened and not just recently. It has been ongoing. I am surprised, if the departmental inspections are as thorough as they have been portrayed here, that this has not been identified because there are hundreds in this particular school. It is a very large school and the supplier, as I said, has given lunchboxes to every child.

Is this the hot school meal, not the cold school meal?

They are currently providing hot meals.

If it was the cold meal option, it would be different because the same food health and safety concerns do not arise. If they provided people with lunch boxes to bring the cold meal home-----

Would it be appropriate for them? Could that be seen as a kickback and giving out free lunch boxes to pupils?

I do not think so. If it is to bring home cold lunches, I would not necessarily see it that way. If it is to bring hot meals home, it is a contravention of our contract and they should not be doing it. If the Cathaoirleach can send us the details, we will absolutely follow it up.

I just want to move on to the fixed rate of €3.20. That is what ends up within the school lunch. Obviously, there are profits to be made there by the supplier and that is in-built. The full value of what ends up being served to the pupils when they get their lunch is not €3.20. Of the €3.20, leaving aside the profits, how much does the actual food cost, whether it is a sandwich or whatever hot food it is? Is there a rate for the food that ends up on the plate?

No, it is a single rate which is paid for the production, delivery and distribution of the food. It is a single rate.

Okay, so it is €3.20. Obviously, the profit for the supplier is built into that.

As it would be for any business.

Absolutely, yes. That rate was set in 2023. I had a quick look there and food inflation went up about 16% between 2023 and 2025. How is Mr. McKeon ensuring that the quality and quantity of food has been maintained over that period? I am sure suppliers are not taking that 16% hit to their in-built profits. Is there a review going on, taking into consideration those inflationary costs over the last number of years with regard to that figure? What actions have been taken to ensure the quality and quantity has not been impacted by those inflationary costs?

There are a couple of issues wrapped up in that question. We said we would periodically do a review of prices. There will be one due next year. I do not want to say what that review might lead to. I do not want to be saying what the outcome will be. Obviously, that will be priced into the budget for the subsequent school year. To be honest, we have not come under any particular pressure from suppliers to increase the rate at this point in time. However, I expect, for the reasons the Cathaoirleach set out, we will get that because they know the price is set for this year. They will be thinking about next year and the opportunity will arise. I do not want to say what we will do in that case.

The amount we pay, at €3.20, is in the mid-range of what is paid in other countries. Some countries pay €2.50 and other countries pay €3.70. These are the current rates-----

The costs of goods are different in every jurisdiction.

Food does not change that much.

I am conscious of my time. Are any schools paying above the €3.20 price, either with support of the Department or using their own funds?

They certainly should not be paying above €3.20.

Is Mr. McKeon aware of any schools paying more?

We are certainly not funding them to do it and when we do the reconciliations, we do not pay for anything extra.

Is Mr. McKeon aware of any top-up payments being made by any schools to any suppliers?

I am not aware of it and we certainly are not funding that.

Is Mr. McKeon trying to get clarification there?

No, that was the question about costs. I have a table with the international comparison of prices and I was going to share it. That is all.

Okay. I will leave it at that for now.

I thank the witnesses for their flexibility and thank colleagues for staying here this morning. I reflect on having been a parent through the implementation and roll-out of this scheme and I echo what some colleagues have said this morning in terms of supporting the intent behind the policy ambition. It is laudable and really worthwhile. I fully support a nutritional, value for money, universal hot school meals programme for every child in the State. However, having direct experience of it, I think the research that Mr. McKeon keeps citing is inaccurate. Collectively, we have too much anecdotal information to give Mr. McKeon - and we are just a very small cohort of public representatives here - that would paint a very different picture about the reality of the implementation of what has been a really fast-paced piece of social policy. Has a cost-benefit analysis of the programme ever been published?

I will say a couple of things in response to that question. Very often, the public service, and the Civil Service in particular, gets criticised for non-delivery. This is a programme which has been delivered, it is providing school funding and it has been delivered in a reasonably fast-paced way, which evidences that stuff can be delivered. Is everything perfect? No, it is not. Can we improve it? Yes, we can and yes, we will. There is a balance to be struck. There can be paralysis by analysis. We can analyse things and do things and we will never be here. If we had gone down - I know Deputy Byrne is raising it - the perfect solution of kitchens in schools and canteens and facilities. If we had gone down that route, there would not be school meals today. There just would not be and we would be years and years away from it. We have taken a very pragmatic and practical approach and there have been compromises; I will say that.

With regard to the feedback from parents and others, we have got the anecdotal feedback as well. We have got both positive and, as the Deputy says, negative. For the survey that was done, 86,637 parents responded. It is the best quantitative data we will ever get in terms of their views and 81% of parents supported the programme and felt it delivered nutritious food. That was 81% of 86,637. That is not to say the Deputy's experience was not real but, overwhelmingly, the experience and the feedback from parents is different. The feedback from parents in DEIS schools is particularly positive. Actually, as we rolled out to more schools and got into the more affluent areas, it turned out some of the more affluent parents do not like the food. I am not passing any judgment or comment but I included the article by Professor Katriona O'Sullivan in the briefing material. It is an article well worth reading.

With regard to the cost-benefit analysis, it is too early at this point to have done a full cost-benefit analysis but we intend to do one. The full cost-benefit analysis would include the shadow price and economic benefits, which is why I included the World Food Programme report that pointed out the evidence from other areas and the evidence is that it overwhelmingly pays for itself in terms of the social return to children.

Why is it too early to do that now?

Because we have really only expanded it to all schools in the past year. If you are going to do a proper cost-benefit analysis, you need the data. You need longitudinal data. We do not know the outcome for the children who are now-----

When does Mr. McKeon envisage doing a cost-benefit analysis?

It will probably be another few years because, in reality, most of these studies are done in two ways. They are done by looking at changes in attendance patterns, educational attainment, progression into employment and things like that on a longitudinal basis for children who are now getting the meals compared with the children from previous generations who did not. We have only been doing this in reality since 2023 at any type of scale. The children who got it in junior infants in 2023 are only in primary school now. For the children who were in primary school, some of them have not made it into secondary school. You need to wait until that is done. The reason I included the World Food Programme report is the evidence from every other country is that it pays for itself.

Is every other country adopting the same approach in terms of a reliance on private providers who ultimately are focused on one thing only and that is making a profit?

There is a mixture.

There is a mixture. In that case, one cannot rely solely on that as a parameter for comparison when we have jumped into taking this approach. We are looking at a budget of approximately €286 million next year. Am I right that we are talking about 2,850 schools?

It is around about that. I always say about 3,000 because the number goes up and down.

I accept that. That equates approximately - I know this is not accurate - to an average of €100,000 per school-----

It is €90,000, on average.

Okay. In that, there is the €3.20 per meal figure. When was the last time Mr. McKeon ate a meal that was handed to him and prepared for €3.20?

I will talk about children. When we set the prices, we spoke to suppliers, we spoke to schools and we looked at the prices in other countries. We believe that it can be done for that amount for food that is produced at scale, whether it is in a local delicatessen or a larger place. I will not name a big retail chain that has restaurants and cafes but you can go there and get a child meal, which includes a drink and pasta, say spaghetti Bolognese or lasagne, for €2. It can be done.

The evidence is that it can be done. As I said, I have here the rates in other countries-----

I do not have time to go into the rates in other countries.

We are in the mid-range of countries.

That is interesting, given that we are top of the table in European comparisons in terms of costs.

We are in the mid-range.

That is really interesting. Has Mr. McKeon made a business case or application to the Department of public expenditure to increase that fee from €3.20?

One of the things we have to watch is economy as well. If we are currently getting the meals delivered at €3.20 in a case where the nutrition review and the parental review is that the meals are adequate and fit for purpose, we have to be very careful about pushing the price beyond that. Just to give the prices, Ireland is €3.20, Finland is €2.80 and the Netherlands €2.30. Are we saying that Ireland is going to be 90 cent a meal more than the Netherlands?

Are we saying that we fully back the way it is being delivered right now?

If I go to Austria, if I go to Germany-----

We are in Ireland.

They both use the same model. I made the point at the beginning that we have delivered this at a very fast pace. I am not trying to be argumentative, but I challenge the Deputy to think of an alternative model that could have done it that fast.

I am merely questioning. Mr. McKeon keeps inferring beliefs and values behind people's questions. Has Mr. McKeon put a business case to the Department of public expenditure to look for an additional sum towards that €3.20 or does he feel that is sufficient?

At this point in time I feel it is sufficient and we will review it next year

. In regard to the policy, who is responsible for the waste? Who is responsible for getting rid of anything that is uneaten or half-eaten?

The provider is meant to look after that.

The supplier.

The supplier, yes.

Why are children bringing home meals?

Well, they should not be. We just had that discussion with the Chair. They should not be bringing home-----

Mr. McKeon knows the reality on the ground is that a huge number of children are bringing home meals. He knows that is the reality.

Does the Deputy want to give us the examples? We would say to the schools that they should not permit that.

Teachers have enough to be doing.

A number of schools would like to do it and they argue they should be allowed to do it and we tell them they are not allowed to do it and should not be doing it.

They are doing it. I will tell Mr. McKeon why I am emphasising the point. The data about waste is way off because he is not getting an accurate calculation. He is getting a calculation of what is left behind. He is not getting an accurate calculation of what has gone to waste.

I do not know. I have said that we have had the anecdotal evidence, and we were hearing this. We got a nutritionist or dietician to visit 54 schools and ask questions of all of the rest of them.

Is that 54 schools out of 2,800?

We did a survey of over 700 schools, of over 86,000 parents, and we asked them the question. The quantitative data that is available, other than anecdotes, is that actually the anecdotes overstate the issue considerably. That is all I can say. I have to rely on the data that is presented through statistically valid research by professional organisations who do this for a living, and what they tell me is those numbers. The Deputy might not believe them Other people might not believe them.

I am just telling Mr McKeon it is not the universal truth; that is all.

I accept that and I accept if 80% is fine, there is one in five where it is not. As we are looking at 3.5 million children, that is a big number.

There is ready acceptance that it needs to be improved. If we look forward five years from now, what will have changed in the programme in terms of nutritional value? There is legislation before the House, for example, to underpin nutritional standards in school meals. How does Mr. McKeon foresee the model of provision evolving? Will we always have a reliance on a very small number of private providers? Is there potential for a State-funded scheme to be set up to provide this more directly or does Mr. McKeon see it as being more of the same with minor tweaks?

There are a couple of things. We have made changes already and we referenced them in our briefing material. We changed the procurement approach. We are actually changing the menu options and introducing a standardised menu over a three-week cycle. The dietitian we engaged will specify that menu and that will address some of the concerns that have been raised in terms of the food quality and the mixture of food. That will help and it will change and that will all happen within the next year, never mind the next five years.

I refer to the other model the Deputy referenced, where one would move from contracting in or buying food from a small number of suppliers to a State-provided one. First, there are 300 suppliers, which is not a small number.

The vast majority of them are small.

It is about 70% in the top-----

That is a significant majority for-----

It is a competitive and contestable market. There are a couple of realities regarding the challenge if the State were to do it. I have said before that the ideal situation would be to have a kitchen and a canteen in every school with a chef preparing food.

We are doing nothing to move towards that ideal.

There are a couple of things. The school infrastructure does not support that at the moment. The cost of building that infrastructure in schools, many of which are buildings which are 60, 70, 80, 90 or 100 years old, would be very substantial. Leaving that aside, there are 3,800-odd schools. It would not be possible to go out and recruit 3,800 chefs tomorrow. Those in the catering industry and the restaurant business will tell the Deputy that. There are very practical issues that would have to be overcome before going to that model. That is not to say that model might not happen over time but right now it is not at the top of our agenda.

Perhaps the Chair will allow me to squeeze one more question in. Does the Department have any sort of guidance for private suppliers when it comes to upselling additional products on their menus? The basic hot school meal is provided but the menu is littered with a number of different options to add to the basket. There are basics like fruit, rice cakes, water and all that kind of stuff. This stuff tends to add up and it is still very much available on these apps now. Does the Department ask them not to do this and to provide it as part of the core meal, or are we looking at these as optional extras?

The funding that is provided by the Department is for, in this case, the hot school meal. There are schools that make a choice to add those kind of snack options within the school. That is completely a decision for the school. It has nothing to do with the Department. We do not fund it or oversee it in any way

I accept that, but does the Department ask providers not to do it or is it happy to allow that practice?

It is really a matter for the school.

It is not though, really, is it?

I think it is if the school makes the choice to do it and in fact the parents are choosing from that menu as well.

Can I make one other point in relation to the waste? One other really important thing is getting the portion right. As the Deputy described it, some of the research done in the review was looking at uneaten meals. As the Deputy knows, this is particularly a problem where there has not been a cancellation for meals, but there is also an issue, and maybe that is what the Deputy is referring to, where some or most of a meal is not eaten.

I can tell Ms Lyons directly that in my house it is not eaten and it is not opened but it is brought-----.

There are different versions of this but I think getting the right portion size is really important. That has always been in the nutritional guidelines. We will be writing to suppliers again about that issue and it is something that will make a difference in terms of the right portion size for the child, and that will help.

I thank the witnesses for their time.

The hot school meal programme has been a successful programme delivered across this country. I am a parent of three young children, all of whom are national school and they are benefiting from the hot school programme. It does not surprise me that 90,000 people responded to the survey. In the WhatsApp groups that I am in, hot school meals, what is in the meal, the children having the meal or not having the meal are the things everyone is talking about. The vast majority of parents whose children are in national school right now like the scheme and it has benefited their children. That does not mean that we cannot look at it, examine it and better it but it is important to state that.

We heard a lot about food waste but obviously if children do not attend school and they have clicked in and the food is associated with them for whatever three-week period, that will contribute to food waste. Typically, a huge proportion of the children not attending school are neurodivergent or have some kind of an additional need. Sometimes that is not really reflected or talked about. What are we doing to improve food options for neurodivergent children? A lot of neurodivergent children may want to eat different or very specific meals and their needs are very different. I am not suggesting that the fact the meal does not serve their need is contributing to that child not being present.

It could be a contributory measure that would work as a pull factor to encourage children who are facing challenges at school to attend. Will the witnesses talk about that a bit?

There are two things. As it is, we ask providers to make sure they have plain food on the menus so that children in families who are neurodivergent will have options to pick from. A lot of them have extensive menus and children can get plain pasta with a little sauce or plain pasta with no sauce and so on. All that is available. I was asked earlier why children are picking that kind of food and we saw examples of menus. It is a choice by the parent. If the parent decides to choose the plain food, we have to respect that choice. It may be because the child is neurodivergent or because the child is picky.

When we develop a standardised menu, we will specifically include a set of foods that should be suitable for neurodivergent children. I have some personal experience of this. We have to be careful about the food purists - and I have spoken to our dieticians about this - who say we cannot have chicken goujons or chicken nuggets. I certainly know one child who is neurodivergent and will only eat chicken nuggets. At Christmas dinner and family wedding celebrations, the child has to be brought out to get chicken nuggets. Therefore, we have to be careful about being too purist and then leaving children like that behind so we will try to enable choice in the standardised menu for those children.

Did Ms Lyons want to come in?

Mr. McKeon has probably said it all. The standardised menu gives us a good opportunity to develop the choices available to children with dietary needs and special schools and special classes. It is already in the nutrition standards that dietary requirements should be reflected in the menu. When a school is making a choice and looking at the submission of a tenderer, it is not assessing on price, because the price is set. Therefore, the menu options are important and for schools that are aware of children who have dietary needs and are in touch with parents, it is important the menu reflects that and that the supplier is providing the kind of variety or options needed. Moving to the standardised menu will strengthen that approach as well.

On Mr. McKeon's point, Ms Lyons mentioned special classes and special schools, but there are a lot of neurodivergent children in mainstream classes in every school in Ireland. Who is feeding into the process and contributing to the understanding of what a standardised menu should look like?

We recruited and pay for a dietician who is based in the Department of Health. She works under the structure of the Department of Health in its health and well-being area. She operates in a wide network under the institute of dieticians and gets specialist advice and information about how menus should be developed. It is not that she works alone or in a bubble. She absolutely engages with that network, which will provide the appropriate advice.

I suggest, if it is not happening already, that groups like AsIAm or Neurodiversity Ireland could be given an opportunity to feed into that process.

It is not just the dietician, but the wider unit in which she works is very connected in that way on the wider issues that affect food safety and standards, beyond school meals. She absolutely has access to that and I agree with the Deputy.

We will take that suggestion back. So the Deputy is aware, UCD, UL, the Food Safety Authority and Better Start are all involved in the advisory group. They are professional dieticians who normally work with people who have different needs so they have a good understanding, but we will bring back the suggestion.

Very often, dieticians do not deal with neurodivergent children. They might be dealing with children who have special dietary needs relating to a medical need. It is just a suggestion, which the witnesses might come back to the committee on. Can there be some kind of structured engagement with such groups as AsIAm, Neurodiversity Ireland and Down Syndrome Ireland? There is a plethora of relevant organisations that might have a good input to make to this. School is a challenging environment for lots of children and can be most challenging for neurodivergent children. If an element of this can be bettered for such children, it is important we engage on it.

I have three children in a primary school. They are fortunate enough to be in a brand new Educate Together school. It is a new building and the infrastructure is excellent. Have we done an analysis of use-case examples? Is it the case that children and parents of children in schools that have the infrastructure we spoke about, such as kitchens as so on, are having a better experience of the hot school meals programme than those in schools that do not have the infrastructure? Is it as simple as that?

Generally speaking, it is in the research that food prepared on site rates higher than food that is delivered hot and delivered hot rates higher than when it is dropped off cold and heated up. There is not a huge difference in the data, but there is a noticeable statistical difference. It is considered better to do it on site.

It was said that 3,800 chefs would have to be hired directly. Is there any way to examine whether shared or community services could be looked at to support schools that do not have the infrastructure?

We have done that. Earlier, a Deputy raised two schools in her constituency, which use shared facilities and are trying to support it through the community employment scheme. We are looking at that. We are also proposing a model for procurement - it would still be procurement - where schools could cluster together to give them a bigger contract, which would enable them to look for higher standards and maybe use a local supplier. It might not be economical for a local supplier to deliver to one school, but it might improve the situation if a supplier can deliver to four schools banded together, so we get less concentration in the market.

In the early roll-out of the scheme, there was an enormous burden on principals and teachers in introducing the new scheme. Teachers and principals have enough to do on this issue. In some schools, the burden on the principal and teacher has improved versus the parent just picking the food on an app during the week. Do the witnesses have good use-case examples when they examine the scheme across the school network, that is examples that are better than others, which could be deployed in other schools?

The burden on schools has been addressed to some extent with the standard documentation approach. Last year, with colleagues in the Department of Education and Youth, a standard set of procurement documentation was developed. Before that, the school had to manage that as well. That has definitely lessened the burden. Schools still have to carry out the procurement, but there is a lot of support, which Ms Gaffey might want to talk about, available to schools to manage the process, with templates. On the school procurement unit website, people can see all the different documentation for schools to avail of to be able to navigate their way through the process.

Health and safety was important to us in developing the procurement documentation as was making sure the roles of the food business operators, FBOs, are done by the FBOs. Prior to that, we received anecdotal feedback that schools were involved in heating food and so on. Specifically on handling the food, in schools that are using the new procurement documentation, the only role the schools play is in loco parentis, which is literally placing the food in front of the child. That has got rid of quite a significant burden of work which was being placed on some schools by some FBOs.

The other thing to know is that some schools will not yet be on the new contract so will not have used the new documentation if they already had a contract in place that was going to run for a year or two more. Therefore, there might be a bit of incremental progression, but certainly the schools that have moved to that documentation have significant assistance with the process.

With the agreement of our witnesses, I will open to a supplementary round of questions of five minutes for each member. Is that agreed? Agreed.

Going back to procurement, it was noted that during site visits in 2026, the Department agreed the allocation of funding to one school. A procurement process was completed as well, but a successful tender was already committed to before the procurement process was in place.

How did that happen?

Sorry, is this in the report of the Comptroller and Auditor General?

Yes.

We provide the funding to the school and the school is now required to give us evidence that it has undertaken a procurement. In that particular case - I do not have the full details on it - there was nothing to stop the school from doing the procurement in advance and coming to tell us it had done it. The funding does not happen before the procurement. It can happen after the procurement. Bear in mind that we pay a fixed price. We look for evidence that there has been a tender and procurement.

The school did not have the procurement done. It signed off that it had it done but it did not have it done. The Department gave the money out without procurement happening.

That was discovered, yes.

Yes, it is an evolving situation and I think there has been tightening up of the procurement process, which is significant.

I think the Comptroller and Auditor General notes in his report that a much higher level of compliance has since been introduced to the standard procurement process. It is one of the risks when we have a devolved process, which is what the schools want. If we impose so many constraints on it, it is no longer devolved. It is about getting the balance between giving the schools the ability to tender and get suppliers in their local area-----

Yes, I suppose it is the suppliers who are winning. They are not even going through the procurement process when winning the tenders.

That was one case out of 3,000 schools.

It was one case that was found out.

The issue there is that we have learned from it and we have introduced new procurement rules.

What are the new procurement rules?

What we now require is that the schools have to use the standard procurement documentation and the standard contract.

They did that before.

No, they did not. That did not exist. The other thing is that when the schools apply for funding, they have to give us the reference number of the procurement notice on eTenders, so we know procurement has happened. That control was introduced in the past year.

That is okay. I would like to see that there have been controls. We can all make mistakes but we must ensure that mistakes do not happen again. That is good. It was mentioned that the Department would like to see food being produced on-site. Has it involved the Department of Education and Youth in that? Is there a thought process whereby kitchens might be put into new schools going forward?

The Department of Education and Youth might want to answer that one. Our concentration, for all the reasons we have discussed today, was on getting the roll-out happening, then to review it and deal with the issues that are emerging and fix them.

As Mr. McKeon mentioned earlier, we do not want to work in silos. We want to work together.

I accept that but the first focus of our attention has been to get it up and running. I think we have done that reasonably successfully and quickly in a way that the public service might not always be appreciated for doing. We are now looking at fixing the issues that have emerged in the current system. With regard to longer term development, that is a huge capital build programme and my colleagues in the Department of education might want to comment. It is not something that is active within our Department.

It is a lot cheaper for that to start off when we are building new buildings. I do appreciate all the work that has been done here. I actually read that book by Dr. Katriona O'Sullivan. It would pull at your heart strings and it is fantastic to see that children are all acquiring a hot meal every day.

On the enrolled numbers, I was a bit concerned when I read that, although the Department of education gave the Department of Social Protection the data for enrolment within all the schools, that data was not used and more school dinners were going out to some schools than there were children in the school. How did that happen?

I think the issue there is that the official school enrolment numbers are given at the end of the year, in May and June. Schools are now working from September and the number will be different. If we just based it on the enrolment number, we would leave schools underfunded.

When the Department of education is enrolling children in a school, it knows how many children are enrolled because the teachers are allocated on the basis of the number of children enrolled in the school. Is the Department of Social Protection not getting enrolment numbers at the start of the year?

That is not what I am saying. What I am saying is that when we started the programme first, the enrolment data available was from May or June. We were then funding for the school year beginning September. Teachers told us that they were correct numbers in May and June but once classes finish and new classes start, the numbers will have changed. We asked the schools to get certified by the principal and a member of the board of management the enrolment numbers they wanted to provide. We now have online access to the enrolment data and where there is a variance of more than 10%, we query that and look for it to be validated.

A few of the local suppliers in County Monaghan have said they have not been paid yet. That is from the start of September. I sent an email the other day about it. Three suppliers have not been paid from the start of September. Maybe the officials could look into that.

We will have a look at that. It is a matter for the schools. We fund the schools and the schools make the payments. If the Deputy can give us the details, we will follow up.

I have sent an email to the Minister, Deputy Calleary's office.

I thank everyone for staying on. I am sorry; I have another committee meeting so I had to leave for a bit. On the issue of packaging, waste and the sustainability arguments, I note from some of the documentation that there have been changes in suppliers having to provide recyclable materials and so on. Can we have a bit of detail on that?

The schools certainly fed back to us that they had a burden in terms of the waste management. The interdepartmental working group looked at this and said the way to deal with it was to get the suppliers to handle the waste management. We have changed the contract award process so that dealing with waste management is now a requirement, and it gets 20% of the marks in the assessment of tenders. That is the first thing we have done. With regard to recycling of material, we have asked that material be recyclable or compostable.

Biodegradable.

Anecdotally, I have got feedback where children were saying they used to like the foil container, which was nice and shiny, but now the food comes in this cardboard box and does not look as appetising. It is the same food. Sometimes the compostable packaging is not as attractive.

I totally agree. Is it the case that all suppliers now have to provide compostable packaging materials?

The requirement is for recyclable, but would include compostable, where possible.

I wonder how much is actually recycled, if the packaging contains food and so on.

The anecdotal evidence is that it has got out there. I have certainly been told that the food looks a lot worse in the brown cardboard box than it did in a nice foil container.

The supplier is responsible for all the waste in terms of packaging and the school has nothing to do with that. That is part and parcel of the contracts.

Yes.

I will go back to the issue of payments to schools and the case that was identified. What was provided for €8,500? Was it some sort of pod or something?

It was a pod. I have more detail now. It was a sensory pod for children who are neurodiverse.

What was the basis of that being provided?

As I understand it, the school went out approaching suppliers looking for contributions towards the building of a sensory pod and this supplier offered it that money.

That was €8,500.

Yes. I will mention that it was not one of the big suppliers, by the way.

It was not one of the big suppliers.

No.

It must have been big enough if it could afford €8,500.

I do not know whether-----

I suspect Mr. McKeon will not identify the supplier or the school.

No.

What has been done to correct this?

In the original contract there was some ambiguity about this, or a lack of clarity. We have made it clear to schools and suppliers that there should be no money transferring between them for anything other than the meals.

This pod is still there, obviously.

It is still there.

The school has not refunded the cost of it.

Not that I am aware of. We have made it clear to schools that the only financial exchange between them and a food supplier should be for the food.

Does this not in many ways lock that supplier into the school? Let us be honest, it would be very hard for a school to break a contract with that supplier after it has given the school a physical piece of infrastructure?

That is why we have introduced the rules.

It has not changed in this case.

Not that I am aware of. As I said, the programme rolled out very fast. Maybe we should have-----

When did this happen? Was it last year or the year before?

This is in our inspections from 2024 to 2025. We have changed the procurement documentation since. We have changed instructions to schools. As the Deputy will know from his own work, schools will approach their suppliers to look for money for school fêtes, raffles or sports days and suppliers will always cough up.

They were doing that. In some ways, it may have been different if it had stayed at that and they were getting €50 here and €100 there but when we saw this type of thing we had to say "Stop".

Within the new procurement arrangement, there is a strengthened service level agreement that the school signs with the Department. This is called out very specifically. When the school is signing up for that, it is very clear that rebates or incentives are not permitted.

It is quite possible that the intentions were all good here, but it does not look great in terms of a financial arrangement between the supplier and a school if these additional items are being provided.

I think there might have been more to it than that. I think it might have been family members from the supplier in the school and so on. Anyway, that is neither here nor there.

It was on an old contract. Things have been strengthened up since then, including the service level agreement.

It raises questions around conflicts. It raises questions in terms of the school ultimately being able to secure the best supplier going forward if this close relationship has been built up by providing physical infrastructure on the school.

It is a matter the board of management should pay attention to.

I did not say this earlier, but I have three children going to primary school and they have benefited from the school meals. On a positive note, it is something that is welcomed in our household, as it is in many other households across the country. While we are here today to question the value for money and how the system can improve, it has been a successful programme overall. I take it that it has accelerated quite rapidly in recent times. That will present issues. Overall, however, a good job is being done.

I have a number of concluding questions. Does Mr. McKeon have a figure of how many schools are using each of the four different delivery models for service provision?

I called some figures out earlier on and we can dig them up. We are now asking the schools to give us that data as part of the funding process. As I said earlier, 880 are prepared off-site and delivered hot, 700 are prepared off-site and then heated on-site, 131 are prepared off-site and heated off-site in a mobile unit and 55 are prepared fully on-site.

Has the Department carried out a review of the difference in costs for the schools in the delivery of each of those models?

We fund the schools the exact same amount of €3.20.

Okay. Has the Department of education carried out that analysis?

It is €3.20, regardless of which model that the school chooses when it goes to tender. It is very clear that the food business operator takes those costs. The food business operator pays for everything. It is €3.20 per meal.

The preferred delivery model is meals fully prepared on site. It is a really low number of 55 schools. There was a question asked of the Department of Social Protection, and I will ask the question of the Department of education. There is a legacy issue with an awful lot of old schools within the system. Since the hot school meals programme came about, I am sure it is now the priority of the Department to ensure that all schools from that point going forward have provision within the new schools. Is that the case?

No. The space allowed for those kinds of kitchen facilities in schools has been increased, but only to allow for the regen, not for cooking from fresh.

That is not for cooking from fresh. Is that a policy decision?

It is a budget decision.

It is a budget decision, even though it is identified as the best model both in terms of delivery of the programme but also from any of the metrics or analysis carried out, it is the preferred model. The most important people here are the children in terms of quality of delivery, but that is not being taken into account.

In terms of our Department's capital funding as per the NDP sectoral plan, our priority is to deal with the increasing demographics and the provision of school places for schoolchildren and those with special needs, including those in temporary accommodation.

It is not a funding priority for the Department.

As per the NDP budget, our funding is going into the provision of school places for children. The school meals scheme at the moment does not provide any capital funding for the development of kitchens to cook from scratch.

If we are building a school, surely it makes sense to ensure there is provision within that, from design through to construction provision, for those facilities to be there.

The space has increased for new builds to allow for the regen ovens.

Okay. I will go back to the issue of waste. There does not seem to be a uniform approach to collection to ensure the suppliers are dealing with the waste generated from school meals. Our youngest daughter has come through the primary school system and is now in secondary school. I raise the amount of waste she was bringing home. At times she might get four slices of carrots in a big hard plastic container. It was totally unsuitable. You may say it is recyclable, but is that excessive amount of waste appropriate? That occurred throughout the school. If she got a wrap, it came in a hard plastic container right the way through. I know it was said that it may have changed. Is there still a dependency there? Has a memo come out from the Department on the appropriateness of high levels of plastic packaging? Irrespective of whether it is recyclable, it is a huge burden.

We spoke about this earlier. We have a few different versions at the moment because not everybody is on the new procurement yet. In the current procurement, the requirement for suppliers is that the containers are recyclable, and preferably compostable. The supplier has full responsibility for the removal of waste, which is why, as we said earlier, if the Cathaoirleach is aware of a situation where that is not happening, we need to know more about it. I am cognisant of the fact that not everybody is on that new contract and there may be other models with this happening. It will be addressed as schools come on-----

Most hard plastic is recyclable, but excessive usage of it is not good. I do not need to get into the arguments of why, but-----

If the requirement is recyclable, and the supplier is meeting that requirement, it is-----

I will move onto the other area of schools. A figure was given that 300 schools have either opted out of the programme or were unable to get a supplier.

They have not applied.

Can we get the specific breakdown on that? I am conscious, even in my constituency, that some rural schools that want to be part of the scheme have not been able to get a supplier because they are in a rural area. Can we get those figures?

We will send that on to the committee. I think I called the numbers out earlier on. About half of the schools say that they are in the process of joining. Schools in the other half have various reasons. We will send it to the committee.

It is to get a breakdown. How many schools cannot get a supplier, regardless of all their attempts? I am conscious of Ballycoog school in my constituency, which wants to be part of it and has applied, but cannot get a supplier. It sees itself as disenfranchised from something that it sees as beneficial for its pupils.

We are very conscious of that.

What assistance is being given by the Department in those cases?

If we are aware that a school has difficulty in sourcing a supplier, we are in touch with that school. There are different options. The first is one the school may not favour the most, but a cold meal option is an option. Some local suppliers may find it easier to provide the cold option rather than the hot option. That may or may not suit the school. One development which we will use is a clustered arrangement for schools. It applies in more rural locations where a number of schools are having difficulty sourcing a supplier. A clustered procurement approach is a more attractive approach for a supplier. The individual school will still have a contract with that supplier, but perhaps the clustered arrangement will be more attractive to the supplier.

That is being looked at.

With our colleagues in the Department of education, we have developed the documentation for the procurement for that. We will be in touch and are already in touch with schools that are having this difficulty to look at whether a clustering solution would work.

There is one last area I want to touch on. It was flagged to me by teachers in a particular school which is attended by a number of children with diabetes. Obviously, calorie intake is closely monitored. There have been incidents within the school where the calorie count on the label of the lunch, whether it was a wrap, a sandwich or whatever, was not accurate and led to negative impacts on the child who is dealing with diabetes. Who is responsible? Is that something the Department monitors? Is it down to the school? Whose responsibility is that?

In the first instance, the Food Safety Authority of Ireland has responsibility for food labelling. All food suppliers are meant to comply with the Food Safety Authority of Ireland regulations. If they are not compliant, the Food Safety Authority of Ireland will follow up. If the Chairman gives us that example, we will bring it to them. Our inspections this year and for the next year are visually based, looking at the food to see that they have two sets of vegetables or that they have potatoes, meat or whatever. We are working with a dietician to develop a tool which will enable the inspectors, who are not dieticians but social welfare staff, to assess things like calories and nutritional value. We hope to have that for the 2027-28 school year. In the meantime, food labelling is the domain of the Food Safety Authority of Ireland.

It is very important in that situation that the school management would address that urgently with the supplier. Obviously, it should not be happening.

As there are no more questions, that concludes our engagement today. I thank the Secretary General and his officials from the Department of Social Protection for attending today. I also thank the officials from the Department of Education and Youth and the Comptroller and Auditor General’s office for their attendance once again. Is it agreed that the clerk will seek any follow-up information and carry out any agreed actions arising from the meeting? Agreed. The committee will next meet on Thursday, 5 November with officials from the Department of Education and Youth.