It follows a public meeting held last week at Haeata Community Campus to discuss what an up to 50 per cent funding cut to the Ka Ora Ka Ako – Healthy School Lunch programme could be like.
Christchurch East MP Reuben Davidson, who set up the meeting, was joined by Labour education spokesperson Jan Tinetti, several Christchurch city councillors and members from the Waitai Coastal-Burwood-Linwood and Waipapa Papanui-Innes-Central community boards.
Davidson has also been to various schools to get their feedback on the proposed cuts and will be delivering a stack of letters from several five to 14-year-old pupils to Luxon this week.
One letter from a Haeata Community Campus year 8 student mentioned the rising costs of food and ingredients.
"Mr Luxon, since buying food and ingredients to make lunches are expensive, didn’t you make the expenses higher for people to buy, and families and especially the chiefs that makes lunches for us children and family?
"Foods digest in our body which brings us happiness because we have food that made us full . . . happiness makes us want to be a better person.
"Being a better person allows us to learn better and be smarter which means we’ll get good grades.”
"There’s some families out there that do not have the money to buy dinner so the leftover lunches from our school is sometimes their dinner."
Principals, pupils, parents and meal providers Nourish Ōraka, a community enterprise established to provide healthy school lunches in Shirley, attended the Haeata meeting to talk about their concerns.
"They have all seen the many positives of the programme and are very concerned at what the cuts will take away from our communities and ultimately from our kids," Davidson said.
"We also know from local principals and teachers that it has increased attendance, reduced sick bay queues and helped kids to focus and learn.
"I can’t see any reason we’d want to lose that progress."
Davidson said any government that is truly focused on the cost of living, school attendance and achievement "should listen to the voice of our children".
"David Seymour, the Associate Minister of Education, has talked about halving the programme. This could mean some schools that are part of the programme miss out completely."
He said the cuts could also mean schools get a reduced amount of food, and kids without lunches would be singled out.
"We know this is not a good approach as it creates a stigma and a lot of kids won’t ask for lunch out of a fear of drawing attention to themselves.
"The solution would be to maintain and grow the programme, that’s what I’m calling for and why I’m asking people to sign our petition and write letters to the ministers.
"No-one campaigned on cutting school lunches and no-one should be."
