Up until the 2023 election Aotearoa had an effective school lunch program. Kids got fed on locally-produced food, improving educational and employment outcomes. But National hated that, so they wrecked the system and replaced it with Seymour's Slop - mass-produced by the lowest-bidder (a massive foreign multinational with a shady record of course), which has burned, poisoned, or otherwise endangered students. The regime calls the programme a "success", but its only success has been in saving money by not feeding kids properly. In reality its a disaster.
Sacking the current providers, restoring funding, and going back to what we had before ought to be an easy policy for the next government. And the Greens have actually promised to do it:
The Green Party wants to bring back the school lunch programme to what it was, and then expand it to more schools.This is great to see. But it also raises the obvious question: where's Labour? Shouldn't they be promising this? Or are they too tied up in trying to appear "responsible" (NeoLiberal) and not spend money on anything other than their fellow rich people? And on the gripping hand, who cares? They can do this, or they can be in opposition. Their choice.The party says if it is part of the next government, it will also permanently fund the Ka Ora, Ka Ako programme (which was renamed Healthy School Lunches in October).
