Not that I care about being fair to Thatcher, but she wasn’t the first.
The milk thing can be summarized as such:
1906, kids are malnourished, let’s give them milk - some counties (LEAs but im trying to translate here) refused
1930, a bunch of counties are still refusing, they are encouraged
1945, schools are forced to give all children under 18 1/3 pint of milk a day (same government as founded the NHS btw)
1968 Harold Wilson’s Labour govt cut this to under 11 years old
1971 Edward Heath instructs Thatcher (then Education Secretary) to cut it to under 7 years old, she does, many schools pay for the milk themselves instead
1977 the EU allows for extra funding to be claimed on 7-18 year olds for milk if they are malnourished
1978 uk provided funding back to up to 12 year olds if their families were on government assistance
1979 Thatcher elected
1980 widened the subsidies for milk again
1986 narrowed to only government assistance families again
1995 it was cut again now to children 5 and under where it remains today
1997 Blair elected, program for healthy school meals is started shifting the focus from “milk” to all food and drink.
1999 report claims children eat unhealthier than they did in 1950
2001 Celebrity chef Jamie Oliver starts his School Dinners Campaign
She also infamously took free milk away from schools
Not that I care about being fair to Thatcher, but she wasn’t the first.
The milk thing can be summarized as such:
Actually interesting and factual. Thanks, I didn’t know
and the whole section 28 thing