Steep rise in pupils eligible for free school meals since Covid

According to Department for Education data, 9.7% of pupils were eligible for free school meals at October 2020. This is an increase from 17.3% in January 2020. This amounts to 1.63 million children, an increase from 1.44 million in January 2020.

Of those 1.63 million, 302,400 have become eligible for free school meals since the first national COVID-19 lockdown was announced. Over the same period in 2019, prior to the pandemic, 208,500 children became eligible for free school meals.

While some of these pupils may have been eligible for free school meals previously, their latest spell has started since the first national lockdown began on 23 March 2020.

It is important to note however that 71,800 pupils who started Reception class in September 2020 and had not previously been recorded as eligible for free school meals are also included. For the same period in 2019, 61,000 pupils who became eligible for free school meals started Reception in September 2019. As nearly all of these pupils will not have been assessed for free school meals before, they are known to make up a large proportion of newly eligible pupils each year.