Stanford & Seymour tackle lunch fiasco

Education Minister Erica Stanford and Associate Education Minister David Seymour have again had to reschedule a meeting over school lunches.

Erica Stanford and David Seymour have met to talk about the school lunches programme.

The Education Minister and her associate were set for one of their regular meetings last Tuesday amid heavy criticism of the performance of the free lunch programme Seymour is in charge of.

However, he did not show up to that meeting and the pair struggled to reschedule until Wednesday morning.

He told reporters on Wednesday afternoon the meeting covered "all sorts of things, mainly education, but it was a fantastic meeting as we always have".

"We discussed a whole range of issues around the school lunch programme and how it's getting better, and what our plan to do that is," Seymour said.

Stanford characterised the meeting this morning as "really productive".

"We went through some of the complex and challenging issues, and I offered David my full support: anything he needed from my office, we would be providing it," she said.

The meeting comes a day after Libelle Group, which was subcontracted by the main contractor Compass to provide 124,000 of the 242,000 lunches a day, went into liquidation.

Associate Health Minister David Seymour.

Seymour earlier told Midday Report he had been aware for "weeks" there were issues with Libelle, but the government was not aware the company might fold in the way it has.

Receiver Deloitte yesterday told Checkpoint the company had been struggling for months and still owed money to multiple suppliers and staff.

Seymour has consistently refused to discuss the details of Libelle's struggles, saying that they were commercially sensitive and a matter for Compass to handle with Libelle.

Asked why the government had not contracted Libelle directly, given it was providing more than half the lunches across the country, Seymour said it could be argued either way.

"It's simpler for us to have one line of accountability - one contract, one price - and let them manage the complexity of other relationships I would have thought.

"It's an interesting hypothetical but look at the outcome. The outcome is there's been a problem with Libelle - that problem's been resolved. Yesterday they went into liquidation and we delivered 99.96 percent of meals on time. So if people want to talk about the outcome and should we have structured it differently, actually the way we've structured it has allowed a really good outcome."

Stanford said questions about why Seymour did not pass that on that Libelle was in trouble was a question for him. She said she was not at all annoyed he did not tell her.

2 comments

Card

Posted on 14-03-2025 10:28 | By Cards

What extremely entitled, spoilt little brats some parents are raising! Make your own sandwiches & some fruit.


How Come?

Posted on 14-03-2025 22:17 | By Yadick

How come all of these schools suddenly NEED lunches for all these kids. It's just another handout and responsibility that 'parents' can shun off to someone else.
Absolutely no way can you convince me that thousands of lunches are an absolute necessity. These kids don't need a hot lunch handout. What's wrong with cold pasta, cold lentils, cold rice, cold mince etc. Be bloody grateful. Very, very few families need this help in comparison to everyone that's getting these. It's not the schools responsibility, or the Governments responsibility, or our responsibility. Parenting comes with responsibility that often means parental sacrifices. How many of these parents are smoking, vaping, drinking, driving V8's +, watching massive TV's, great thumping stereo? Sure a very small handful need this help but definitely not a nation full. Get real.


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