Andy Burnham urged to introduce universal free school meals and end scourge of hunger

Andy Burnham urged to introduce universal free school meals and end scourge of hunger EXCLUSIVE: A year-long Right to Food Commission - led by the Labour MP Ian Byrne - warns food insecurity 'is a national crisis that needs an immediate emergency response' Andy Burnham is being urged to end the scourge of hunger across Britain with a string of measures including universal free school meals. It comes as a year-long Right to Food Commission - led by the Labour MP Ian Byrne - warns food insecurity "is a national crisis that needs an immediate emergency response". Based on sobering conversations across the country, the Commission said the new Prime Minister should act urgently to improve the lives of millions. Mr Byrne said: "We have heard harrowing evidence about the effect food insecurity is having on children. It is distressing, heartbreaking and utterly avoidable. We have also had it confirmed that we have an income problem, not a food problem in this country." Last year the government announced it would extend eligibility for free school meals to all children in families who receive Universal Credit, helping an estimated 500,000 more kids. But recommendations from the Commission - seen by The Mirror - urges the government to go further and make free school meals universal for all children up to the age of 18. They say this will "end school food debt and related stigma". It demands an end to the five-week wait for Universal Credit after a claim is first made to avoid claimants facing an immediate "income and food crisis". Among dozens of recommendations it also calls on ministers to establish a Cost of Living Unit based in the Prime Minister's office to alleviate pressures on families. And it urges the government to usher in a "Right to Food Bill" to combat food poverty. It suggests reforms to capital gains tax and equalising it with income tax rates could raise more than enough to fund the £7.8billion needed to help vulnerable families. One person told the Commission: "A right to food has to be a legal right, not a good intention. When something is a right, you can ask for it, question it, and expect it - instead of feeling it is your personal failing to go without. "That right has to have teeth: someone accountable for it, a way to challenge it when food is denied, and support that reaches people before they hit crisis, not after." Another said: "Queuing at food banks is degrading, it adds to the stigma of not being able to provide decent food, clean clothes and a warm home. People who work feel embarrassed, stressed and often degraded just as must as stay at home families". A third said: “Despite having two full time wages coming into my household, the rise in the cost of living has severely impacted our ability to afford healthy food for our family.” Chair of the Commission Barrie Margetts said: "The biggest example of the broken system Prime Minister Andy Burnham has rightly diagnosed is that in the sixth wealthiest country in the world we have 14 million people not knowing where their next meal is coming from. "We have thousands of children going to school hungry and families having to choose between eating and heating, or eating and paying the rent. "We know that child-ill health is linked to food insecurity - 700 children a year are hospitalised due to malnutrition, rickets or scurvy for goodness sake. "A consistent message we heard across the country was the need for universal free school meals and holiday food provision for all school-aged children. This government must act now, put in place immediate relief measures and then work towards ending food insecurity once and for all by legislating to have a right to food.” Vice-chair Mr Byrne added: "We have heard harrowing evidence about the effect food insecurity is having on children. It is distressing, heartbreaking and utterly avoidable." Earlier this week polling from Amnesty International also found three-quarters (75%) of people have worried about the cost of food in the last year. The survey also found a massive majority - 82% - said there should be a legal right to food.