With the National Education Union, we’ve brought together a coalition of powerful voices to demand free school dinners for every child. Through effective organising, strategic communications and inspiring creative, we’ve built incredible momentum for change.
In autumn 2022, we worked with the NEU to launch a new campaign: Free School Meals for All. Our bold demand quickly won widespread support as we reached out to everyone from mayors, councillors and medical bodies to chefs and faith leaders to join our coalition.
At the same time, we cultivated relationships with MPs to get the campaign on the agenda in Parliament. In September, coalition members Socialist Educational Association and Kim Johnson MP put Free School Meals For All to a vote at the Labour Party conference, and it became official party policy.
Then in December, Zarah Sultana MP introduced the Free School Meals For All Bill. 72 MPs have backed an Early Day Motion supporting the bill, with sponsors from Labour, the Liberal Democrats and the Green Party.
The Government has twice blocked the bill’s second reading. We’ve responded by mobilising our coalition to publicly call them out for failing children, and we’ll keep fighting until the bill passes.
In June 2023, we organised a headline-grabbing Week of Action culminating in 70 MPs, Peers, children and young people, councillors, faith and civil society leaders handing in our open letter at 10 Downing Street.
Schools ran activities and special assemblies, faith leaders offered prayers and our stories cut through across the media. We made headlines in The Times, The Big Issue and on Radio 4’s Today, and children spoke about the campaign on Good Morning Britain. Together, we shifted the national conversation on child hunger in schools, and showed politicians we’ll keep fighting until we win.
BUILDING A BROAD COALITION
By taking a networked approach, and drawing together leaders and institutions from across civil society, we’ve created a campaign that can’t be ignored. We’ve used email updates, campaign briefing calls, in-person events including a conference, and engaging content to keep everyone involved and informed at every stage. Our emphasis on meaningful engagement and valuing everyone’s contribution has built a passionate, active, powerful coalition.
WINNING MEDIA COVERAGE
Ever since the campaign launched with a front page spread in The Mirror, we’ve identified parents, educators and faith leaders who could be media spokespeople and supported them to bring the issues to life. We worked with the British Dental Association and School And Public Health Nurses Association to run a joint survey on lack of food and child health, securing a Guardian exclusive for its publication, with follow-on coverage in the Huffington Post, Nursing Times and others. And our 2023 Week of Action got Free School Meals for All into the news 80 times, including coverage by BBC Today, The Times, The Financial Times, The Guardian and The Spectator.
AMPLIFYING OUR MESSAGE
We’ve achieved huge reach by creating content for coalition members to share at key moments, with an online toolkit that includes graphics, social media posts, videos and template copy. Celebrities, influencers and journalists have shared our campaign too. We also geotargeted the party conferences with programmatic ads to build a buzz around the campaign.
DELIVERING POWERFUL CREATIVE
We’ve developed strong brand guidelines so that all our outputs are recognisable and visually striking. Our copy and imagery are shaped by carefully considered principles, and avoid the negative styling of traditional poverty campaigns. Our images are bold, confident and joyful, imagining the world as it should be for children, in a future with Free School Meals for All. This discipline has paid off, as the language we’ve used is now echoing through the Free School Meals debate.
By being ambitious and pushing for what we believe all children deserve, we’ve changed the national conversation around Free School Meals for All - and brought influential organisations and tens of thousands of people with us.
