Provide universal school meals: note

Central fiscal result

+£2.8bn - Net fiscal impact in 2028-29

Low case: +£1.5bn. High case: +£6.0bn. Positive numbers are fiscal costs or borrowing pressure. Negative numbers are Exchequer savings or receipts.

Scenario and baseline

• Models provide universal school meals by 2028-29.
• Baseline is current policy or published departmental plans.
• Central case uses published party or official anchors where available.
• Wider manifesto interactions are excluded unless stated.

Affected population

• Affected units are people, firms, households or providers depending on policy.
• Direct exposure follows the manifesto or government target group.
• Indirect exposure includes suppliers, workers, consumers and taxpayers.
• Weakest counts are widened in the low and high cases.

Gross impact

• Published anchor or scenario central is +£2.8bn in 2028-29.
• Gross costs or receipts are adjusted for behaviour and delivery risk.
• Tax, benefit or procurement offsets are separated in the fiscal build-up.
• The range is deliberately wider where implementation detail is thin.

Fiscal build-up, central case

• Gross programme or delivery cost: +£3.2bn
• Tax and receipt offsets: -£0.2bn
• Administration and evaluation: +£0.1bn
• Behavioural and pass-through effects: -£0.3bn

Central net impact: +£2.8bn in 2028-29.

Behaviour and pass-through

• Low case assumes stronger delivery or receipts than central.
• Central case applies moderate behavioural leakage and pass-through.
• High case allows weaker delivery, larger take-up or higher costs.
• Output effects follow incidence, capacity and investment channels.
• Distributional gains do not automatically imply GDP gains.

Phasing

• 2026-27: +£0.3bn. Phased implementation and take-up.
• 2027-28: +£1.5bn. Phased implementation and take-up.
• 2028-29: +£2.8bn. Phased implementation and take-up.
• 2029-30: +£2.8bn. Phased implementation and take-up.

Main source groups

• Belot and James, "Healthy School Meals and Educational Outcomes" (Journal of Health Economics, 2011): Healthy school meals improved educational outcomes and absenteeism in a UK setting; relevant to meal and breakfast policies.
• Institute for Fiscal Studies, "Green Party manifesto: a reaction" (2024): Used to define the pledge wording, policy scope and implementation scenario being modelled.
• Local Government Association, "Green Party manifesto summary" (2024): Used to define the pledge wording, policy scope and implementation scenario being modelled.
• Holford and Rabe, "Universal Infant Free School Meals" (Institute for Social and Economic Research, 2022): Universal infant free school meals improved take-up and some educational outcomes; relevant to universal meals and breakfast provision.
• Department for Education, "School funding statistics" (2025): DfE statistics provide the school-spending baseline and pupil-funding context; used to scale new education spending.
• HM Treasury, "Spending Review 2025" (2025): Departmental baselines affect whether stated school funding is additional; supports the fiscal counterfactual.
• Green Party of England and Wales, "Manifesto for a Fairer, Greener Country" (2024): The manifesto defines the tax, spending, climate, housing and public-service proposals modelled here; used to define the scenario, not as an official costing.