Friday 15 June 2012

Seconds no more?

I hadn't actually been following it regularly, but on the couple of occasions I'd seen it mentioned somewhere and taken a look, I was quite impressed with the NeverSeconds- the nine-year old Scottish schoolgirl's daily account of what her school dinners consisted of.  I can't actually remember what I had for school dinners at her age, but I will admit my recollections of school dinners at secondary school are not particularly favourable ones, and I can't help feeling today's kids get a better deal overall than we did - aided and abetted by Jamie Oliver's intervention, no doubt.  Nevertheless, some of "Veg's" meals looked pretty dire, and at £2 apiece not outstanding value for money - although at least she had a choice, which is more than we ever got.

However, it was very enterprising of her, I thought, and at the same time quite supportive of the school, since the photos were apparently all taken with their consent if not encouragement.  Sadly, the school catering service which is run by the local council, came in for some hefty criticism from an article in a national daily paper, and the aforesaid council  chose to metaphorically shoot the messenger in true council jobsworth style by banning the taking of any more photos: the reason given being that the catering staff were upset and "feared for their jobs".  As far as I can make out, the photos simply recorded what "Veg" chose to eat that day from what was available: there's no suggestion that the photos or comments were doctored or chosen to present an unfavourable or unfairly biased representation, and indeed some of the fare looked (and was reported to have tasted) quite good.  Not only that, she raised a staggering amount for charity via the blog.

Anyway, the ban apparently generated so much criticism and bad publicity for the council in such a short space of time, that I see they've now done the decent thing (and probably the only sensible thing under the circumstances) and promptly rescinded it.  Common sense prevails!  

Oh, and we never got seconds of school dinners either - except when the food was so unsurpassingly awful that there was loads of it left over.          

   

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