At one school, the children have the meal in the school, the food being sent in by a caterer, the head-mistress preferring that arrangement.
Annual Report of the School Medical Officer for Stoke-on-Trent, 1912, p. 23.
At Acton the meals are given at a dingy eating-house which is intended primarily to serve the needs of the women working at the laundries in the district.[262] There is only one room, so that the children have to have their meals with the other customers, and the hour at which the children come in, between twelve and one, is, of course, the busy hour for the restaurant. At one time a rota of ladies attended voluntarily to supervise the meals, but this plan has been given up; the School Attendance Officers now take it in turn to be present. The children come and go as they please and there is no attempt to teach table manners.
This eating-house is situated in the poorest part of Acton, where the great majority of the children who are on the dinner-list live. In a few cases, where the children live in other districts, arrangements are made for them to obtain food at the cookery centres; this food they take home with them. This plan, we were told, is only adopted in cases where the mother can be trusted to see that the dinners are really eaten by the children for whom they are intended.
At Liverpool, till quite recently, the same system was in force. The children received coupons at the school, which they presented at various cocoa rooms in the city.[263] The objections to this system were many. The number of cocoa rooms, at which coupons were accepted, was limited, and in some cases the nearest cocoa room was situated too far from the school for the children to be sent there.[264] Though some managers refused to supply unsuitable food, others gave whatever the children asked for--frequently buns, jam puffs, or iced cakes.[265] Often the children would take the food home to be shared among the other members of the family.[266] At some cocoa rooms the children were served in the general room, and were brought into contact with adult customers "of a class not choice in language or manners." There was little or no supervision--only occasional visits by the teachers--and consequently no attempt "to influence the children in the direction of cleanliness and orderliness at meals."[267] In spite of these revelations the system was continued for several years, being only finally given up in August, 1912. The meals are now served in centres. The food is at present supplied by caterers, but the Education Committee are considering the advisability of providing their own kitchen.