In 2016 there were four and a half million children attending state primary schools in the UK, a number that rises year upon year. The Conservatives say the free breakfast scheme they plan to introduce if they are re-elected next week will cost £60 million per year. That is not nearly enough to serve up muesli and a full English five days a week during term time. I have a suspicion that school cooks will not even do porridge – much too Oliver Twist – but will opt instead for low-grade breakfast cereal with milk and sugar. 

Surveys reveal that an alarming proportion of children go to school on an empty stomach. A snack of any kind at the beginning of the day is better than nothing. I support the idea of breakfast clubs. For parents setting off early to work, they provide a settling-down moment for children, and an appealing alternative to what can sometimes be a stressful breakfast at home. If such an option had been available at my children’s school I would have taken it, and, if asked, paid for it. 

But breakfast is breakfast – so use it for what it is: the first fuel injection of the day. No matter how well intentioned the new policy, a primary-school-age child needs more than the empty calories in corn flakes (even when “fortified” with powdered vitamins) in order to concentrate through a long school day.