Scots council: 9-yr-old lunch blogger was causing 'distress and harm'
A Scottish council have said that a nine-year-old food blogger was misrepresenting her school dinners and distressing the canteen staff, by publishing a photoblog about her lunch. The media attention caused by the photos, such as the one below was causing "distress and harm" to staff the council said. School Dinner by Glasgow …
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Re: In the army now
2pounds for the meal of which 70p was for ingredients, the rest for staffing, power, councillor junkets to learn about how the schhol dinner system works on whatever tropical island they saw on the travel channel.
I've always been a believer in doing it right or not doing it at all. If an extra 20p a day split between staffing and food brings better quality food then to me it is worth it. Why pay anything for crap when you can make a packed lunch. Those that genuinely cannot afford it get free dinners, which is as it should be.
If the kids don't like healthier food then that's the parents issue. If we didn't eat what was on offer our parents wwould find out and there would be lickings and a monologue about how hard my parents worked for their money and who the hell was I to turn down good food.
If I smacked my kid the council would have me in chains in minutes, yet they can charge 2 quid for child abuse on a plate.
Re: In the army now
> I read that the school meal pictured was being charged at £2.
That doesn't mean that any more than 70p is actually spent on the meal.
Re: In the army now
I despise sodhexo. They took over a subsidise staff canteen. Choice went down, prices went up, food quality went down. The one positive was accidental, they hired a Polish cook who could actually cook and did his best to sneak real cooked food past his managers.
We did nearly all get sacked one day, he made a crumble, it looked like apple but didn't smell right so we asked him. Having about 4 words of English he just drew an outline in the air of something remarkably phallus like. Thus pear crumble became cock crumble (we did explain to him what this meant, he had a wicked sense of humour). This went down very well with everyone till our director asked what it was.
Apart from that it was 4-5 quid for a sandwich (remember the company subsidised this racket), if you wanted frozen fish (don't ask the type) and chips it was usually over 5 quid.
Salad bars
Salad bars, etc, are no good, if they're not accompanied by suitable teaching about food and introduction to foods which may differ from what has been previously experienced. If all you eat at home is burgers and chips, you're not going to stuff yourself with salad at school, especially if burger and chips is also on the menu.
I'm all for choice, but it's not a choice if you're not capable of understanding the options or the consequences of your actions. Most children (any many adults) are not.
Re: Salad bars
I bow to your knowledge of what 'most children' know and what is taught in school about healthy eating.
How did you get that knowledge?
Pardon me, you made it up to suit your argument?
Hmm, son, I am disappoint
Re: Salad bars
My Father, Mother, both sisters, Aunt and Uncle and one cousin are all teachers, ranging from primary to secondary head, with specialisms including SEN and Speech Therapy.
So no, I didn't make it up, I've been hearing this sort of thing for a couple of decades.
Re: Salad bars
I agree to a point. Yes the school may have more luck if it accompanied a salad br with education as you state. However, the biggest change has to be driven by the parents. Parents are usually kids role models, before they get to school they have had 4 years of conditioning from their parents. It would be an uphill battle for the school without parental support. True some kids would respond better than others but I do believe (and I am more than happy to hear your thoughts) that the biggest battle is in the home.
I remember our primary school picked a different country every month and you learnt about their culture (and history etc), including making their national dishes. How we didn't poison each other I don't know, but it did make us braver when it came to trying different foods. Some kids hated it. Funnily enough it was the kids with more affluent parents who could afford junk food who hated anything that wasn't burger, chips and coke.
Look at the JustGiving link.
Most of the donations appear to have come in after the ban, so it's done some good.
(On an unrelated note, someone at A&B Council needs to put the shovel down.)
Blogger was causing 'distress and harm'?
Not as much distress and harm as those dinners look like they would cause
Re: Blogger was causing 'distress and harm'?
+1. Just looking at it makes me want to cry.
Re: Blogger was causing 'distress and harm'?
I'd be somewhat distressed if I had to eat that!
I'd probably be "distressed" too if the someone was if someone was publishing a blog with photographs proving my work wasn't up to snuff. That doesn't mean that the blog is in the wrong though.
As for the charge of misrepresentation, if there were two choices each day, unless one was something she absolutely hated then it would seem reasonable that she chose the better of the two options. Therefore, the photos potentially show the school dinners in an overly flattering light as they don't factor in the less palatable option. I suppose technically that is misrepresentation, but surely one that if anything is in the school's favour.
indeed
If they wanted to refute the photos then they should have taken their own photos to justify everything was fine.
Oh wow
I was prepared for a statement way up on the idiocy scale, but the council still managed to impress me.
Re: Oh wow
Their efforts to portray themselves as the victim are hilarious.
Distress & Harm
Right. That meal looks like toy food you give a 5 year old to play at cooking with on their Little Tykes play kitchen.
Distress & Harm caused to the councillor's wallet which was getting a kickback for awarding that catering contract to the cookery clowns that would net him/her the most moolah, most likely.
Little Tykes play kitchen.
No no no - its all about da a la Carte Kitchen with the Swiss roll drizzled with baked beans! Or it least it would be if it was 1987 still!
Back to the main topic - so a nine year old girl is causing harm and distress is she? I take it her local council are planning the extradition charge to the US for terrorism against canteen food as we speak - or maybe they have decided to just drone her as it's now the in thing to do to terrorists and those that cause harm and distress to society and interfere with the functioning of the state!
What a bunch of losers!
Re: Distress & Harm
"which was getting a kickback for awarding that catering contract"
I think you've nailed it right down.
Avoided criticism?
"The Council has directly avoided any criticism of anyone involved in the ‘never seconds’ blog for obvious reasons despite a strongly held view that the information presented in it misrepresented the options and choices available to pupils"
The only "obvious reasons" I can think of is that, while the Council believes the options and choices have been misrepresented they know that a Court of Law would think otherwise.
The trouble with politicians is they never stop digging when they realise they are in a hole. Say hi to the Earth's core for me......
Good grief
Even a McDonalds burger looks better than that one ... and I wouldn't touch a McDonalds if you paid me.
I agree with Mr C Hill, come the revolution make them pay for the bullet, before it's used of course.
Re: Good grief
> Even a McDonalds burger looks better than that one ...
And is probably cheaper? 99p?
Re: Good grief
Instead of wasting bullets you could probably just get them to eat one of those meals.
So the school approved...
but the council thought there was something to hide?
I hope the puiblicity get the charity (mary's Dinners) all the support it needs!
Scottish diet
That's good for a jock diet, there is a bit of green stuff on the plate.
Deep fried pizza anyone ?
Re: Scottish diet
Presumably you're English? Thought you lot took pride in the quality and incisiveness of your humour?
Re: Presumably you're English?
Stereotype, but it's true more often than not. Not particularly funny, and a very old, weak joke, but true.
Despit this, Scotland produces some great food. Just not a lot of salad.
Re: Presumably you're English?
I grew up in dumfries and as I said earlier, that looks a lot better than the thin watery slop that i got as a school dinner when I was in primary school.
If it couldnt be boiled to death is those huge aluminium cauldrons then it wasnt done. I do remember we did get a plate of salad once a month with a pork pie on it. Everyone ate the pork pie, egg and cheese and slung the rest.
Reminds me of the rhyme
School dinners, school dinners
Concrete chips, concrete chips
Soggy semolina, soggy semolina
I feel sick, I feel sick
Re: Reminds me of the rhyme
Works if put to the melody of Frère Jacques
Re: Rhyme?
Dinners rhymes with dinners
chips rhymes with chips
semolina rhymes with semolina
sick rhymes with sick.
And there you have it. Children aren't known for their poetic prowess.
I'm sure we used to try and insert toilet talk into that song, but I can't for the life of me remember how. But then again, i can barely remember last week, let alone 30 years ago.
Re: Rhyme?
Toilet quick
I feel sick
It's too late
I've done it on the plate
Just donated
I have give £10 to Mary's Meals - a good cause with a good supporter at that school!
they never learn
find themselves in the hole and... start digging, deeper and deeper, furiously, and with the most ridiculous tools, like a toothbrush up their arse. I bet they'll soon, faced with "general public outrage" send some poor "spokesperson" to apologize to the family and issue a statement that their position has been mis-interpreted and mis-represented, etc,etc.
and, by the way, is it one of those "healthy" meals on that plate? Yum-me! :/
what are they complaining about?
that's a lolly she's got there for desert! a lolly!! ffs!!!
why's she comlpaining? we never got lollies at our canteen when i were a lad at school. it was always horrible unidentifiable stale pudding of some kind drowned cold custard. i would have killed for a lolly!
kids these days, tsk, [cue Monty Python....]
7 digit pageviews right now.
Someone tell the council about the Streissand effect.
Re: 7 digit pageviews right now.
If The page view number is updating in realtime, 10 hits/seconds
Oh well, busts the theory
that this was a cunning ploy by Argyll & Bute to sell themselves. They are certainly making an impression, but I don't think it's what they intended.
Where do I buy that food???
Just followed the Marys Meals links and read up. It costs £10 to feed a child for a year. Where can I buy this food, £30 and I'm sorted for the year.
What concerns me, is that primary school are given the option to eat junk food. Its OK to give them an ice lolly and burger, as there was the option of an 'all you can eat salad bar'. These are small children - given the option of course most of them will eat the high in sugar and fat food.
If my child went to this school i would be fuming, and the catering staff, teachers and councillors should be disgraced of themselves.
I have kids at school, the school menu is published and rotates over 2 weeks (9 day option). They are allowed a "junk" option once a week (burgers for our little uns) and chips one day. The rest is pasta, rice, pie, sausage and mash, jacket potatoes. Veg with every meal and fruit as an option daily.
I have brought up my children to appreciate fruit and vegetables as a normal part of their eating as such even the 5 year old picks up fruit to eat (not just in school but in cafe's too).
Whilst not the best looking thing in the world there is a hell of a lot worse and I would like to see both sides of the story (and the menus) before I jump on the venom wagon.
"The rest is pasta, rice, pie, sausage and mash, jacket potatoes."
So not particularly healthy either, then?
Bah!
The council are saying choices include things like 'meat or vegetarian lasagne served with carrots and garlic bread or chicken pie with puff pastry, mashed potato and mixed vegetables,' but what the photo shows is a very small hamburger, two potato croquettes, three slices of cucumber and an ice lolly. With a disparity that wide between advertisement and reality, small wonder the council has moved to stop the child.
Re: Bah!
I wonder if it's the catering company who are telling the council that it's all vegetarian lasagne, while trousering the difference. Corporate catering in schools? Yes please!
Re: Bah!
There's lasagne and then there's lasagne, there's chicken pie & then there's chicken pie.
From the picture in the previous article I had a problem working out that the strange flat brownish thing was supposed to be pizza. I've seen (and eaten) burgers that bear virtually no resemblance to the one in the picture for this article. 3 slices of cucumber could be described very loosly as "salad" - especially if there were other offerings available on the salad bar, however inedible they may have been (brown slimy lettuce, the same bowl of tomatoes that was offered the previous day etc).
1 scoop of "smash" made with no butter and dried out through being sat under a heat lamp isn't really any more appetising than those croquettes, and cheap tinned or frozen mixed vegetables can be pretty revolting. A small brick of rock hard bread that's been baked to death with a drizzle of artificial garlic flavoured oil isn't exactly haute cuisine either.
I suggest that -
- the council hire this 9-year-old to handle their public relations. She's clearly better at it than them.
Oh, to be a fly on the wall in next week's staff meeting.
And I'd love to see them televise Monday morning's assembly now.
Another triumph for devolution
In England it would be *illegal* to serve a child the lunch shown in that picture.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2007/2359/contents/made
Re: Another triumph for devolution
You think it's different in Scotland?
http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2003/05/17090/21740
But if the child won't put the food on their plate what are you supposed to do?
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