End ban on snacks, say boarding school heads

They say strict guidelines introduced three years ago, banning snacks including cakes, biscuits and sweets, are inappropriate.

While the rules, which cover everything from breakfast clubs through to tuck shops and after-school clubs, do not impact as much on day schools, state boarding heads say they are affecting their pupils' meal times and snacks.

The headmaster of Royal Alexandra and Albert School in Reigate, Surrey, Paul Spencer Ellis, told the Times Educational Supplement: "The whole logic is that the regulations are for a day school where the parents aren't going to feed them properly at home, but in a boarding school we do all their meals.

"But, as it stands, pupils come into the boarding house after school and they want to grab some carbs and it's illegal. It's illegal for me to give them a sticky bun."

He claims the rules do not make sense because he is allowed to give pupils a pudding at lunch time, but banned from providing something similar after school.

In the school's latest Ofsted social care inspection inspectors found that boarders were "vocal in their unhappiness" at the food guidelines.