SOME of Europe’s biggest catering companies are so appalled by Britain’s cheap school dinners that they are refusing to supply them.

Avenance, owned by Elior Group, provides school meals for French children but said last week it would be “detrimental” to British pupils to serve them ingredients costing as little as 37p per head. Another French company, Sodexho, announced that it would refuse to bid for future contracts unless more money was spent on proper ingredients.

The boycott has exposed the stark contrast between school dinners in France and Britain. French children are given well-balanced four-course meals with fresh ingredients costing about £1.10 each — three times the 37p here — while British children are mainly fed cheap processed food.

Tim Collins, the Conservative education spokesman, said: “It’s absolutely shaming that French companies feel standards are so low in this country that they are refusing to bid for contracts.”

The growing concern over school meals has been highlighted by Jamie Oliver, the celebrity chef, who works as a school cook in the Channel 4 programme Jamie’s School Dinners. He is campaigning for more money to be spent on ingredients.

A meeting of school catering companies on Tuesday will call for more government spending on children’s nutrition.

Tim West, chairman of Avenance, said: “Our neighbours in France spend a lot more than we do. The amount we spend is absurdly low and is never going to be able to fulfil children’s nutritional requirements.

“We are not prepared to bid for contracts in the state school sector in this country. It’s just not possible to provide good standards at the price demanded and it would be detrimental to the interests of children.”

Sodexho, which has contracts serving 700 schools, said last week it was reviewing its school catering policy and would refuse to bid for contracts where the cost of ingredients was less than 55p a head.

Stephen Thorns, Sodexho’s divisional director for commercial education, said: “We have done our absolute best to provide children with the best food possible, but the figures just don’t stack up. People need to realise that if they don’t want children eating processed food, there is a price to pay.”

Scolarest, a subsidiary of Compass Group, provides some of the cheapest school dinners in Britain. It spends on average about 45p a child, but said last week it would like to see this rise to 70p.

The better provision of school meals in France is exemplified by Sodexho, which has contracts on the Continent and in Britain. It spends between 45p and 55p per head on ingredients in this country, compared with between 70p and £1.38 in France.

In Paris the total cost of a school meal is about £4.10, with about £1 spent on ingredients. The city provides a subsidy of nearly £60m. “We devote a considerable sum to school meals in Paris because we want to emphasise quality and nutritional balance,” said Eric Ferrand, the deputy mayor.

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