Daytime TV host Eamonn Holmes has given his backing to the Bradford school at the centre of a 'lunchbox police' sausage roll row.

The heavyweight presenter weighed in on the side of Shirley Manor Primary Academy, which was this week criticised for a heavy-handed approach to enforcing its healthy eating policy.

On Wednesday the T&A exclusively broke the story that the school had been checking pupils' lunchboxes for unhealthy contraband after hearing from unhappy parents including Wyke dad Steve Fryer.

Mr Fryer, whose son Troy, 7, had a sausage roll confiscated by teachers, today appeared on ITV's flagship This Morning programme to discuss the policy.

He told the show: "He's a really fussy eater, is Troy, so we just packed him what we had been packing him for the last two years - he's been going with a sausage roll, maybe, or a jam sandwich - you know, things that we could actually get him to eat.

"So we just packed him the same and they took the sausage roll off him and a chocolate biscuit.

"They gave him a ham sandwich. He doesn’t even like ham so he had to take the ham out and just have a crisp sandwich for his dinner."

Mr Fryer said he was not against the school encouraging healthier eating but said you can't force children to eat. He said the school had suggested he try Troy with other foods, including cocktail sausages.

He said: "It’s not just about a sausage roll: it’s the principle that they’re actually taking food out of the kids’ lunchboxes and they’re also sniffing bottles of water to make sure they can’t have flavoured water."

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Presenter Eamonn Holmes took the school's side in the debate, saying: 

“I applaud them. I actually think we all need to educated - Steve needs to be educated, I need to be educated.”

He added: “We all think we’re doing the right thing but it’s really good to be told: no, you’re not.”

Referring to the school’s headteacher, Holmes added: “I think Mrs Lacey, there - Heather Lacey, you’re doing a brilliant thing.”

But his co-presenter and off-screen wife Ruth Langsford took the opposite view, saying: “I’m not saying [sausage rolls are] not unhealthy on a regular basis, but to take something and then give him something to replace it that he didn’t like, and therefore he didn’t eat, seems strange to me.”