For some children, a school dinner could be their main meal of the day.

But under the Government’s planned welfare reforms, 350,000 children could lose their free school meals.

Analysis by the Children’s Society found that more than 1.2 million youngsters living in poverty are currently missing out on school dinners which are linked to low-income benefits.

The charity’s report says ministers were considering a new income cap for eligible families which could leave more than 100,000 households worse off.

The Government is considering a new streamlined system of universal credit to replace the current array of benefits and tax credits, raising fears that hundreds of thousands of families could be left with lower entitlements.

The Children’s Society said such moves risked creating a ‘cliff-edge.’ If an earnings threshold of £7,500 was introduced for entitlement to free school meals, 120,000 families in England – with around 350,000 school-age children – would lose out, it says.

According to the charity’s Fair And Square report, 2.2 million English schoolchildren are living below the poverty line. More than half of these youngsters are not receiving free school meals, while 700,000 are not entitled to the dinners, it revealed.

The Children’s Society is calling for all children living in poverty in England to be entitled to a free meal by October.

There are currently 19,857 children eligible for school meals in Bradford.

Social reformer Margaret McMillan was instrumental in bringing school meals to Bradford.

The city was the first in the country to introduce school meals in the 20th century, with Green Lane Primary School in Bradford played an important part.

The school boasts a museum dedicated to the history of school meals, and its role in helping to implement them in the city.

Sally McArthur, one of the school’s deputy heads, explains how Green Lane became a feeding station.

“Green Lane became a school meal kitchen, serving lots of other schools around the area,” she says.

Sally says it was the first school in Britain, and possibly the world, to do school meals.

Councillor Ralph Berry, Bradford Council’s executive member for children and young people, says the Government’s proposals are a “devastating blow”.

“I think it is outrageous. Bradford has worked very hard year on year and has successfully increased our free school meals uptake.”

Coun Berry says he has visited a number of schools where, without a school meal, children would have insufficient nutrition to maintain their attention during the day.

“This city invented school meals and I believe this will deeply damage the educational prospects of the children in Bradford. This is the wrong thing at the wrong time.”

Food scientist Verner Wheelock, who runs Verner Wheelock Associates, a provider of food industry training in Skipton, says the charity’s report makes a “compelling case that every effort should be made to ensure that children living in poverty should have a school lunch which is provided free”.

“I really think that a good lunch is very important for people who are living on the poverty level,” he says. “It can make a really genuine contribution to improving their health and wellbeing and I think it is diabolical if people like that are going to miss out in some new initiative by the Government.

“We ought to be looking after these people instead of making life even more difficult for them.”

He added: “In my opinion this should have a much higher priority than the current campaign to provide healthy meals for all. For the majority of children who do not live in poverty, the impact on their total diet is minimal.”

Children’s Minister, Sarah Teather, says: “We remain totally committed to continuing to provide free school meals to children from the poorest families.

“We are reforming welfare to get more people into jobs as that is the surest way of cutting poverty.

“The reforms mean we will have to think hard about the best way to decide who is eligible for free school meals so they continue to be targeted at those who need them the most.

“No plans have yet been set and we will be consulting later this year about the best way forward.”