A MAYOR is urging the government to invest in children's health by ensuring they have access to healthy food.

Mayor of Middlesbrough, Andy Preston, last week signed a open letter, coordinated by the food and farming charity Sustain, backing call for expansion of children’s food programmes and Sugar Tax investment.

Mayor Preston is joined by Mark Adams, Director of Public Health in South Tees and 29 fellow Directors of Public Health across England.

The new proposals would give £500K to every local authority to improve children’s diets.

The new measures called for include: expanding the School Fruit & Vegetable Scheme to all primary age children in England, extending free school meals and holiday activity and food programmes to all children in England whose families are in receipt of Universal Credit, raising the value of Healthy Start vouchers in line with inflation to £4.25, as well as ensuring all pregnant women and families with young children in receipt of Universal Credit are eligible.

Currently, close to £1million worth of Healthy Start vouchers in Tees Valley are going unclaimed, £370,000 in Middlesbrough, which was ranked the most deprived district regarding income deprivation among children, where 33% of children in are living in poverty.

Mark Adams, Director of Public Health for South Tees, said: “In South Tees, it will national support to our local priorities of tackling obesity, particularly amongst children. It is also essential in narrowing the health inequalities that we face between South Tees and the England average, and also within our area.”

The measures also call on ensuring that families with no recourse to public funds that would otherwise be eligible do not miss out. The letter addresses Rishi Sunak MP, Gavin Williamson MP and Matt Hancock MP, whose remits on the UK’s budget, schools policy and health policy respectively give them the ultimate authority to enact these measures.

These calls echo the recommendations put forward by the National Food Strategy Part 1, which highlighted an urgent need to expand free school meal eligibility, holiday food provision and Healthy Start eligibility in order to address child food insecurity in the UK. Footballer Marcus Rashford has championed increasing and protecting access to free school meals, including over the school holidays, pressuring the Government to continue providing free school meals to eligible children, including children whose families have no recourse to public funds over the August school holidays.

Mark Adams, Director of Public Health for South Tees, said: “We are fully supportive Sustain’s policy call to put children’s health at the heart of the government’s Spending Review. In South Tees, it will add much needed national support to our local priorities of tackling obesity, particularly amongst children. It is also essential in narrowing the health inequalities that we face between South Tees and the England average, and also within our area.”