The Evening Standard has won Campaign of the Year for its School Hunger investigation at the 2023 Society of Editors Media Freedom Awards, which champion the public’s right to know and hold power to account.
Campaigns editor David Cohen collected the award at a dinner held on Wednesday night in the City.
Our campaign, in which we partnered with The Independent and The Food Foundation, exposed the plight of 800,000 children in England who live in poverty but are not eligible for free school meals because their parents’ income exceeds the threshold of just £7,400 a year.
This risibly low threshold is applied by the Government irrespective of the number of children in the family and heavily impacts low-income working families and children of part-time workers, many in jobs like nursing and other caring professions.
They can end up less well off than children in the poorest families who do get free school meals.
The Times was highly commended and other shortlisted titles included The Sunday Times, The i, Daily Express and The Sun.
The judges said our campaign exposed the shocking story of how “hungry parents and children were being forced to steal food” and praised it for its “tangible results”, with the Mayor subsequently agreeing to fund free school meals for all primary school children in the capital.
Southwark Council – one of four London councils that already provided free school meals to primary school children - also agreed to fund free school meals in the borough for secondary school children in poverty. An additional 100,000 children in London now get free school meals.
