Free school meals: 'Mouldy' food prompts action from mums

Kerry Elson said the creation of the new support group had received an "amazing response"

Two mums have set up a parent support Facebook group after being concerned about the quality of their free school meal boxes.

Kerry Elson posted photos on a community Facebook page for Yatton, Somerset, of mouldy vegetables she says came from the company Chartwells.

She called the food "inedible" and said it "just wasn't acceptable".

Chartwells said it had received a lot of "positive feedback" from parents about its food.

The company had been criticised by Premier League footballer Marcus Rashford in January over the amount of food in its parcels, which it apologised for.

The food was described as 'inedible'

The mums said food boxes contained mouldy fruit and vegetables

Mum-of-four Ms Elson said the problem had got worse over the past fortnight.

"It's just inedible, it's mouldy, it's rotten, it is just not acceptable for any child to eat.

"It has got progressively worse the last week or two. We, and other parents, rely on those parcels and they are just not good enough," she said.

Ms Elson's sister-in-law, Ellis, added: "You pick a pear up and put your thumb through it.

"It almost feels like our children are being punished. To think that someone is hand selecting these items to put into the box, to distribute to low-income families, there is no care or thought put into that."

Ellis Elson said people had donated items including food bags, books, pens and pencils, which will be distributed to parents in need of support

They have set up a Facebook support group to offer a "safe place" for struggling parents to ask for help.

"We set this up because we felt so passionately that if we are suffering, other parents are suffering, and is it fair that parents have to choose between feeding their children rotten food or not feeding them at all?" Kerry said.

Their primary school has a contract with Chartwells, which says it has offered replacement parcels to replace the ones that provoked the complaints.

In a statement Chartwells said: "Unfortunately it is impossible to tell whether the pictures provided to the BBC are from one of our parcels.

"It is important to stress that if a parent is ever unhappy with what they receive they can call our helpline and receive a replacement parcel within 24 hours.

"We have substantially enhanced our lunch parcels in the last three weeks, and are also providing free breakfast too.

"We have supplied over 30,000 parcels in the last two weeks and have been receiving lots of positive feedback from parents."