Oldham school where staff buy food and bedding for pupils

Werneth Primary School principal Jonathan Bell spoke about the impact of poverty on his students and how the school can provide a "warm, clean healthy environment".

The headteacher detailed how the school has set up a food bank, with staff who go "above and beyond" and have "personally dug into their own pockets to make sure families don’t go hungry".

Werneth Primary School principal Jonathan Bell (Image: Pinnacle Learning Trust)

Figures from the Department for Work and Pensions show that Oldham children are some of the most likely to be in poverty in the country.

The areas in the borough with the highest rates of child poverty were Coldhurst (67.7 per cent), St Mary’s (60.5 per cent), and Werneth (56.4 per cent), all of which are up from equivalent figures in 2015.

While more than half of children in Werneth were identified as being in relative poverty, according to the DWP figures, the headteacher said only around a third were eligible to receive the pupil premium – government funding to help improve educational outcomes for disadvantaged pupils, such as those on free school meals.

‘Disconnect’ in the figures

The 39-year-old principal said: “It’s quite interesting that there’s that disconnect between 56 per cent of children who are in poverty and only 33 per cent who are able to qualify for benefits and support.

“So, I think there is a connection there in terms of the cause of that between government policy and eligibility, and how eligibility for financial support has changed in that period.

“You’d expect those figures to be far more aligned than they are.”

Pupils at Werneth Primary School (Image: Pinnacle Learning Trust)

Fuel poverty affecting ‘ability to thrive’

The headteacher detailed the effects of fuel poverty on pupils’ learning.

He continued: “We’ve got some families that are living in fuel poverty, and that will affect children’s health, that will affect their attendance; so their ability to thrive is going to be affected by some of those factors.”

Since Covid, the school set up food banks and even a uniform swap shop to help families in need – with some items funded by members of staff themselves, as well as sponsorship from local companies.

Food banks in schools across Oldham

In fact, according to the headteacher, every school in the Pinnacle Learning Trust group of academies, which also includes Hathershaw College and Oldham Sixth Form College, now has its own food bank.

Mr Bell said: “The food bank has put food on the table of families that have nothing in their cupboards and our staff have gone above and beyond all the time.

“They’ve funded and provided food for the food bank when we’ve got families that are very new to the area or have had to move house suddenly.

“They’ve provided things like bedding and clothes for families, to make sure that those children’s experience is not as affected by circumstances as they might be at times.

“We try to support children to make sure whatever the circumstances the family have found themselves in, that we’ve given them an opportunity to have those things that would meet their basic needs and allow them to come into school and learn and do the best they can.”

Staff ‘amazing group of people’

The headteacher added: “[Staff] personally have dug into their own pockets to make sure that families don’t go hungry, that children are clothed, that children have bedding, so that they can have warmth in a house that has no heating.

“That’s the team that we have here, they’re an amazing group of people, an absolutely amazing group of people.

“It’s by no means all the community, we’ve got some people with their own businesses and some great cars and big houses, it’s not all one thing, Werneth, as an area, but when we’ve got families in need, our staff rise to the occasion and they’ve done that time and time again, whether it’s food, clothing, bedding, even things for around peoples’ house just to make them feel more secure.

“They’ve done that time and time again to make sure the children come in in the best shape they can to be ready to learn, and also to give them the best chance educationally.”

Oldham children some of the poorest in the country

According to DWP figures, Oldham children are more likely to live in poverty than nearly everywhere else in the country, behind only Birmingham, the City of London, Nottingham, and Leicester, which had the highest.

However, the DWP said figures for the City of London should be treated with caution, due to the low population in the square-mile centre of the nation’s capital.

Overall the data reveals 21,079 children in Oldham were living in relative poverty in the year ending April 2022.

It meant 38.5 per cent of children in the area were in a family whose income was below 60 per cent of average household income and claimed child benefit and at least one other household benefit.

The figures are up from 36.5 per cent of children who were living in poverty in 2020-21 and up nearly 10 percentage points from 28.9 per cent seen in 2014-15, when comparable records began.