NORTHUMBERLAND Labour’s deputy leader has added his voice to calls for the Government to fund free school meals during the school holidays.

The latest figures show that there were 7,526 eligible children in the county last year – continuing the rising trend of the previous two years – with Labour warning that they now face half-term with tier two Covid-19 restrictions, but without free school meals.

In the summer, the Government bowed to pressure to run a food voucher scheme throughout the holidays, but so far there has been a refusal to commit to doing the same next week or at Christmas.

Cllr. Scott Dickinson has now joined Labour colleagues nationally to call for the meals to be provided, while also asking Anne-Marie Treveylan, the Tory MP for Berwick-upon-Tweed, to back this campaign, saying that children in Northumberland have had a "really rough year."