The Kitchen Changes Hands
Local government reorganisation will move school catering arrangements to new councils on a fixed date. It reopens an older question: who should run the kitchen, and on what evidence?
In this briefing
- Introduction
- What a catering arrangement carries
- Reorganisation: what transfers, and what it transfers into
- In-house or outsourced: what the comparison has to include
- The third route: a company the council owns
- Capital in the kitchen
- People, pay and pensions
- The schools' view
- The supplier and investor view
- Questions to carry forward
- References
Introduction
On 1 April 2027, twelve councils in Surrey will be dissolved and two new unitary councils will take over every service they ran.[1] In most of the other two-tier areas invited to reorganise in February 2025, elections to new councils are intended for 6 May 2027, ahead of vesting day on 1 April 2028.[2] Vesting day is the date a new council legally comes into existence and its predecessors cease to exist.
School catering rarely features in reorganisation plans. It is not a statutory headline service in the way social care or waste collection is. Yet where a county council provides school meals, through its own staff, a council-owned company or a contract it let on behalf of schools, that arrangement will pass to a new organisation on a fixed date. So will the staff, the kitchens, the service agreements with schools and academies, and every commercial assumption built into them.
An earlier briefing in this series looked at four policy dates that reach school catering contracts between 2026 and 2027. This one looks at a structural change: what happens when the organisation holding the arrangement is itself replaced, and why that reopens the oldest question in the category. Should a school's kitchen be run in-house, by a council, or by a contractor, and how would anyone know which is better value?
What a catering arrangement carries
A school catering arrangement is rarely just a meal price. It usually carries an operating service: breakfast and lunch, free and paid meals, menu development, allergen and dietary…
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This briefing reflects the author's analysis and understanding of the market, based on professional experience and information available at the time of publication. It is provided for information and discussion and is not legal, financial, investment or other professional advice. Full disclaimer.