LONDON – The British government dropped a controversial proposal to scrap free milk for schoolchildren as prime minister David Cameron warned on Sunday that cherished public services would have to be axed in upcoming spending cuts.
Cameron likened Britain to a failing business and said an austerity drive needed to address the record budget deficit would involve painful cuts to government services.
But, confusion over plans to scrap free milk – which saw a minister appear on television saying the idea was under consideration just as Cameron’s Downing Street office ruled it out – showed how hard it would be to make such unpopular cuts.
Free milk for schoolchildren was first introduced during the 1940s and now costs the country £50 million a year, but getting rid of it is a political hot potato because of the effect on children’s welfare.
The proposal echoed the decision of former Conservative prime minister Margaret Thatcher to withdraw free milk for children over seven when she was education secretary in the 1970s, earning her the nickname “Thatcher the milk snatcher”.
Details of a spending review by the Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition government will be announced in October, with departments facing unprecedented cuts of some 25 per cent.
"When a company is failing, when spending is rising, sales are falling and debt is mounting, you need someone to come in with energy, ideas and vision," Mr Cameron said in the Sunday Timesnewspaper.
“But even with reform, the truth is there will be some things we genuinely value that will have to go because of the legacy we have been left. I don’t like that any more than anyone else, but this is the reality of the situation we’re in.”
Cameron has warned that there would be some unpopular spending decisions, and while few firm proposals have been made public, some suggestions have already been dropped after causing friction in the coalition.
The latest casualty was the proposal to end free milk for children under five.
The BBC reported health minister Anne Milton had written to her Scottish counterpart detailing plans to scrap the milk scheme.
“It’s no longer happening,” said a spokesman for Cameron. – (Reuters)