Letter to all parents through the Mosques regarding Halal school meals

You may be aware that Bolton Council of Mosques (BCoM) have been engaged in attempting to verify the authenticity of Halal meals within schools in Bolton. We are pleased to inform you that BCoM have completed an audit of the Halal meat and chicken supply chain for School Meals provision in Bolton.

To this end we have examined the supply chain and have undertaken an audit of the ingredients used in the preparation of both Halal and vegetarian school meals.

As a result :

• The ingredients used have been changed to ensure all ingredients are suitable for Halal consumption.
• The suppliers of meat and chicken have also been reviewed. The new suppliers of meat and chicken will be HMC approved.
• The products will be supplied by an HMC approved supplier to the Council’s distributor / contractor in sealed and labelled packs, which will then be delivered to the Schools by the Contractor in the same sealed and labelled bags.
• Measures have also been put in place for tracking and monitoring through HMC for the supply and distribution of meat products to schools.
• A guidance manual for the storage, preparation and serving of Halal meals in the School Kitchen has also been developed by the councils catering department and circulated to all schools.
• The Council’s catering division have trained all the kitchen staff in respect of handling, cooking, storage, serving, etc of Halal meals
• It is proposed that this will continue to be reviewed, developed and monitored.

The next phase will be to develop suitable monitoring arrangements within the schools to remove any potential issues of cross-contamination during preparation and serving as this is the individual schools responsibility. We will work with the schools and the Council’s catering department to achieve this.

The Council have taken a decision that Halal School meals will be re-introduced in the 15 Schools which were previously served Halal menus starting from Monday 12th May 2008.

A list of the Schools where Halal meals will be provided is attached and parents are requested to note the Schools. Only the schools listed below serve Halal meals through the Councils catering department.

Schools where Halal meals will be served:

1. The Valley
2. Sunning Hill County Primary
3. Pikes Lane County Primary
4. Bishop Bridgeman CE School
5. Clarendon County Primary School
6. Haslam Park County Primary School
7. Lever Edge County Primary School
8. All Saints CE School
9. Brownlow Fold County Primary School
10. Gaskell County Primary School
11. Gilnow County Primary School
12. Sharples County Primary School
13. St. Mathew’s Bolton CE School
14. St Michael’s CE School
15. St Paul’s CE School