Barnet’s Jewish community is founding a new charity that will aim to ensure the area’s schoolchildren are provided with free kosher school meals.

Despite Mayor of London Sadiq Khan’s pledge in July of additional funding to ensure schools could accommodate religious dietary requirements, problems allegedly remain with the provision of these meals.

The charity Kosher School Meals will act as an “intermediary between schools and society”, said its spokesman.

He added that it would seek to raise money to pass on to schools on a needs basis to help fund equipment and other associated costs in the provision of these meals.

The charity was founded by a group of Barnet councillors, business leaders, parents and teachers and is being led by Finchley Church End councillor Eva Greenspan.

Councillor Greenspan told the JC: “We hope to use the efficiency of the private sector, combined with the support of parents, to make sure [our kids] do not go hungry and lose out on their meals just because they’re Jewish.”

A spokesperson for the Mayor of London said: “We have increased the amount provided to councils for kosher meals to £3.50, a top-up of 85p, due to additional costs associated with delivering this provision.”