A company involved in supplying school lunches has gone into liquidation.
Deloitte New Zealand, who has been appointed liquidator, said Libelle Group was contracted by Compass Group to deliver approximately 125,000 meals daily as part of the Government’s Ka Ora, Ka Ako Healthy School Lunches programme.
“The Liquidators are undertaking a full and urgent review of all of Libelle’s operations, with our immediate focus being working with Libelle’s employees and affected stakeholders to ascertain the way forward, including ensuring students around New Zealand continue to receive their school lunches,” said David Webb of Deloitte New Zealand.
Libelle Group is a member of the School Lunch Collective alongside Compass Group NZ and Gilmours. It also runs things such as school tuck shops.
Associate Education Minister David Seymour said it was a commercial matter between Compass and Libelle.”Compass has assured the Ministry that any disruption will be minimised, and the liquidation process will not materially impact the provision of school lunches.
“To ensure the uninterrupted delivery of the school meals provided by Libelle central production kitchens, the Compass Group has told the Ministry that it will assume operations during this transition and take responsibility for providing meals every school day.”
In Question Time today, Prime Minister Christopher Luxon said the school lunch programme is “not at risk” after Libelle’s liquidation and that David Seymour was “working incredibly hard through some very challenging issues”.
Labour leader Chris Hipkins asked Luxon what it would take for him to step in “particularly given the one minister who actually seems to want to get it sorted out, Erica Stanford, is being ignored by David Seymour”.
“This is a minister who’s working incredibly hard through some very challenging issues to make sure that we get our food back to scratch, and to make sure that we deliver on time and in full,” Luxon replied.
“There’s some improvement happening, there’s a lot more that needs to happen, and as I said the minister is wanting to make sure there are improvements in place for Term 2.”
Speaking to reporters before Question Time in Parliament, Seymour said he believed “in the fullness of time, the record will show that we’ve acted very well, sometimes in some challenging circumstances”.
“I think people will say David Seymour, the Ministry of Education, and the Government were doing the right thing at the right time.”
He would not give any further detail on the situation when asked, saying that “sensitive commercial matters” were being worked through.
“If I start wading in with my reckons, that would upset the apple cart and I’m not going to do that.”
Education Minister Erica Stanford today said Seymour had informed her of “some difficulties” with Libelle in a conversation that took place “a couple of weeks before I was on Q+A”.
Stanford appeared on TVNZ’s Q+A programme on February 16, making their conversation likely to have occurred at the end of January or the beginning of February.
She said she didn’t know the “complete and utter full extent of it, but I knew there was some issues”.
“In terms of what’s happened today, I didn’t know it was quite at that point.”
‘Difficult situation’
The School Lunch Collective’s Paul Harvey acknowledged this was a “difficult situation” for Libelle and that the priority remained ensuring that 120,000 students continued to receive meals through the program.
He said Deloitte had asked Compass to help manage the transition and ensure stability while options for Libelle’s future were explored.
“To minimise disruption, Compass Group NZ has taken immediate steps to support Libelle, including ensuring staff wages are paid and keeping kitchen facilities running.
“We recognise the vital role that Libelle’s staff and partners play in delivering school lunches, and we are committed to ensuring the future of Libelle as part of the programme and supporting its people through this process.”
NZEI Te Riu Roa president Ripeka Lessels said she was concerned about how children would be fed and how schools would cope with another “lunches disaster”.
“[Education] Minister Stanford needs to take control of the programme immediately and give schools the choice to use in-school and community lunch providers if they wish to.”
Libelle’s liquidation is the latest in a string of issues that have plagued the revamped scheme.
At the beginning of the revamped programme at the end of January, some lunches arrived late or not at all, with several schools paying out of their own pocket to help feed their students.
The School Lunch Collective acknowledged there had been “teething problems” and Seymour said there would be “continuous improvement”.
The Ministry of Primary Industries launched an investigation into meals that had plastic packaging melted into the contents on March 4.
It is one of a number of investigations underway into food safety issues with the lunches: the mislabelling of lunches with special dietary requirements in Christchurch, another report of a packaging failure during heating and transportation in Whanganui, and a complaint from a Thames school about lunches being delivered at an unsafe temperature.
A Gisborne schoolboy was allegedly taken to hospital for treatment after being burnt by the contents of a school lunch when it spilled on their leg last week.
Stanford was due to speak with Seymour about the scheme last week, but the meeting was postponed.