Scots council blasted by fans of girl’s school meals blog

RED-FACED Argyll and Bute Council came under fire after interest in Martha Payne’s Neverseconds blog about her school meals went global.

NeverSeconds Martha and celeb Chef Nick Cairn

A COUNCIL received almost 4000 protests when they tried to stop a pupil taking pictures of her school meals.

Red-faced Argyll and Bute Council came under fire after interest in Martha Payne’s Neverseconds blog about her school meals went global.

The Lochgilphead primary pupil was told by bully-boy council chiefs she was not allowed to add pictures to her blog about school dinners.

But the council were forced into a U-turn after Martha won backing from thousands of supporters, including celebrity chefs Jamie Oliver and Nick Nairn.

A freedom of information request has now revealed Argyll and Bute Council received 3894 queries from Martha fans after trying to ban her from taking pictures of her lunches.

Supporters from around the world bombarded the council with emails, letters and calls expressing fury at the tactics.

Last night, Martha’s dad David, of Lochgilphead, said he was amazed.

He said: “It is a reminder that when people feel they have been treated unfairly by public bodies that something can be done about it and this is a prime example of that.

“It’s quite staggering but people were rightly annoyed by it.”

Martha’s JustGiving page has raised £113,000 towards kids’ charity Mary’s Meals.

Reported by the Daily Record.

The jobsworth who bullied a little girl should be fired!

They should be ashamed of themselves, they acted like playground bullies.

Well done Martha for seeing them off.

I wonder though why the Daily Record is reporting a story that is at least two months old, or is it only now the Council is acknowledging the response? But they did submit a Freedom of Information Request, therefore I assume the Council delayed until the limit of response time before giving an answer.

I wonder, does this count all the responses on twitter, as it would have been far far higher than 4,000?

At the weekend, Martha along with other child bloggers was featured on the front cover of the weekend section of The Times, with a double page spread inside.

Martha Payne aka Veg with her blog NeverSeconds writes on food. When she started her blog she expected family and friends to read NeverSeconds. It was quite a surprise to find the next morning 25,000 hits. She has had bully boys at her local council try to shut her down, these with the help of her friends and supporters she has seen off, an endorsement by Jamie Oliver, interview on the BBC Radio 4 Food Programme, nominated for a Great Scot Award, has raised over £110,000 for a food kitchen in Malawi called Friends of NeverSeconds, in September she plans to visit Malawi for the inauguration of Friends of Never Seconds and from where she will blog about Malawi. To date her blog has clocked up nearly 7.6 million hits and they are running at about one every couple of seconds.

I have nominated Martha and NeverSeconds for the Food and Farming Awards, will you?

I cannot think of a more deserving recipient for the Derek Cooper Award than Martha and NeverSeconds as a writer who has raised awareness of food, especially with children, and raised more than £100,000 for a food kitchen in Malawi for schoolchildren, to be called Friends of NeverSeconds.

Tags: food, Martha Payne, NeverSeconds