Life education the UK UK Politics

The government put out a video where parents talk about free breakfast clubs and, oh boy, a lot of people are mad about the answers

Michael White. Updated November 22nd, 2025

Free breakfast clubs should be an easy, popular win for the UK’s increasingly embattled Labour government.

But, as with most political success stories, it’s all about how you sell it.

At the start of October, the Department of Education shared a social media video asking parents what they would do with an extra 30 minutes a day.

Presumably the prompt was supposed to get parents talking about how helpful the 30-minute free breakfasts are with work-life balance and cost of living pressures.

Something like this, from a more recent video from the DoE.

However, in this earlier October video, the editor decided to include clips of parents replying with answers like, “have a lie-in”, “do something for myself” and “go for coffee with the other mums”. One mother is quoted as saying the breakfast clubs are helpful because it’s so busy in the mornings that she can’t remember if the kids have eaten.

It’s not the parents’ fault, to be fair. It’s the blame of whoever came up with this silly framing. Anyway, the resurfaced October clip has gone viral over the last few days, with people (some of the usual suspects, it must be said) questioning the tone and messaging of it.

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Source: Twitter/X/@educationgovuk