Norfolk teaching union says schools are spending thousands to support children with period products
It comes as a new study reveals more than a third of students are stuck in hygiene poverty.
A group representing teachers in Norfolk says schools across the county are now spending more than £1,000 a year to support their pupils who cannot afford period products.
It comes following shocking new research out today which has revealed an increase in children across the UK in hygiene poverty, with staff in state schools collectively spending £40 million of their own money to support them.
The research shows school staff are seeing more than a third (37%) of their pupils facing hygiene poverty, with 8 in 10 claiming they have seen an increase in the number of pupils affected over the last 12 months.
Mark Burns works for the NASUWT in Norfolk and told us: " It's been going on for quiet a few years, where teachers both on informal and schools on a more formal basis, fund simple cleaning products for students. Even to the extent of stuff to take home, it's not just in the school."
"Teachers are spending quite considerable amounts of money on this - and schools themselves with red box period packs and stuff like that that they're giving out on a very regular basis is really draining school funds."
"The schools are organising it because they know that it's one of the biggest reasons why schools have a lower attendance - because there's that stigma around being dirty, around not being able to have the clean clothes or the better quality clothes."
"Now if there was a better, more stratified method of child benefit all of those things could be done by Government to make sure that those people and children are in a better situation to function in society and would also take the pressure off the school budgets and the teachers themselves."
Ahead of National Hygiene Week (October 2nd-8th), teachers have teamed up with challenger brand, smol, and charity, The Hygiene Bank, to rally outside Westminster to call on the government's Child Poverty taskforce to take urgent action and support pupils across the country.
More than three in five (62%) school staff have seen children arriving at school with dirty uniforms or kits, and 4 in 10 (42%) have spotted negative changes to children's personal hygiene- leading to significant impacts on pupils' wellbeing and learning, with staff seeing lack of self-esteem, bullying and isolation; over a quarter of school (28%) staff have seen pupils miss school entirely, according to the research by the charity and smol.
Almost a quarter (23%) of staff feel there is an overreliance on them to personally pay for hygiene products, with just under two in five (39%) claiming that a lack of school funding is the biggest barrier to support. More than half (60%) of teachers have personally purchased pupils' soap or toiletries, with half (50%) purchasing a pupil laundry detergent, and 41% washing their pupils' uniforms.
With 4.2 million people in the UK now living in hygiene poverty, Ruth Brock CEO of The Hygiene Bank and Hilary Strong, Suds in Schools Lead will be encouraging the nation to write to their local MPs to ensure the issue is firmly on the agenda for the government's upcoming Child Poverty Strategy.
The Government says their 'period product scheme' provides free sanitary products to girls and women in state schools, until the end of 2025's academic year.