A LEADING Monmouthshire County councillor will be taking a motion to full council today (Thurs June 25) in the hope of convincing councillors to wholeheartedly support the continuation of its free school breakfast policy. The provision was originally grant funded by the Welsh Government, operating between the hours of 8am and 9am, offering a free breakfast to all children who attended. This provision lasted until March 31, 2013, and following that the funding was transferred into the regional settlement grant. With the transfer, the Welsh Government said it expected the existing breakfast club provision to remain new clubs to be set up if needed, unless the request was unreasonable. Currently 26 schools in Monmouthshire offer this service but in June MCC?put forward a motion that in light of budget cuts and growing costs, while the breakfast itself should continue to be provided free, a £1 charge for the childcare element of the provision should be imposed. A report due to be presented to council papers said that while the provision has been provided free for a number of years it had been identified as being able to support the proposed charge. There would be no additional income from this service, and the money spent on the service would be used to cover staff costs of £10 per hour. Where it is envisaged that a individual schools will not collect enough income to cover these costs, a transfer of central budget will be made to support them. Some councillors however feel that this is putting strain on working parents, and say the service should remain free. And while the initial proposal was sent back from cabinet to gather more information to be assessed ahead of making any decision Councillor Dimitri Batrouni is taking a motion to full council in the hope of getting the proposal thrown out. Labour leader, Councillor Batrouni said, "Breakfast clubs are popular in Monmouthshire, with more than 1,000 children across the county regularly attending them. It is beyond belief the Tories want to penalise them for attending. "Working parents should simply not have to face the prospect of being charged childcare because their child is getting breakfast - it goes against the spirit of the Free School Breakfast policy. This confirms the Tories want to add to these families' burdens not help them out."  He also pointed out that among the schools in Monmouthshire, some primary schools have extremely high numbers of pupils attending the breakfast club, and often an imbalance of free school meals students. While in Deri View school, on average 53 pupils attend the breakfast club, with 32.64 per cent on FSM, in Llantilio Pertholey school an average of 45 attend the club, with only 16.08 per cent on FSM, and in Cantref Primary, 39 students attend on average with a mere 6.38 on FSM. In cases like this, with a high proportion of the students attending required to pay, it could cause the numbers using this often vitally needed service to drop. In light of this, Councillor Batrouni is taking the following motion to council, "That this council wholeheartedly supports the free school breakfast policy; thanks the Welsh Government for implementing it; recognises the tremendous positive impact it has had on families and children's learning in the classroom; is disappointed the Conservative and Liberal groups want to introduce a charge for the childcare element of it; believes any charging associated with the policy is a retrograde step; and therefore asserts that this policy, or anything akin to it, is permanently dropped." Leader of the Council, Peter Fox has expressed his concern at Councillor Batrouni's comments, and has responded that further enquiries are being made into the proposal before any action goes ahead. Councillor Fox said, ""I'm surprised that Councillor Batrouni has made this inaccurate and scare-mongering statement. "He knows very well that the council's cabinet members shared his concerns about a report that made a case to charge for the childcare element of the free breakfast club initiative. The cabinet made it very clear that there was a need for more information and the need for a scrutiny committee to consider this proposal before they would consider it further. It is extremely important to the cabinet to understand if this proposal would impact on those most in need within our communities as the protection of vulnerable children and adults is one of our three main priorities."