the School-Leaving Age) a building programme to provide 'hut'-style accommodation to meet the additional educational demand. School meals and milk The Education Act 1944 made it a duty of local education authorities to provide school meals and milk. The authority could remit the charge for the meal in cases of hardship. The Provision of Free Milk Regulations 1946, made under Section 49 of the 1944 act, provided free school milk to all children under 18 in maintained schools from August 1946. In 1968 Edward Short, the Labour Secretary of State for Education and Science, withdrew free milk from secondary schools for children over eleven. His successor, Conservative Margaret Thatcher withdrew free school milk from children over seven in 1971, earning her the nickname "Thatcher, the Milk Snatcher". Shirley Williams withdrew free milk for children between seven and five in 1977. See also United Kingdom home front during World War II References Further reading Aldrich, Richard, Dennis Dean, and Peter Gordon. Education and policy in England in the twentieth century. (1991). Batteson, C. H. "The 1944 Education Act reconsidered." Educational Review 51.1 (1999): 5-15. DOI:10.1080/00131919997632 Dunford, John, Paul Sharp, The Education System in England and Wales, London: Longman, 1990, 17–24. Gosden, Peter. "Putting the Act together." History of Education 24#3 (1995): 195-207. online Goldin, Claudia, "The Human Capital Century and American Leadership: Virtues of the Past," The Journal of Economic History, 2001, Volume 61, Number 2. Green, S. J. D. "The 1944 Education Act: A Church‐State Perspective." Parliamentary History 19#1 (2000): 148-164. Griggs, Clive. The TUC and Education Reform, 1926-1970 (Routledge, 2013). Hillman, Nicholas. "Public schools and the Fleming report of 1944: shunting the first-class carriage on to an immense siding?." History of Education 41#2 (2012): 235-255. Howard, Anthony. RAB: The Life of R.A. Butler (2013) ch 10. (originally published 1987) Jago, Michael. Rab Butler: The Best Prime Minister We Never Had? (2015) ch 9. Jeffereys, Kevin. "R. A. Butler, the Board of Education and the 1944 Education Act," History (1984) 69#227 pp 415–431. Ku, Hsiao-Yuh. "Fighting for social democracy: RH Tawney and educational reconstruction in the Second World War." Paedagogica Historica 52#3 (2016): 266-285. Ku, Hsiao-Yuh. "Education for liberal democracy: Fred Clarke and the 1944 Education Act." History of Education 42#5 (2013): 578-597. McCulloch, Gary. Educational reconstruction: The 1944 education act and the twenty-first century (Routledge, 2013). McCulloch, Gary. "British Labour Party education policy and comprehensive education: from Learning to