A BURNLEY headteacher has gone bananas and accused the Government of letting down needy children by leaving them out of a scheme to provide pupils with free fruit.

Christine Lawless, of Taywood Nursery School, Tay Street, said she was furious her school, along with hundreds of others across the country, had been overlooked for inclusion in the national scheme, which started last month.

And her concerns have been echoed by the Lancashire Healthy School's Programme, a partnership of local health authorities, which is lobbying the Government to include nurseries once the pilot scheme is rolled out nationwide.

The LHSP aims to raise educational standards and improve health in schools through healthy eating, promoting exercise and drugs education.

As part of the scheme all pupils aged four to six are supposed to get a free piece of fruit every day. But nursery schools are not included as the Department for Health say it would be too hard to organise.

The headteacher, along with the chair of governors, Darren Ashworth, has now written to the Department for Health to demand an explanation.

Mrs Lawless said the omission was particularly galling as the school was in Trinity ward -- among the top ten percent of the most deprived wards in the country, the very areas supposed to be the target of the initiative.

Mrs Lawless said nursery schools in Burnley were invited to a meeting about the scheme in March, but were told when they arrived that there had been a mistake and they were not eligible to take part.

She said: "Nursery classes and foundation stage units attached to primary schools are eligible, yet they cater for pre-school children as do nursery schools.

"My chair of governors and I have written to the organisers of the scheme stating our disappointment and our feelings of being discriminated against.

"The reply quoted the number of schools involved in the scheme in the North West, 2,600, and the major logistical exercise that was demanded of them. To have included nursery schools would have increased this number and caused additional problems.

"In the meantime, children attending nursery schools in Burnley, as opposed to nursery classes or foundation stage units, fail to gain access to this valuable scheme.

"With most nursery schools being situated in deprived areas, there is a great need for children to have healthy food, especially fruit."

Mrs Lawless suggested nursery schools could link up with nearby primary schools and collect the fruit themselves to alleviate delivery problems.

The pilot project will be looked at again in April 2004. Department of Health research from early pilots involving 500 schools showed more than half of the schools noticed an improvement in pupils in the classroom with a marked increase in attention levels and ability to settle to work.

Reception classes and Years 1 and 2 at primary schools are taking part in the scheme, part of the £297 million New Opportunities for Health programme.

Latest research shows that compared to other English regions, consumers in the North West are least likely to eat fresh vegetables, salad and fruit and least likely to have eaten five portions of fruit and vegetables per day.