SCHOOL meals bosses want to fight off hungry predators by carving up the lunch market.

The town hall is asking schools to enter a profit-sharing agreement to bring in more money and beat private competition.

Councillors say it's the only way to generate money for kitchen improvements and keep the school meals service alive.

New laws allow high schools to buy their meals from private companies. Private firms are likely to "cherry pick" the larger high schools for business and if they opted out, this would lead to increased costs for everyone else and put the viability of the service at risk.

Private contractors already provide meals to some schools in neighbouring authorities like Rochdale and Manchester.

That challenge is being taken up by councillors who want to retain the notion of Bury schools being a "family". They also hope it will pay for improvements in the service.

Officers say that schools are more likely to work with the council and generate new business if they have the incentive of sharing the profits.

Any profits would be split 40/40 between the school and the council, with the remaining 20 per cent going into a pot to pay for kitchen refurbishments.

The shared goals for both primary and secondary schools would be to seek continuous improvements, increase nutritional awareness, respond to customer needs, and persuade more children to take school meals and therefore bring in more money.

All schools will be able to bid for money from the 20 per cent investment reserve to pay for improvements. Their bids will be judged by a panel against criteria set by the council and head teachers.