A student at a Northland secondary school that served raw chicken to students says this is not the first time raw meat has been served.

Kaitaia College has come under fire after reports students got food poisoning and needed to be hospitalised after getting raw chicken for lunch yesterday.

Year 12 student Lennox Goodhue-Wikitera revealed on TVNZ’s Breakfast programme that it had happened before.

“I just really hope, since it’s been brought to public attention, that the school would just take action and either find a different food provider - because it’s gone on for way too long now.

Bells Produce is under fire for supplying students at Kaitaia College with raw chicken in their lunches.

“We’ve had raw meat served in the past. Just find a solution.”

Lennox described the discovery that they were eating raw chicken as “horrific”.

“We went to our whānau group, went to get our lunch and there it was - raw chicken,” he told the show.

‘It was horrific and disgusting’

“I don’t even know how it got there, how it left the facility and actually got into the school. It was horrific and disgusting what we saw.

“A lot of students started to feel sick. A lot of them had to go to the hospital. They also had to set up the hall as an area where students went if they were feeling symptoms of food poisoning and stuff.”

Many concerned parents started to arrive and school staff immediately moved to help affected students and families and to contact the school community and whānau about the situation.

Despite what happened, Lennox praised the school’s principal, Louise Ānaru, who told parents straight away and helped students who were sick.

“Some teachers even - out of their own pockets - shouted kids lunch because we couldn’t eat lunch.”

Teachers bought pizza, hot chips and ice creams, he said.

The lunches were supplied by an outside school lunch provider under the Ministry of Education’s Healthy Lunches in Schools initiative.

It appeared the campaign was not too popular with students, however, as a protest last year asked for the canteen to be brought back.

Investigation at lunch provider launched

Lennox said that was what students wanted.

“We don’t think we’re being heard.”

Facebook post on March 8 from Bells Produce, who provided crumbed chicken in lunches to Kaitaia College pupils.

Meanwhile, the school lunch provider involved - Bells Produce Ltd - has launched an investigation into how raw chicken came to be in the lunches.

The company took to social media to apologise to the school and children affected.

In a notice posted on Facebook, it said: “We have become aware that in [yesterday’s] lunches to the Kaitaia College, which had cooled crumbed chicken as an ingredient, that a batch of the lunches had uncooked meat.

“All of the lunches were recalled as a safety measure once we [were] notified. We understand this is a concerning issue and we will be investigating what may have caused this issue as well as working with the school and everyone required in this matter to work through it.”