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Starving pupils dressed in ­threadbare clothes and shabby shoes stealing food from classmates - it sounds like a scene from a Victorian drama.

But this is the reality of life on the ­breadline in 21st century Britain, the human face of savage Tory cuts that have driven down wages and pushed up living costs.

And as Education Secretary Michael Gove today takes to the stage at the Tory conference in Manchester to trumpet his policies, you can guarantee there will be no mention of a Mirror poll that reveals ­thousands of children are going to school hungry, exhausted and poorly clothed because their parents are so strapped for cash due his party’s austerity measures.

In our poll, more than 85% of teachers quizzed in the survey said there has been an increase in the number of pupils turning up to school in the past two years without having eaten breakfast.

And they revealed children are arriving dirty, in uniforms that do not fit and without warm clothes in winter.

Some are so famished they have resorted to stealing food off others, eating a week’s supply of break-time fruit on a Monday and nodding off from lack of nourishment.

Teacher Nicky Downes, who works in a Coventry primary, said: “I’ve looked in children’s lunch boxes on occasion and found one slice of buttered bread.”

Another told how parents are filling their kids full of junk food because it’s cheaper than the healthy school dinners.

The staff member said: “Parents who pay for school meals are taking their children to the chicken shop for lunch (at £1 for a small meal) as it is cheaper than school meals.”

Other answers to our questions put to 1,700 teachers included:

“Bed and breakfast children, with no facilities for hot food, or clothes washing. Pupils are dirty, unkempt, hungry, poorly nourished.”

“I have noticed children complaining of missing breakfast and no snack at break.”

Some teachers told how they have taken in food for starving children, fearing that they would not eat at all

“Staff making toast for children who arrive hungry is becoming an increasingly regular occurrence.”

“Children sneaking extra sandwiches from school dinners and stealing them for later as their whole family are hungry.”

“I have had to resort to buying breakfast biscuits for hungry children in my class. ”

“Parents struggling to make ends meet ­especially since the introduction of the Bedroom Tax. Some parents have commented they may not be able to afford the bus fees to bring their child to school due to the changes and cuts in benefits.”

But Mr Gove has already tried to blame “chaotic homes” for producing starving pupils and insisted child hunger is rarely to do with “the finite amount of financial resources entering that home”.

Teachers claim the reality is very different and said our survey should shame David Cameron and George Osborne who target the poor to fund tax breaks for their rich cronies.

Ms Downes added: “You can tell when a child is hungry. Their head drops onto the table by morning break and after lunch. Hunger affects attainment.

“None of this is because the parents are lacking in parental skills or are poor managers of their budget as Gove would have you think. If a child goes without breakfast and we know about it, we will provide them with one.

"If they have no or little lunch, we provide them with one but who knows what they get for dinner? And what happens in the holidays?”

Magic Breakfast charity founder Carmel McConnell, who set up the group to help feed around 800,000 pupils who go to school hungry, said: “We’ve carried out home visits and found empty cupboards.

"We have also heard of a mother crying in the headteacher’s office because she hadn’t eaten for two days.

"Teachers tell me they have given up doing the main lessons and sport because the children just don’t have it in them to take part.

"It’s pretty shaming. I think, ‘We are talking about half a million primary children arriving at school too hungry to learn'.”

Malcolm and Amanda Hickey face a daily struggle to make sure their children do not go to school hungry.

Malcolm, 55, lost his £30,000-a-year job as a warehouse manager three years ago after he fell and broke his hip. The dad-of-four has been unable to find work since.

But despite the constant battle to make ends meet, Malcolm said: “Our kids never go to school hungry.

"We always make sure they eat breakfast – one of them doesn’t like to eat first thing so we always make sure he has money for toast at the breakfast club at school.”

Because the family budget is so tight daughter Ella, six, wears a uniform given by local organisation Mum’s the Word which recycles school clothes.

The family live on the tough Shadsworth estate in Blackburn, Lancs, with their other children, Callum, 15, Morgan, 10, and 15-month-old Harper.

Malcolm said: “Headmasters want the children to look smart at school, and us parents do too, but you have to be able to put food on the table as well.

"People think if you are unemployed and live on an estate like ours that you don’t want to work, but that isn’t the case at all.

"I want to provide for my family.”

Our survey of schools across the country shows many teachers have seen a rise in pupils unable to ­concentrate. Nearly all said more parents are unable to afford to pay for school trips.

In more than 40 pages of heartbreaking ­anecdotes, teachers have provided a shameful catalogue of suffering endured by our most vulnerable youngsters.

Time after time they say essential services which offered a lifeline to poorer children before the Coalition took power – such as uniform grants – are so stripped back by cuts the most needy have no help.

Working with the National Union of Teachers and Child Poverty Action Group, our poll provides evidence of the suffering of the 3.5 million British youngsters classified as living in poverty. Virtually all the teachers believe benefits cuts have a negative impact on pupils.

Once in power, the Tories pledged along with their Lib Dem partners to continue Labour’s aim to “maintain the goal of ending child poverty by 2020”.

But the number of poor kids has since leapt by 300,000, and many more are set to plunge below the ­breadline. NUT General Secretary ­Christine Blower said: “The Government can and should do more to reduce child poverty.

"Tired, hungry children can’t learn and parents in one of the richest countries in the world shouldn’t have to rely on food banks.”

And it’s not just poor areas that have been hit by the cuts. Karen Dean-Arshadi, 54, teaches at a school in middle-class Hoddesdon, Herts.

But she said: “People just don’t have money ­available. People are living on the edge, from day to day. I find it depressing, as do many of my colleagues.”

MIRROR POLL RESULTS

Have you seen an increase of any of the following happening in your schools in the last two academic years?

Children coming to school hungry

YES: 85.51%

Increase in uptake of free school meals

YES: 79.8%

Children unable to afford school trips

YES: 83.45%

Parents seeking advice from the school on education grants/allowances

YES: 74.87%

Parents unable to afford school uniforms

YES: 76.98%

Children with unexplained absences from school

YES: 83.28%

Children unable to concentrate in class

YES: 88.21%

Children leaving school because they can no longer afford to live in the area

YES: 61.81%

Children travelling long distances to school because they have moved away from the area

YES: 74.77%

What impact do you think the benefit cuts will have on your school?

* A large negative impact: 43.83%

* Some negative impact: 47.9%

* No impact: 2.44%

* Some positive impact: 0.68%

* A large positive impact: 0.27%

* Don’t know: 4.88%