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Named: 10 areas getting DfE cash for holiday clubs

Named: 10 areas getting DfE cash for holiday clubs

Holiday activities and food scheme expected to help children across 17 local authorities – but questions raised about disadvantaged areas missing out

22nd June 2020, 11:30am

Catherine Lough

The government has revealed 10 projects set to receive £9 million in funding to be split between them, which they will use to run holiday food and activities programmes this summer.

The holiday activities and food scheme, which is in its third year, assesses the impact of different food and activity programmes for children over the summer holidays.

News: Rashford prompts government U-turn on free school meals

Background: DfE spending £2m on tackling holiday hunger

The programme is expected to benefit 50,000 disadvantaged children across 17 local authority areas. It was launched in 2018 with a £2 million pilot, with regional projects needing to bid for funding to run schemes over the summer. Last year, the Department for Education (DfE) quadrupled the funding allocated to the scheme.

However, the scheme this year has been criticised for ignoring some areas of deprivation.

Emma Hardy, Labour’s shadow further education minister and the MP for Hull, said on Twitter: “Where’s the support for disadvantaged children in Hull! Please tell me this isn’t everything. Is this a wind up?”

No programmes are to be funded in the South West or Midlands.

When the first year of the programme was evaluated in 2018, it was found that 18,200 pupils had attended at least one holiday club session.

Nearly half (49 per cent) of attendees were eligible for free school meals, and the evaluation noted that “the true percentage could be higher as 24 per cent of attendees had a recorded FSM status of ‘not stated’ or ‘not known’”.

However, only a quarter of all pupils attending went to more than half of the sessions offered by any of the 283 new and existing holiday clubs.

The projects funded in 2020 will be:

1. StreetGames, Newcastle
2. Gateshead Council
3. Edsential, Cheshire West and Chester, Halton and Wirral
4. Spring North, Blackburn with Darwen
5. Leeds Community Foundation, Leeds and Bradford
6. Voluntary Action Sheffield
7. Suffolk County Council
8. Mayor’s Fund for London, Lambeth and Southwark
9. Tower Hamlets Local Authority
10. The Romsey School, Southampton, Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight

Children’s minister Vicky Ford said: “It is more important than ever before to make sure the needs of the most disadvantaged are at the heart of everything we do. We cannot afford for any of our children to lose out of their education as a result of Covid-19.

“Just this week we announced the Covid Summer Food Fund, and a £1 billion Covid catch up fund so that no child is left behind.

“On top of this, we are rolling out the £9 million Holiday Activities and Food programme across England, with two co-ordinators based in the North East ensuring that thousands of children will be able to benefit from free nutritious food and enriching activities during the summer period.”

The news follows the government’s announcement last week regarding the Covid Summer Food Fund, which will support children who are eligible for free school meals with vouchers to cover the summer holiday. The government made a U-turn on its decision not to fund free school meals over the holidays following a campaign by footballer Marcus Rashford.