West Lothian Council to give families more than £1.5m in support over summer holidays
West Lothian Council will give families more than £1.5m in support over the summer holidays.
The money is part of the free school meals programme which ensures youngsters do not lose out during the six-week summer holidays which start at the end of this month.
Beverley Akinlami, CLD Youth Services Manager revealed the spend in addition to the £400,000 summer holiday programme for the county this summer.
The Council Education PDSP heard that activities will be delivered by council staff in partnership with regulated childcare providers, third sector organisations, and community groups with a wide variety of programmes set to be available across West Lothian.
The 2025 Summer Programme will provide holiday clubs over the six-week school holidays. Officers will coordinate the delivery of summer holiday provision for young people in partnership with regulated childcare providers, third sector organisations, and community groups to design and deliver activity programmes and services, to support targeted groups and wider provision for young people.
The council will also invest £1.513 million towards free school meal payments during school holidays. As per previous years, this will come in the form of direct payments to families of pupils entitled to receive free school meals.
Family vouchers enabling free access to activities will be distributed by West Lothian Council Anti-Poverty Service linking in with the West Lothian Food Network
Ms Akinlami told the councillors: 'The provision of summer holiday activities to support targeted groups and wider provision for young people in West Lothian will complement direct payments to be made to families of children and young people entitled to free school meals, and embed support for the most targeted groups and young people within their local community over the holiday period.'
Councillor Pauline Orr said: 'There's something going on in almost every area. How do we communicate this information out there to families and providers, so they know?'
Ms Akinlami said: 'As a council we take all the information from our providers, and we have advertised on the council website. That wlll be under the Get into Summer webpage. Theres also information that we circulate to schools and colleagues within social policy so they can support families who may need additional help to access services.'
By Stuart Sommerville, Local Democracy Reporter
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