The holiday activities and food programme will continue from April, ministers have confirmed, but funding beyond the next financial year is subject to the spending review.
Councils, schools and club providers had been awaiting clarity over the funding for the scheme, which was due to run out at the end of March.
But Stephen Morgan, the minister for early education, told MPs today he was “delighted to be able to confirm that this great programme will be continuing for 2025-26, backed by funding of more than £200 million”.
However, “future funding for the programme will be determined by the spending review”, which the Treasury is due to set out later this year.
Launched in 2018 with a limited pilot, the holiday activities and food programme funds councils to provide clubs and meals for children eligible for free school meals and others they consider vulnerable in the summer, Christmas and Easter holidays.
It was extended nationwide in 2020 following a high-profile campaign by the footballer Marcus Rashford, who prompted a series of U-turns from government on support for disadvantaged pupils during the Covid pandemic.
The programme costs around £220 million a year.
MPs wanted statutory duty
MPs today attempted to amend the government’s children’s wellbeing and schools bill to place a statutory duty on councils to provide the programme.
Ellie Chowns, the Green MP for North Herefordshire and a signatory to the amendment brought by Stroud MP Dr Simon Opher, warned short-term funding extensions “periodically leave local authorities unable to plan provision in the long term.
“I’ve seen this myself as a former councillor. That sort of hand to mouth approach to funding really creates uncertainty for club providers, and it leaves children at risk of holiday hunger if funding is not renewed.
“So that is why I do feel the holiday activities and food program must be secured and put on a statutory fitting alongside other crucial parts of the nutritional safety net.”
But ministers warn this would ‘stifle innovation’
But Morgan warned that “flexibility has been key to delivering the HAF in thousands of holiday clubs across the country”.
“Placing a legal duty on local authorities to deliver food and activities to free school meal recipients would risk stifling the innovation that local authorities have to deliver HAF in a way that is right for their communities.”
It would also risk their ability to “develop and evolve year to year, whether that is through working with schools to target children with low school attendance rates, or through working with police and community organisations to support children at risk of involvement in gang violence”.
He said the programme’s grant conditions already placed an obligation on councils to “make free holiday club places available to children in their area who receive benefits-related free school meals”.
They must also meet school food standards and the chief medical officer’s guidance on physical activities.
But HAF “doesn’t only provide meals and activities”, he said.
“HAF clubs work with children to teach them about the importance of healthy eating and maintaining a healthy lifestyle.
“Children and their families can learn about how to cook nutritious and tasty, low cost meals, and clubs can act as a referral point for families, to get information, help and access to other services and support when they need it.”
