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<p>This government has announced a programme of research and pilots to explore ways
of supporting disadvantaged families during school holidays. Following the success
of our previous programmes, we now understand more about how best to support disadvantaged
families. We are targeting this support where it is needed during the 6-week summer
holidays.</p><p> </p><p>We awarded £2 million of funding to 7 organisations to deliver
free healthy food and activities to children and families in some of the most disadvantaged
areas in the country during the 2018 summer holidays. The organisations informed us
that with this money they were able to support around 280 clubs and reach around 18,000
children.</p><p>In summer 2019 we invested £9 million in 11 local authority areas
reaching around 50,000 children. The assessment process for bids for the 2020 summer
programme remains ongoing and we will announce the outcome of the process shortly,
alongside the areas that we will be working in and the number of children that we
expect to benefit.</p><p>We have also commissioned an independent evaluation of the
2019 programme, which will report on the number of disadvantaged eligible children
who accessed the clubs across the country, including our work in the North East, and
which will be published in 2020.</p><p>Further funding of this programme after 2020
will be considered as part of the three-year Spending Review and we will set out our
plans in due course.</p>
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