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Half-term support for children eligible for free school meals in Plymouth

Plymouth City Council has today announced a special support scheme to help families of children entitled to free school meals during the October half-term.

Eligible families will receive an additional payment over the half-term period to enable them to buy a meal for their children.

Around 9,000 children are currently entitled to free school meals and the scheme announced today will allow families to apply for the payment via the Council’s website. Eligible applicants will then receive a BACS payment of £11 (equivalent of £2.20 per day) straight into their nominated bank account.

Jon TaylorCouncillor Jon Taylor, Cabinet Member for Education, Skills and Transformation, said: “We understand just how difficult the last few months have been for low income families, so following the government’s decision not to extend the free school meal scheme yesterday, we are pulling out all the stops to ensure children in Plymouth don’t go hungry over half-term.

“We know that feeding children during the school holidays is hard for families and coronavirus is causing even more worry. We want to help take some of the pressure with our scheme which means eligible families can apply for a payment to support them during the school break next week.”

The scheme will be live on the Council’s website from midday on Monday 26 October and closes at midday on Monday 9 November. Details of how to apply will be announced on Monday.

Councillor Taylor added: “To ensure we are able to keep supporting some of our most vulnerable families, we already working towards being able to offer a healthy food parcel during the Christmas holiday. More details of this will be announced soon.”

www.plymouth.gov.uk/holidaymeals