Has anyone noticed a lot of the summer camps for poor children are in expensive villages miles away from where a lot of poor kids actually live?

[Noahide]

The strange thing about the Haf programme in my (not small) town is that the majority of the summer camps are in more expensive villages that are a few miles from here.
Seems strange when most children eligible for Haf have parents who cannot drive and it’s unlikely many children in said expensive villages are eligible.

We’re also not on any means tested benefits but qualify because of my son’s needs - there’s a SENd specialist one that we have access to a few times during the holidays.

It is however an hour away by car, so I take OPs point on accessibility.

I think the point the OP is trying to make is that it would make more sense economically for the tax payer to locate this service near to where families with children live. This will enable them to walk to the service (which is beneficial to them and to the tax payer).

Without knowing anything about the OPs place of residence, we can assume that the area follows the pattern of people on low income being clustered together.

OP, the issue might be explained by a lack of proactive planning by the your local Authority or whoever is responsible for establishing these services. Instead of planning around the population it is often the case that organisations apply to provide them and receive grants that enable them to offer free places. It will be a tick box exercise.

That being said please don’t underestimate rural poverty. This can be quite distinct from the value of village house prices. Not everyone will live or own property in the village.

Glad you asked because I was wondering that. What camp are you in OP? Poor kid camp or can afford stuff camp?

OP has alrady said her child is eligible as they are on free school meals.

I'd really like to see an example of one that's in a place like the OP describes and then see what the nearest alternative is

If no one is willing to give up this space - which is fair enough because you know schools have other stuff going on in summer holidays - then we can't match up suitable space out of nowhere!

Maybe going forward someone needs to ask whether there are any places that are willing to run in the town. Be proactive

Do you think people haven't done that already?

If it's anything like the council run adult courses here it just won't have occurred to people running course that large number of their potential market won't be driving and bus fares when it's two buses - one to center and one back out again won't have been considered or timings.

When move was due to happen to closing that surbub center - they were going to move to another subub but feedback happend and TBF they took in on board and there is a poor neigbourhood near center and they've moved to center there. Even if you are coming in from outskirts it's then one bus to center not center then back out.

Not just here - last location where we live area least used swimming pool in center -- and that was causing scratched heads in council - well it was not as well off as other outlying areas and buse fares and times weren't great for access and many drove but parking charges were also high.

It's probably an invsible barrier to those setting them up - because it's not not on their radar.

We had a similar experience with the HAF clubs near me, a lot in the more rural areas, it was because thats where the facilities were. Some did watersports on the reservoirs or bushcraft activities. They did used to open up unused places if they didn't fill them to any children. There were ones in town too though in local parks that had vans that parked up and offered activities and crafts. they were a lot of fun.

Alright, you go ahead and set one up.

I'm really curious to know what part of the country this is

don't bother volunteering or helping out there's always someone moaning behind your back

Rural areas can have a huge amount of hidden poverty. People think because it looks lovely and green that everyone there must be wealthy. This is very much not the case. Rural wages can be very low (include income of farming families who might seem ‘asset rich’). They also often have tighter communities where people organise stuff for themselves - including holiday camps - because there is general a lot fewer options available than in towns.

OP if you are upset by the lack of holiday camps in your area why don’t you reach out to local organisations to see if you could help set one up?

You are not being unreasonable to want these to run in locations you can get to. I have just had a look at my area and there are 2 in our town (at the football club and leisure centre) and quite a few within an easy bus ride. I noticed from the map, there are more in the poorer areas and these are clustered around the town with a few others dotted around. There appears to be something in most of the towns.

Have you checked on you Council website (or the link from it) if there are any you can get to? It would be worth you contacting them to explain your issue and hopefully they will take this into account with future planning even if it doesn't help right now.

Also ‘poor people’ in rural areas often have to prioritise running a car over other expenditure because just of people from the town may struggle to get to a village by public transport, people around villages may struggle to get anywhere without a car.

Have you contacted the body that organises the camps to discuss demand in your area? Obviously too late for this year, but you can talk to the organisers (the council?), your elected representatives (MP, local councillors, community council) to get support for having a camp in a more accessible location.

It sounds poorly thought out.

We dont really have that many clubs just for fsm children where I am. Basically all the providers doing clubs for people who can pay have to offer a couple of places for fsm children as part of being allowed to use school sites. Obviously providers not using school sites do what they like.

So a lot of clubs arent where needed as they are where customers are.

People do t understand because they don’t want to.

Im not in this situation but would have been when ds was eligible due to age.

Yhe whole idea is to provide activities and food to help families struggling financially (plus a few other outlying criteria).

It’s really doesn’t take a genius to work out if the club takes £10 a day bus fare to access the “free lunch” is no longer free. It’s actually more expensive than families who aren’t entitled are probably paying for their lunch.

It is poor planning to provide a “free” activity that costs a lot to access.

It seems odd around here too, the locations are not great and its only available to limited numbers - you cannot pay to attend. Its really frustrating as there is very little childcare provision in the holidays outside of this - this is rural norfolk / suffolk

I have to say in my area it is done pretty well. They are held at local schools, youth centres and easily accesible activity centres.

@Noahide chooses to use the term “poor” to describe her circumstances. She compresses children on FSM, children eligible for HAF and children from low income families under the banner of being “poor”. Many will agree, some may not.

As to the availability and accessibility of these holiday camps, the fact that they exist, have the facilities, are in LA areas that are actively funding them is surely the overriding reason they are located where they are. LAs with less available space/funds/incentive clearly are not.

If as OP states these camps are not being attended because “poor children” cannot get to them, then they are not fulfilling their obligation, which could be due to poor commissioning.

Therefore, OP you could contact your local MP with an enquiry as to how accessible are these facilities for “poor children”. Funding could be found or generated to provide transport. You need access to these facilities, making that contact is the first part of the process that you can engage in, in order to
gain accessibility for your children. Good luck!

Has the OP?

I was talking about the organisers

they get what they get they can't just commandeer resources

trust me, no one volunteers on this for fun they do it because they really believe in helping

Are they summer clubs that are running specifically for the HAF programme (ie: they wouldn’t exist without the grant funding), or are they summer clubs that would run anyway but are able to offer some places through the HAF programme?

I know that here where I live, the majority of the HAF grant funding is used by holiday clubs that already exist (holiday clubs at schools, art camp, football club, rugby club), so the clubs are in various places around the city and are presumably already meeting a demand from local residents (the school holiday clubs are very in demand, especially the couple that actually run 8-6 rather than 10-3!). The clubs have to put in a bid to the council for the grant funding saying how many places they can offer and what activities will be available, so it’s whichever organisations are aware of the funding and can offer places. I’ve noticed it’s mostly community groups.

If the clubs are running solely to offer HAF places, then it is disappointing that they are located in places that are inaccessible to the expected users, but it could just be that those were the venues that were available/ had the best facilities/ were cheaper than the venues in town, and possibly the transport issues didn’t even occur to the organisers. You could find out which department at your council is responsible for the HAF grant applications and let them know that the locations are inaccessible due to transport costs as feedback for next year.

It’s really doesn’t take a genius to work out if the club takes £10 a day bus fare to access the “free lunch” is no longer free. It’s actually more expensive than families who aren’t entitled are probably paying for their lunch.
It is poor planning to provide a “free” activity that costs a lot to access.

It was surpising how it just hadn't been considered by organised adult courses who dropped in and had a chat to us - I couldn't even do evening classes as buses didn't run up there that late.

Of 12 left at end of course two were local so could walk - one drove and rest of us relied on buses and needed two one into center and one out to area of course - and they had no idea of that cost of that - same as cost of the course for those of us that paid - but over months.

They and teachers taking classes all drove - so they were thinking free street parking not need day tickets on buses and needing connections. It was just something not on their radar.

trust me, no one volunteers on this for fun they do it because they really believe in helping.

Very few of the organisations offering this are volunteers. They are commercially run. I used to run performing arts holiday clubs and could not have done this due to the food/education requirements. There are the odd charity doing it in my area, such as a local football club's Community Foundation but they have their own prmises and infrastructure.