Nottinghamshire County Council swapping Free School Meal vouchers for £2 million Household Support Fund cash to help more people this winter

The announcement comes after an investigation by the BBC identified Conservative-controlled Nottinghamshire as one of 21 authorities no longer offering any form of supermarket vouchers or cash payments to families with children in receipt of FSM during the 2022 Christmas break – although alternative schemes are in place.

But Nottinghamshire County Council says this is not the case for the county and the scheme it has in place will enable it to help 11,120 FSM-eligible households before Christmas.

The Local Government Association said some authorities simply could not continue to provide the vouchers with the Government grant funding they currently received.

Some council bosses have instead decided to give grant funding to third-sector organisations such as foodbanks, or to focus resources on the Government-backed Holiday Activities and Food scheme.

And Nottinghamshire says by adopting its approach of offering a one-off payment of £100 from the Government’s Household Support Fund to all struggling households this winter, rather than vouchers to just FSM families, it can now help about 50,000 households struggling to make ends meet to get extra support.

Between July 2020 and October 2021, the £15-a-week vouchers were funded directly by the Government and could be used by any family with a child eligible for FSM.

In October 2021, direct provision was replaced with the Household Support Fund, which gave unitary and county councils in England discretion over how to help financially struggling families.

In 2021 the Government also rolled out the HAF programme, which funded council bosses to “coordinate and provide free holiday provision” for children on FSM “including healthy food and enriching activities”.

However, in August 2022, a BBC report said Nottinghamshire and 11 other councils had scrapped offering vouchers under the second round of the HSF funding.

A spokesman for one of those councils said using FSM as a threshold for voucher entitlement was too restrictive and households in receipt of universal credit can only claim FSM if they earn less than £7,400 a year, a threshold that was too low.

The third round of the HSF is expected to allocate about £5.6 million to Nottinghamshire and is being administered by the council in partnership with borough and district councils between October 1 and March 2023

The council has written to all eligible households inviting them to apply for their payment before the deadline of January 31.

Coun John Cottee, council cabinet member for communities, said: “With so many people dealing with the rising cost of living, we want to help those households hardest hit this winter.

“We are therefore offering a one-off winter support payment to spread the funds as widely as possible and ensure as many eligible households get the help they need.

“This approach means we will support 50,000 households this winter and we will be getting that support out to everyone who applies soon as we can.”

Coun Tracey Taylor, cabinet member for young people, said: “We have provided food vouchers to those children entitled to free school meals during each separate period of school holidays for the last two HSF rounds, but given the pressures so many families are facing, this time we are making a one-off combined payment.”