The Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) has granted £40.9m of its Youth Investment Fund to youth charity OnSide Youth Zones.
Yesterday, DCMS announced the beneficiaries of a £90m portion of its £380m Youth Investment Fund to rebuild or regenerate youth services across the countries.
OnSide is among the 43 youth centres across the countries that will receive funding in second round of grants from the fund.
Large grants
The £90m funding pot will help build or refurnish 300 youth facilites over the next three years in places that have little youth provision and high levels of need and benefit 45,000 more young people.
OnSide was allocated five separate grants totalling £40.9m. These include grants to develop a new youth zone in Salford and the redevelopment of a 2,500sqm car park in Crewe.
Another recipient is Heart of Hastings CLT Ltd which received £8.6m for further redevelopment of a five-story double-fronted building to create a long-term youth hub in East Sussex.
Meanwhile, Brighton Youth Centre was allocated £4.3m to transform itself into a state-of-the-art facility accessible for all young people across Brighton, with the aim to reach 3,000 young people per week.
OnSide: Funding provides ‘vital support’ for young people
OnSide chief executive officer Jamie Masraff: said “We’re delighted that our Youth Zone projects in Grimsby, South Bristol, Preston, Crewe and Salford have received vital funding from the Youth Investment Fund. This completes our capital fundraising campaigns for each and means we can focus on raising the annual running costs for each.
“At OnSide we believe that all of society has a shared responsibility for our young people which is why our model brings together private sector philanthropy with public funds in a place to create new youth provision. It’s encouraging to see such vital government support for young people at a time when this is so critical.
“This is essential investment in youth services and youth work that will see many much-needed youth organisations boosted, including a number of our Youth Zone projects. In the context of the sustained challenging funding environment that has faced the youth sector over the past decade, there remains very real need across the youth sector. We hope this is the beginning of renewed focus on investing in youth.”
Other funding pots
DCMS will also make £11m available to support an additional one million hours of youth services over the coming two years, which will enable 200 youth clubs to open for an extra night a week.
The funding will go to youth clubs in areas with the “highest rates of anti-social behaviour to get young people on the right track through positive activities and role models”.
In addition, DCMS approved £16.9m to support uniformed youth organisations including the Scout Association, Girlguiding and St John Ambulance in a bid to create 20,000 new places for young people aged 10-18.
Matt Hyde, chief executive of Scouts, said: “Every week, Scouts gives almost half a million young people the skills they need for the job interview, the important speech, the tricky challenge and the big dreams: the skills they need for life.
“We’re really grateful to the government for committing this new funding so that we can help even more young people learn these through Scouts. It means we can work to make sure more young people in areas of deprivation have adventures away from home, learn outside school and get the chance to volunteer.”
£560m investment
The Youth Investment Fund is part of a larger £560m investment called the National Youth Guarantee that will give young people access to club activities, adventures away from home and volunteering opportunities.
Culture secretary Lucy Frazer said: “I want every young person to have the opportunity to access the kinds of life-changing activities which expand their horizons and allow them to develop vital life skills.
“The National Youth Guarantee will provide these opportunities and support young people with access to regular club activities, adventures away from home and volunteering opportunities.
“We’re supporting this […] with an investment to create or renovate spaces for youth clubs and activities to support opportunities for thousands of young people across the country who would otherwise miss out.”
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