Dave McNicholl is chief executive at Warrington Youth Club. In his latest column he takes a look at the organisation's summer holiday club

WE are extremely proud to be part of a network of network of youth organisations called ‘OnSide’, which is an independent national charity, with the head office based in Bolton.

The main purpose of OnSide is to develop and build iconic centres for children and young people, called youth zones.

They are aiming to develop 100 of these inspiring centres across the country. Alongside developing new centres OnSide lead the network of 10 existing youth zones, and a further five under construction or in design.

OnSide provides support to the youth zones in a range of ways including bidding for large grants, trusts and contracts on a regional or national platform, none of which would be accessible to the individual youth zones as local charities.

As a whole the network of youth zones has more than 40,000 members, with many youth zones having more than 6,000 members aged seven to 19 or up to 25 for those with a disability.

Warrington Youth Club has been part of the OnSide network since July 2016 and benefited from inclusion in a range of funding grants including employability programmes, Projects to support children of current and ex service personnel and mentoring programmes.

Over the past three months OnSide has secured funding on a regional basis from the Department for Education, to offer holiday programmes to children and young people who are unlikely to receive meals during the school holidays.

Over recent months there has been increasing coverage in both regional and national media about the concern of the malnourishment of some children during the school holidays when the routine of the school day and the structure of school meals are not available.

We are launching our holiday club which is open to all children aged seven to 12 years from across Warrington at our new venue, Penketh Youth Centre, Honiton Way on Monday.

Our holiday club is designed to support children to have a fun and exciting summer with a rich programme of arts, sports, dance and drama activities. We have a weekly trip to various educational and enjoyable locations including museums, parks and forests. We are working closely with Penketh Parish Council to provide swimming for the children.

Our holiday club is open from 8am to 6pm Monday to Friday throughout the school holidays, we are Ofsted registered and prices start from £6 per day.

For more information and to book a place email holidayclubs@warringtonyouthclub.co.uk call 909660 or visit warringtonyouthclub.co.uk