Summer play scheme pulled for second year

A POPULAR play scheme attended by thousands of youngsters in South Derbyshire every year has been cancelled for the second time amid continuing uncertainty over the coronavirus pandemic.

South Derbyshire’s Summer Playscheme has been cancelled this summer due uncertainty over whether such large-scale events will be permitted despite the lockdown slowly easing.

The scheme, which takes play equipment to different areas of the district every summer, traditionally takes place in July and August and in the past has offered more than 100 sessions to children during the school holidays across South Derbyshire.

South Derbyshire District Council’s head of cultural and community services, Mary Bagley, said: “It is a real shame that we have had to take the decision not to go ahead with this year’s Summer Playscheme.

“We know it is very popular with children from across South Derbyshire and we looked at all the options before very reluctantly reaching the conclusion that, due to ensuring that the schemes could be run in a Covid safe way, we needed to make an early decision and cancel.”

The South Derbyshire Summer Playschemes have been running for well over a decade and are very popular events, with more than 6,000 young people attending sessions each year. They are run with funding from parish councils and the South Derbyshire Community Safety Partnership.

This marks the second year the scheme has been cancelled due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Active South Derbyshire, which runs the sessions, hopes to reschedule a number of the cancelled sessions, once it is safe to do so, on evenings, at weekends and during half-term and utilise the run up to Summer to plan alternative delivery for the summer holidays, in partnership with the district’s schools.

Further details on the service and any future sessions are available by checking the Active South Derbyshire Facebook page.