The Salvation Army gave out hundreds of free lunches and school uniforms to kids over the summer holidays as part of support offered to help alleviate summer poverty.

The church and charity’s Emergency Response Vehicle gave out around 400 lunches over four days as part of Chester-le-Street’s free activity week, which offered activities and fun for youngsters over the six-week holiday.

Working with Chester-le-Street Uniform Donations, The Salvation Army also hosted Uniform Exchanges from their church in Low Chare, offering free uniforms to help tackle the high cost of living for families.

Captain Ali Brooks, who leads Chester-le-Street Salvation Army, said: “The summer holidays are meant to be a time of joy and fun for kids, but quite often families are limited because of the cost of activities, so free events like the Community Days are great as it means everyone gets that opportunity to have fun.

Salvation Army volunteer Ray gives out lunches from the Emergency Response van

placeholder image — Salvation Army volunteer Ray gives out lunches from the Emergency Response van

“Our Emergency Response Vehicle is a welcome and reassuring presence, and being able to offer free lunches to children really helps parents out, especially if they are struggling with the cost of feeding youngsters during the holidays when free school meals have stopped.”

The Salvation Army also had their gazebo on site with volunteers putting on craft activities for kids to do. Ali continued: “It’s a chance to see some of the families that attend our parent and toddler groups in term time, engage with new families and provide kids with activities to do, reinforcing the message of The Salvation Army and our ethos of Love God Love Others.”

Chester-le-Street Salvation Army works hand-in-hand with Chester-le-Street Uniform Donations, led by Kay Fowler, hosting two Uniform Exchange days in the hall during August.

Anybody could attend to pick up blazers, jumpers, trousers, skirts and summer dresses for up to 20 schools across the area. The items are free with monetary donations encouraged. Donations come from the community, schools and supermarkets.

Kay said: “It’s really busy, and year on year it gets busier because uniforms get more and more expensive, and a lot of the time they have to buy the items with logos on, which puts the cost up.

“I’m constantly getting messages on the Facebook page asking for items and people will queue at the door when we hold these events.”

One mum who has three children aged 15, 14, and eight at different schools, had to cut down her working hours after a cancer diagnosis. With her marriage also breaking down, she struggled financially. She said: “The kids are all growing and it’s the added cost of everything really, plus not being able to hand uniforms down because they are at different schools. Without this place I’d be spending hundreds of pounds on uniforms. In one of the schools even the trousers need to be branded, and the blazers cost about £30.

“Places like this are excellent, it’s good for the environment too as it saves things going to landfill.”

The Salvation Army's Ali Brooks runs craft events as part of Chester-le-Street community days

Another mum with five children aged 15, 14, 10, eight and five, who works two jobs to keep up with the cost of living, said: “With the primary school items, it’s not so bad as you don’t necessarily need logo uniforms, but the amount still adds up. It’s particularly the cost of the secondary uniform which gets exorbitant. It would cost hundreds of pounds if I bought new.

“It’s made a huge difference being able to come here, I just got two jumpers, which if I’d had to buy new would have cost £15 each. I like being able to make a donation for the items knowing it helps others.

“It’s the waste aspect of it as well, children grow so quickly so a lot of stuff gets wasted when it’s perfectly usable. You don’t need to buy brand new.”

This kind of support was on offer at Salvation Army churches throughout the UK and Ireland. It comes after a snapshot survey by the church and charity found more than a third of parents (35%) plan to skip meals so their children can go to holiday club[i]

Kay from Chester-le-Street Uniform Donations and Captain Ali Brooks from The Salvation Army

For more information on Chester-le-Street Salvation Army visit https://www.salvationarmy.org.uk/chester-le-street and on the Uniform Exchange search for Chester-le-Street Uniform Donations on Facebook. The next Uniform Exchange event will be in October.

[i] Fieldwork conducted from an online panel by nfpResearch as part of the nfpPublic UK research programme in May 2025. Base size is 299 parents with children under 18 at home from a nationally representative sample of 1,000