MORE than £85,000 is to be invested in three new holiday food programmes in Glasgow’s South Side.

Members of Glasgow’s city administration committee have agreed to provide the additional funding to reduce the risk of hunger in some of the most vulnerable communities.

Queen’s Park Govanhill Church will receive £11,283, Southside Housing Association £47,360 and Wing Tsjun Scotland £27,230.

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At the committee executive director of finance Martin Booth said: “At a meeting in February the allocation of food was approved which provided funding for just over £2 million to 37 projects.

“As a result of discussion, the internal audit were asked to look at the service provision across the city. They identified some risks in the south of the city.

"In order to reduce that risk, it is proposed that three additional awards are made at a cost of £85,819.78. This will be funded from underspend from community budget.”

Members welcomed the proposals and asked what steps could be taken to prevent this from happening in the future.

Councillor Martin Rhodes said: “I support the recommendation today. How have these organisations been chosen and how did this problem occur so we don’t get into this problem again in future years?”

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Councillor Jon Molyneux added: “I am glad that officers have looked into these issues which have affected my ward. The obvious limitation was the limited amount of funds available.

“We need to think about how we design this programme going forward so this doesn’t happen again.

It was confirmed that the pressures of covid had not helped the council solve the issue within the agreed timeline.

Mr Booth responded: “I acknowledge the pressures on the timeline which have been covid related. The three organisations were chosen because they met the geographic challenges, and they were the next three high scoring applications as well.

“Internal audit are going to carry out a more in depth review to identify lessons learned and make recommendations so we can improve our process so that risks are identified at an earlier stage.”