Thousands of Fife families will benefit from free school meal payments until August amid concerns about the financial sustainability of the scheme.
Next week, Fife Council will rubber stamp plans to spend £130,000 a week on the service until the end of the summer holidays.
It comes after the Scottish Government confirmed local authorities would receive a further £27.6 million to combat holiday hunger.
The support means the council will not have to dip into ringfenced funding to foot a £2.6m bill for feeding more than 11,000 youngsters from the start of lockdown to August.
The government said the extra funding would enable councils to continue to support a range of people, including those on reduced income because they are self-isolating, until the end of September.
However, Fife’s Labour co-leader David Ross said the direct payment scheme was not a long term solution.
“It’s unlikely that we will be able to continue making these payments to people,” he said.
“We haven’t taken a decision on that yet and are still looking at the options, but just to do that as a blanket is not financially sustainable.”
On Thursday next week, Fife’s policy and coordination committee will discuss a report on addressing food insecurity in the region.
It warns: “While the direct payments are effective in ensuring that people have the funds to pay for food, there are concerns about the long term financial sustainability of the payments.
“There are also concerns that the longer the council continues to provide direct payments, the more likely it is that people will become reliant on them.”
Fife Conservative councillor Tony Miklinski welcomed the continuation of the scheme to support disadvantaged families.
He said: “It is important that the council continues to look for an effective and sustainable way of supporting and protecting those most at risk across Fife communities. What we do this summer can’t just be turned off come the end of the year. We need consistency from the council.”
Elsewhere, Perth and Kinross Council’s executive director of education and children’s services Sheena Devlin said direct payments would continue after the summer holidays in the region but would be be “adjusted to reflect the days children attend school”.
She said: “We know the current lockdown is making life difficult for many families and want to help where we can.
“Addressing food insecurity in this way not only helps ensure our children and young people continue to enjoy a healthy diet, it also relieves some of the stress for parents over the summer holidays.”
