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What are Holiday Hubs? 

Holiday Hubs are for children and young people who cannot access any other form of mainstream activities during school holidays due to the nature or complexity of their disability or support needs. â¶Ä¯&²Ô²ú²õ±è;

Each holiday hub is run by an activity provider who is contracted by City of Edinburgh Council to deliver this work.  

Each year there is a new annual intake and the Holiday Hubs run in the same cycle as the academic year.  

Holiday Hubs run Monday - Thursday from 9am to 3pm during October, February, Easter and Summer holidays.  

2026-27 Holiday Hubs support provision application dates 

Opens: May 07 2026 

Closes: 11pm 03 June 2026 

Submit Your Application 

If your child meets the holiday hubs eligibility criteria below, you can apply for a space via our 

Please make sure you read our Holiday Hubs application guidance materials carefully before submitting your application 

If you need help submitting your application you can contact your school, or email holidaysupport@edinburgh.gov.uk 

Eligibility for holiday support 

• Children and young people who reside in City of Edinburgh and for whom they hold duty of education and/or care.  

• Children and young people with a disability and as a result cannot access universal provision. 

Eligible applications will be considered against the following criteria:  

• Child’s plan indicates the child/young person requires highly specialised curriculum and resources not ordinarily available in a mainstream classroom deployed/designed for the child/ young person’s specific use on a continuous basis 

• Child’s Plan indicates that the child/young person can easily become significantly overwhelmed and dysregulated and thus requires an environment of space and reduced sensory stimulation including individual or small-group sessions.  

• Child Plan that indicates planning for the child/young person is highly individualised. Planning will involve highly individualised, structured activities requiring frequent review and/or ongoing consultation with external agencies.  

• Child’s plan indicates that the child or young person requires a high level of adult support and supervision continuously as a result of health and safety issues arising from primary care needs.  

• In receipt of support from the Children Affected by Disability team and recommended by their social worker as requiring holiday support within their assessment of need. 

• Recommendation from senior education staff or child disability team recommending holiday support linked to their professional judgment and assessment of ‘imminent risk of family breakdown’ 

• In receipt of child disability payment mid-level care and above. 

Full information about our privacy, data and information sharing policies can be found on our website: Privacy and data protection – òòò½ÊÓƵ 

Holiday Hubs FAQs 

Criteria 

A new holiday hubs criteria was first designed and agreed at committee in 2025. This has been refined and updated for 2026-27 working in collaboration with the Holiday Hubs Parent and Carer Steering Group.  

We have a fixed limited number of contracted spaces available within this non-statutory provision. Unfortunately, there is not capacity to realistically provide support to everybody who needs it.   

Adaptations and updates to the holiday hubs criteria, taken both so far and in future, are reflective of our efforts to continue working in collaboration with the holiday hubs parent/carer steering group to ensure this provision is allocated as fairly and transparently as possible to children and young people who need it the most.  

Complete One Form Per Child  

One form must be completed for each individual child wishing to access the holiday hubs provision. 

Age Range 

Children must already be enrolled in school to be eligible to access holiday hubs. Applications are open to children and young people who will be attending school/are due to attend school i.e. P1-S6 for the academic year and are over the age of 5 years. Children who attend nursery are not eligible.  

Holiday Hub Schedule 

Holiday Hubs run for ten weeks in total throughout the academic year, running during the October, February, Easter and Summer holidays. 

Each week the hubs run from Monday to Thursday, from 9am until 3pm.  

Submitting your Application 

Please provide complete and full information regarding your child’s support needs. Include full names and contact information of any relevant professionals wherever appropriate.  

The holiday hubs are delivered by contracted activity providers so please do not rely on any familiarity that might exist attending school or elsewhere.   

Please check to ensure all contact information is correct before submitting. We recommend that you save or a keep a record of weeks that you have applied for.  

If you have any issues, problems, or queries about submitting your application, please contact holidaysupport@edinburgh.gov.uk  

As we anticipate very high levels of demand, you do not need to contact us to ensure your application has been receieved unless you experienced issues completing / submitting your application. 

Appeals 

If your application for the holiday hubs is assessed to be ineligible or you have not been allocated any provision and you would like to appeal this decision, you can contact holidaysupport@edinburgh.gov.uk to request a link to our appeals form.  

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Transport is not available as part of the holiday hub provision and is the responsibility of parent/carers to organise and manage such arrangements where required.  

We try our best to allocate participants to the nearest hub appropriate to their needs but unfortunately this is not always possible due to capacity and demand of each hub.  

Making a Complaint  

Working together with contracted activity providers, we try hard to provide the best possible provision. Despite this, we recognise that things don’t always go as well as planned and mistakes will be made. â¶Ä¯&²Ô²ú²õ±è;

If you wish to record formal dissatisfaction with any aspect of the service which you receive at one of our Hubs, we advise that you first contact the activity provider in question directly to discuss or to register your dissatisfaction formally.  

Complaints regarding the service provided from the City of Edinburgh Council can be made on our website. â¶Ä¯&²Ô²ú²õ±è;

Zero Tolerance â¶Ä¯&²Ô²ú²õ±è;

òòò½ÊÓƵ and each of the activity providers contracted within the holiday hub provision all operate a zero-tolerance policy towards abusive and unacceptable behaviour. â¶Ä¯&²Ô²ú²õ±è;

We reserve the right to remove weeks that have been allocated to anybody who demonstrates unacceptable conduct to any member of staff within the holiday hubs provision. â¶Ä¯&²Ô²ú²õ±è;

What else is there? 

A range of other local children’s ASN activities and inclusive providers can be found on City of Edinburgh Council’s Website. â¶Ä¯&²Ô²ú²õ±è;

Other support options available for families can be found on the City of Edinburgh Council website - Support for families – òòò½ÊÓƵ 

Fees/contribution  

Holiday Hub Parent and Carer Steering Group

We regularly consult with the holiday hub parent and carer steering group to discuss the holiday hub provision and how aspects of it should be designed / managed to maximise transparency and fairness throughout. The holiday hubs parent steering group is an open membership group and currently meets monthly via MS Teams.

Meeting dates for 2026

• Friday 9 January, 10am to 11am
• Thursday 5 February, 10am to 11am
• Thursday 5 March, 10am to 11am.
• Tuesday 21 April 11am to 12pm
• Friday 22 May, 10am to 11am
• Friday 19 June 9.30am to 10.30am

Discussion notes will be uploaded here after meetings throughout the year and will then be archived at the conclusion of each annual provision

Steering group discussion notes – August 2025

Steering group discussion notes – September 2025

Steering group discussion notes – October 2025

Steering group discussion notes – November 2025

Steering group discussion notes – December 2025

Steering group discussion notes - January 2026

Steering group discussion notes - February 2026

Steering group discussion notes - March 2026