29/11/2004

Sport scholarship scheme receives further funding

An extra £6 million has been designated to the Talented Athlete Scholarship Scheme (TASS), set up to enable school leavers to continue their sporting careers.

The announcement today means that the scheme introduced earlier this year with an annual funding package of £3 million for two years will now run until 2008.

Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell said: "This is fantastic news for budding young sports stars right across the country. This £6 million extra investment now gives people with real promise the best possible opportunity to make it right to the top. All too often young people have shown real talent for a sport at school, but have disappeared from view once they leave. The TASS scheme now gives those people the opportunity they need to develop their raw potential with the help of top coaches and access to the best training facilities and sports medicine possible."

Currently 800 young sporting stars benefit from the scheme which allocates each individual an annual grant of £3,000 to cover coaching, sports science, physiotherapy and the use of training facilities.

Over 30 different sports ranging from canoeing to tennis and 15 disability sports are covered by the initiative.

Today's news brings the total sum of government funding to Britain's young sport stars to £15 million in the period up to 2008.

(mmcg/sp)

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