COUNTY Durham will take full advantage of a £459m project to make sport more easily accessible to every school child, say council leaders.

The PE, School Sport and Club Links Strategy is a country-wide Government initiative contributing to the development of key priorities to improve the lives of young people in education, health, socialisation, citizenship, creativity, physical development and sporting success.

There will be five partnerships for County Durham, and the county council, as the local education authority, will play a leading role.

Each partnership requires a three-year development plan offering all pupils a minimum of two hours PE and school sport each week.

Overall funding is expected to be about £265,000 for each partnership annually.

The county council's cabinet member for education, Councillor Neil Foster, said: "This scheme is in its early days and we are now being asked by the DfES (Department for Education and Skills) to indicate how we intend to implement the strategy for the development of the partnerships. We will have this done by the end of April.

"This is an important strategy with significant opportunities for young people in County Durham.

"Its purpose is to co-ordinate school sport, to improve participation, to build excellence and to use school sport as a means of improving the lives of young people".