Rowde Youth Club, which is being forced to close because of a lack of volunteers, is to hold a farewell barbecue tomorrow.

The club, run by Jan Barber and Karen Wheeler since 2009, has tried unsuccessfully for the past year to get parents and villagers to help out.

Mrs Barber said: “We are very lucky as we have great facilities at Rowde Academy but we just can’t get enough people to volunteer. We have had people saying they will help but then they just don’t turn up.”

Around 25 to 30 children aged between ten and 17 attend the youth club meetings on Friday evenings between 6pm and 7.30pm.

Mrs Barber said: “All we have been asking for is for parents or villagers to be on a rota.

“They would only have to give up a couple of hours a month if we had enough people.

“At the moment most of our members are in the younger age bracket but if we had enough volunteers we could run two sessions.

“But the way it is we feel that we are no longer able to operate the club safely on a regular basis.

“We have just about been able to manage on a week-to-week basis but we are often faced with the prospect of turning people away and we cannot plan to do any activities or organised games as we just don’t have enough pairs of eyes to watch over everyone.”

But she said if enough people came forward over the next few weeks it might be possible to have a re-think on the club’s future in September.

The club is not run by Wiltshire Council and its closure is not connected with its youth service cuts.

The barbecue will be held at the farm of John Butler at Rowdeford Farm, Conscience Lane, from 6.30pm to 8pm.