The first slice of millions of pounds' extra funding for school dinners has arrived in Sussex - but many children will not reap the benefits for another year.

The Department for Education and Skills has given more than £750,000 in ring-fenced money to Sussex education authorities to improve the quality of school meals in the wake of celebrity chef Jamie Oliver's TV series on the poor state of them.

This is the first instalment of a £130 million targeted school meals grant for authorities which will continue for three years.

Schools will also receive their share of £90 million directly over the same period.

However, children in West Sussex will have to wait until next September before any changes are made.

West Sussex County Council has decided to add its extra £391,127 to its existing school meals budget of £2.5 million and put its catering service out to tender to find a better provider to start in September 2006.

Sodexho currently provides packed lunches for primary school pupils at £1.32 a head.

A county council spokesman said: "We will be looking for a company which is flexible, uses locally-produced and sourced food, is nutritional and remains interesting for children to eat."

School dinners campaigner Richard Symonds said he was disappointed with the way the money would be spent.

Mr Symonds, who lives in Crawley with his wife Elaine and their sons Peter, 15, and David, 13, said: "The money should have been ring-fenced so it had to be spent on raw ingredients.

"The idea of throwing it all into the same pot to get a new caterer is not necessarily going to make anything better."

Brighton and Hove City Council hopes to expand an improved menu piloted by caterer Scolarest at three schools last term to as many schools as possible by Christmas.

The council received an extra £114,421, which will raise the amount spent on raw ingredients for primary children from 41p to almost 60p.

The extra money will be used to improve the choice of fruit, vegetables and salads, remove many processed foods, use higher specification products and invest in staff training.

A council spokesman said: "We are already ahead of the game with school meals as our specification already exceeds the current national minimum guidelines.

"We are looking forward to making further improvements with the extra money.

"The pilot schemes for enhanced menus were extremely well received by parents. We intend to extend this enhanced menu to other schools as soon as possible."

Bob Howitt collected more than 200 signatures in two days at his daughter Lucie's school, St Andrew's in Hove, for a petition to increase the amount of money spent on school dinners.

He said: "This is good news but there is always more we can do. We can't stop here."

East Sussex County Council received an extra £250,350 which will mean an extra 8p per meal. Currently the council spends £1.40 on primary meals and £1.44 in secondary schools for ingredients and caterers' expenses.

A spokeswoman said: "The funding is very welcome and will enable us to build on work to improve menus and service delivery. We will consult with school communities and other partners on proposals to make the best use of this allocation."