The following correction was printed in the Guardian's Corrections and clarifications column, Friday January 26 2007
The minister for public health is Caroline Flint, not Flynn, as we said in the article below.

Thousands of children in deprived areas are to be given pedometers to encourage them to walk more, improve their fitness and keep their weight down, the Department of Health said yesterday.

The announcement of the £494,000 scheme, which came on the eve of a report from the Commons public accounts committee expected to be critical of the government's efforts to tackle childhood obesity, will see 45,000 pedometers handed out to primary schoolchildren.

While a pilot project has shown some real success in encouraging children to be more energetic, the step-counting devices will be limited to 250 schools.

Most children in the pilot project, called Schools on the Move, said the pedometers had helped increase their interest in physical activity. Half said they had become more active as a result. The daily average of steps increased from 8,355 to 13,939 at the end of the 23-week programme in the 50 schools involved.

"Using pedometers in schools has successfully encouraged children, especially those who do less exercise, to become more active," said health minister Caroline Flint yesterday. "It is particularly impressive that the children's enthusiasm for pedometers has led to whole families becoming fitter as children have been so eager to improve their step count they have persuaded their parents to do things like go walking with them, or join an exercise club."

The Liberal Democrat health spokesman, Norman Lamb, dismissed the pedometers as a gimmick. "Money promised by the government to improve sports facilities in schools is not getting through, while the number of playing fields has declined," he said.