As the organisation marked its third birthday with a party on the terrace at the House of Commons, Ben Bradshaw, the Culture, Media and Sport Secretary, described its "extraordinary success" in setting up more than 100 schemes across the country and involving more than a million youngsters in activities including street dance, cheerleading, handball, athletics, cricket and futsal.

StreetGames is now receiving £1 million in Government funding over the next three years.

"At the moment, we don’t seem to be doing enough to get our sports legacy right," said Don Foster, Shadow Culture, Media and Sport Secretary for the Liberal Democrats.

"But the StreetGames project has been a fantastic success, involving more than 3,000 volunteers and coaches."

John Mann, MP for Bassetlaw, paid tribute to the way StreetGames had precipitated greater funding for sporting projects in his constituency, even though the organisation only had "small amounts of money" to work with itself.

"Because StreetGames uses those tiny amounts of money in the right way it means we can draw down official money as a result," he said.

"The beauty of StreetGames is that it goes where it needs to go."

He added that StreetGames had helped initiate a project which would soon involve the opening of floodlit artificial football pitches where youngsters could drop-in to play between 4-8pm on Friday evenings.

"That project is going to make a huge difference," Mann said.

"That part of the week is the worst time for vandalism in that area.

"But I guarantee that the crime figures there will plummet once this project gets underway, and that the figures will stay at that level.

"That’s the difference StreetGames makes."

Hugh Robertson, the Conservatives’ Shadow Culture, Media and Sport Secretary, said that the opportunities StreetGames provided to young people to play sport was something that would help their general performance in school and beyond.

The party also marked an official recognition of the Inspire mark the charity has received for its work from the London 2012

The Organising Committee, whose athletes’ representative, former world and Olympic triple jump champion Jonathan Edwards, saluted the contribution his former British team-mate, Diane Modahl, had made in her role as the charity’s ambassador.

"Athletes such as Usain Bolt can produce moments of greatness on the day," Edwards said.

"But what you are all doing in StreetGames is more inspirational, because you are making a difference to people’s lives."

On display was a poster - of boys playing marbles on the streets of Salford - which was adapted from an original painting by the world renowned artist Harold Riley, who is raising funds for the charity through an auction of work.