Public Document Pack Communities, Equality and Local Government Committee Meeting Venue: Committee Room 2 - Senedd Meeting date: 3 July 2013 Meeting time: 09:00 For further information please contact: Policy: Marc Wyn Jones Committee Clerk 029 2089 8505 / 029 2089 8600 [email protected] Agenda Private Pre-meeting - 09.00 - 09.15 1 Introductions, apologies and substitutions (09.15) 2 Inquiry into participation levels in sport - Evidence session 7 (09.15 - 10.15) (Pages 1 - 16) CELG(4)-21-13 – Paper 1 John Griffiths – Minister for Culture and Sport Huw Brodie, Director, Culture and Sport Division Jon Beynon - Senior Sports Policy Advisor Break - 10.15 - 10.30 3 Inquiry into participation levels in sport - Evidence session 8 (10.30 - 11.10) (Pages 17 - 21) CELG(4)-21-13 – Paper 2 Edwina Hart – Minister for Economy, Science & Transport 4 Motion under Standing Order 17.42 to resolve to exclude the public from the meeting for the following business: (11.10) Items 5 and 6 5 Inquiry in Home Adaptations - Consideration of Draft Report (11.10 - 11.50) CELG(4)-21-13 – Private paper 3 6 Committee Forward work programme - approach to next inquiry (11.50 - 12.00) (Pages 22 - 25) CELG(3)-21-13 – Private paper 4 Agenda Item 2 Paper 1 National Assembly for Wales Communities, Equality and Local Government Committee Inquiry into participation levels in sport in Wales Response from : Minister for Culture and Sport I would like to welcome the Committee’s inquiry into participation levels in sport in Wales and I am very pleased to be able to provide written evidence as part of the inquiry. This inquiry will, I am sure, raise some important areas and will help to reinforce the important links and synergy that exists between sport and physical activity. Ensuring that young people are physically literate is a vitally important step as it helps them to become and remain interested and involved in sport. It is clear that we need to overcome the significant difficulties that exist of engaging more young people in particular on a more regular basis in both sport and physical activity. To achieve this, we need to join up our policies in a more co-ordinated fashion which will help us to become a fitter and healthier nation. There are of course some good examples of collaboration across Welsh Government portfolios but we can improve in this area and I will be working with my ministerial colleagues to ensure that we drive forward our shared aims and objectives. This is a point which I stressed when I spoke at the Sport Wales National Conference recently. Sport helps to define us as a nation. I am very passionate about sport and enjoy participating and watching. Participation in sport teaches us about life and we can learn self discipline and teamwork from it. We can learn how to win with grace and lose with dignity and it can help to transform people’s lives, not only by helping people to maintain a healthy lifestyle but to also help those who experience a range of social problems. Within the last year there have been some remarkable success stories within Welsh sport, involving promotion medals and championships won by teams and individuals and that undoubtedly gives the nation a huge boost and helps to inspire people to take part in sport. I have only been Minister for Culture and Sport for a short time; however, I have already seen how important sport is to the people of Wales. I am continually meeting with representatives from a range of sport organisations and have been impressed with the breadth of sporting talent that exists. But success does not come on its own; it Page 1 1 requires a huge amount of dedication and support given by so many volunteers and coaches. These people help not only to create quality experiences and opportunities so that people enjoy participating in sport but also help enable our more talented sportsmen and women reach their true potential. The Committee have raised a number of areas and I will address these in the order in which they were listed. The extent to which the Welsh Government and Sport Wales are achieving the goals set out in the Programme for Government, the Creating an Active Wales action plan and the Vision for Sport in Wales with regard to participation levels in sport; Participation in sport plays an essential part in both short and long term physical and mental health and is also associated with academic and cognitive performance. Other potential benefits linked to sport, particularly involving children and young people, include the acquisition of social skills through active play, leadership, teamwork and co-operation and better concentration in school displacement of anti-social and criminal behaviour. Physical Education in schools can also help to deliver physical literacy and sports literacy and provide access to those who may have become disillusioned about sport and physical activity. Within the Programme for Government we set out clearly that: We remain committed to ensuring all children and young people are able to access a range of sporting opportunities as part of the formal curriculum, after school and in the community. We remain committed to ensuring that children and young people are provided with basic physical skills from an early age and that physical literacy is an important a developmental skill as reading and writing. The Programme for Government also contains other commitments which can support the whole school approach to physical activity. This includes actions such as Page 2 2 delivering improvements in rights of way for cyclists and walkers, including legislation establishing duties to provide cycle routes. Within the Sport Wales Vision for Sport document which was launched in 2010, there are two clear aspirations: • getting every child hooked on sport for life and; • Wales being a nation of champions. Role of Sport Wales Sport Wales are the Welsh Government’s adviser on sporting issues and are also responsible for helping to deliver our policies on sport across Wales. We have provided a budget for investment in sport and through the annual remit letter to Sport Wales we have set outcomes we expect to be delivered with that investment. They are fully engaged in driving forward our goals set out in our Programme for Government and the Creating an Active Wales Action Plan and to drive forward their aspirations contained within their Vision for Sport document. Welsh Government / Sport Wales: Investment in Sport The Welsh Government support the development of our communities enabling those who suffer social problems to have quality opportunities to engage in sport. As part of that community investment we are continuing to support our Free Swimming programme which is being delivered successfully across all 22 local authorities in Wales. This involves investment of £3.5m this year which supports the delivery of more than1 million free public swims each year and attracts over 170,000 people to free structured sessions. Our long term ambition is to get every child to be able to swim by 2020 which has been well communicated to our partners. The Welsh Government is also working with Sport Wales, the Welsh Local Government Association and a number of local authorities to deliver some pilot schemes to extend our free swimming scheme to veterans and serving armed forces Page 3 3 personnel on leave and I will be considering the results of these pilots in the near future. Ensuring that young people take part in sport at an early age is key if they are to maintain their interest in later life. Sport Wales have a number of programmes in place such as the 5 x 60 programme which focuses on secondary schools pupils and this is complemented by the Dragon Sport scheme which focuses on primary school children having fun whilst taking part in sport and physical activity. Sport Wales introduced the Young Ambassadors (YA) scheme as part of the London 2012 Games and these young people have gained a great deal of success in inspiring key partners and stakeholders to help deliver sporting opportunities. The scheme enables children from primary school age onwards to participate in structured training that allows them to act as ambassadors for sport in their school, taking part in running after hours sporting activities and being involved in reaching out to others who might not otherwise participate in school sporting activities. Over 3000 children have become YA’s in Wales so far, of which around 1800 are still active (the balance having left school). They have been instrumental in increasing participation in sports activity, especially amongst female students in the schools within which they operate. My officials are discussing this programme with Sport Wales with a view to both broadening (more ambassadors in more schools) and deepening (joining up with other programmes such as Show Racism the Red Card) this programme. In terms of grassroots development of sport, this year Sport Wales will provide investment of investment of over £5m to a number of governing bodies of sport across Wales which will help to create more sustainable sporting opportunities. Sport Wales are also working with new partners such as Street Games to offer more accessible opportunities for young people who may not be members of school or sport clubs or are located in disadvantaged areas. This leads me onto equality of opportunity in sport which is key to our overall agenda. The Welsh Government via Sport Wales are working closely with Disability Sport Wales who report that last year Page 4 4 they were able to provide over 1 million sport participation opportunities, covering a variety of sports.