House of Commons
Friday 7 June 1996
The House met at half-past Nine o'clock
PRAYERS
[Madam Speaker in the Chair]
Sport
Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.--[Mr. Knapman.]
9.34 am
The Minister of State, Department of National Heritage (Mr. Iain Sproat): I greatly welcome the chance to debate sport again, although there is something ironic about discussing the subject on a day such as this--when we should all be outside in the sunshine either watching sport or playing it.
I hope that the debate will range widely. After all, we have an extraordinary summer of sport before us. The test match season started yesterday, with England doing well; the European football championship starts this weekend; and the Olympics, Wimbledon and rugby league--which is turning itself into a summer game--lie ahead. There is plenty to discuss.
I will deal in my winding-up speech with points raised by hon. Members in all parts of the House, but I shall start by taking up the subject from the point at which we left it in our last debate on 27 October, when we debated the Government policy paper "Sport: Raising the Game". I will also tell the House the great deal that we have done in continuing the momentum that we started and describe our initiatives in respect of schools, the British academy of sport and the regional network of sporting institutes.
"Raising The Game", which was published last July, contained the most important set of Government proposals ever produced to encourage and promote sport in this country. It affirmed a commitment to putting sport at the heart of weekly life in every school and to re-establishing sport as one of the great pillars of education alongside the academic, vocational and moral pillars. The policy also emphasised the importance of sporting opportunities continuing after school, and it included specific and funded proposals aimed at building links between schools and sports clubs. The document urged further and higher education institutions to promote sport among their students, and it presented specific and funded ideas on how to improve the way in which we support and nurture talented sportsmen and sportswomen. Finally, "Raising the Game" proposed the creation of the British academy of sport as a pinnacle of a network of centres of sporting excellence throughout the country, to bring out the best in our top athletes.
Mr. Harry Greenway (Ealing, North):
Can my hon. Friend give an idea of the timetable for establishing the academy of sport, to which we all look forward and which is needed at the earliest possible moment?
Mr. Sproat:
I am happy to answer my hon. Friend, although I will deal with the academy in more detail as
Mr. Nick Hawkins (Blackpool, South):
Has my hon. Friend seen the astonishing document produced by the Labour party on its proposals for an academy of sport? That document appears to quote representatives from a number of sporting organisations, but it seems that all that Labour has done is hijack comments in praise of the Government's proposals. If Labour has completely misunderstood Government policy in suggesting that we believe in a single academy, whereas my hon. Friend may confirm that the Government are considering a number of academies, perhaps Labour is trying to make bricks without straw and Cunningham.
Mr. Sproat:
I did see some of those comments and I was extremely surprised. It is a great pity that individual sportsmen and women are hijacked into being political pawns. As far as I am concerned, this is a non-party political issue. It is not right to take the comments of some people out of context. I know that many of the athletes were extremely surprised--even angered--to find that they had been quoted.
I hope that by the end of this debate, the Labour party will understand that there will be a flagship academy of sport, which will be linked to regional institutes of sport and other centres of excellence around the country. It was clearly spelt out in paragraphs 77, 79, 82, 83 and 85 of our document that there would be a flagship academy of sport with a supporting network in the regions. Indeed, individual sports will have their own academies.
I want to tell the House what we intend to do next. Fist, we will publish a follow-up document to "Sport: Raising the Game", which was published on 14 July last year. We will publish the new document on 15 July--the first day of that working week--setting out exactly what stage we have reached in the intervening year. I think that hon. Members on both sides of the House will be extremely pleased to know how much progress has been made and how much momentum has been maintained in raising the profile of and increasing the opportunities for sport, not just for the champions, the medal winners or the players in international teams, but for every young boy and girl who is capable of deriving benefit from sport--for them, not just for our country's teams in the Olympics or the Commonwealth games.
I want to trace the pathway from young girl or boy through school to the local sports clubs and on to the centres of excellence and all the way up to the pinnacle of championship achievement at the academy of sport. I shall start with highlighting a little of the contents of our new report. The House will have to wait--albeit not with bated breath--until 15 July for the full details. However, I felt that as we were having this sports debate today, it was only right that the House should be given some inkling of what the Government have done and of what we intend to do.
Some people might ask why we start with schools. Sport in schools is probably the single most important element of our sporting strategy. I believe--as strongly as
I believe anything in politics--that sport is a fundamental part of education. We do not have sport in schools simply because it is healthy, although it is extremely healthy. We do not have it simply because it is enjoyable for most pupils, which it is. We have sport in schools because it is important that healthy habits are inculcated in young people at an early stage.
Health and enjoyment are important, but what is fundamental is that sport teaches young people lessons that are not so easily or so well taught in any other way. The behavioural lessons of discipline, especially self-discipline, courage, team spirit, learning to play with others and learning to live within the rules are all vital. If sport had been better taught in schools over recent years, I am sure that we would not have witnessed some of the recent outbreaks of ill-behaviour. That is why the Government start from the premise that sport in schools is important.
We are trying to combine a number of elements in schools to increase the quality of sport and the provision of sporting facilities and to improve the ability of teachers to train. I want to run through some of the mix of ideas that the Government proposed and are now carrying through. I shall try to give specific dates so that the House will realise that this is not just waffle about what we hope to do.
Starting with the coming school year, every school will have to state its sporting aims in its prospectus, which is published at the beginning of the school year; at the end of every year, when that school writes its annual report, it will have to set out clearly what it has actually done, what team games it plays--something that has declined recently--what other games are played, what other schools it plays at what games and with what results, what coaches it has, which teachers have coaching qualifications, what sporting facilities are available, what time the school devotes to sport, what links it has with local sports clubs and what links it has with local businesses to get sponsorship.
Lady Olga Maitland (Sutton and Cheam):
My hon. Friend's point about the time that schools devote to sport is very important. Has he studied the section of the national curriculum that deals with sport? Although it gives details of what children should be doing at each key stage, it does not clearly and specifically set down how many hours per week children should spend on playing sport. We could end up with wonderful statements but no definite results.
Mr. Sproat:
That is an important point, which I had intended to raise a little later in my speech. My hon. Friend is aware that the new physical exercise curriculum, which was set in place at the beginning of this academic year, gives greater choice to schools to put more sport into the curriculum. Schools also now have greater choice to put other subjects into their curriculums. We have freed schools from some of the rather more restrictive elements of the national curriculum.
As I was saying, the school's prospectus and annual report will have to set out clearly what the school aims to do about sport and what it actually does about sport. Parents, governors, teachers and the wider community
will be able to see exactly what a school is offering in sporting facilities and opportunities. Parents will then be able to make a choice. They will say, "Yes, we like this school's attitude to sport and we want to send our children there." That fulfils another virtue of giving people a choice and the necessary information to make that choice.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State intends shortly to publish a policy paper on the arts. I hope that we will be able to achieve the same with that. We are not concentrating only on sport, vital as it is; we are going across the national curriculum to let people know what schools do so that parents can make informed choices about where to send their children.
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