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Bob Russell (Colchester) (LD): Is there any evidence at this stage to show whether the academic achievements of schools that specialise in sport have remained the same, got worse or improved?

Mr. Twigg: I thank the hon. Gentleman for anticipating the next paragraph of my speech. Performance in PE at GCSE, A and AS-level is improving in sports colleges, as one might expect. More interestingly, there is a wider benefit—it is the case with all specialist schools. The curriculum focus is used to drive improvement across the school. The percentage of pupils in specialist sports schools achieving five or more A* to C grades at GCSE, the standard measure, increased from 41 per cent. in 1997 to 48.7 per cent. in 2003—almost double the national average increase for all schools. The hon. Gentleman highlights an important feature of the programme. It brings not only what we would expect—benefits with respect to PE and sport— but a broader benefit across the board.

Mr. Derek Wyatt (Sittingbourne and Sheppey) (Lab): Is there not a problem if we insist that specialist sports schools have to achieve rigorous academic qualifications? Work carried out by social anthropologists at Stanford shows that people who cannot read and write need to do sport, art, music and acting first in order to get the confidence to return to maths and English. I wonder whether that is a core dilemma in the specialist sports school concept.

Mr. Twigg: I do not think that it is. We are certainly not saying that, in order to be a specialist school, it is necessary for that improvement to happen. The improvement is in large part a consequence of the curriculum focus that comes from specialism. On those figures, 51.3 per cent. of pupils did not achieve five or
 
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more A* to C grades at GCSE, but they enjoyed some of the other important benefits that my hon. Friend rightly describes.

Mr. Cash: This is an interesting issue. I do not think that the Minister has mentioned the word "competition" yet. One cannot be good at games unless one is highly competitive. Surely that transfers across to an ethos within the school, which the Minister demonstrated from the figures, that some do better than others in school work as well as in sport. Does he agree that it is psychologically important to get across the idea that there is nothing but good to come from competition?

Mr. Twigg: Hon. Members are kindly anticipating different sections of my speech. I shall deal with competitive sport later—and, by way of reassurance, I shall be saying very much what the hon. Gentleman has just said. I intend to wrap up my remarks because several hon. Members wish to speak.

School sport partnerships are clustered around the sports colleges, establishing a network of 400 such partnerships—families of schools—which receive additional funding to enhance sports opportunities for all children. We have reached a position where just over half of all schools in England are within this network of 313 partnerships. Last week, I had the opportunity to attend their national conference at Nottingham university, with about 1,000 people. There was a powerful sense of dynamism, energy and enthusiasm, sharing the benefits of specialism in secondary schools with other secondary schools and, importantly, primary schools, special schools and the broader community.

More than 1,700 secondary co-ordinators and 10,000 primary and special school link teachers have been appointed and are in place within the partnerships, sharing best practice, organising competitions and activities, and building and strengthening subject leadership, particularly where it is seen to be most needed—in the primary sector. The prime objective of the partnerships is to enable pupils to take up their entitlement to the minimum of two hours of high-quality PE and sport.

The hon. Member for Stone (Mr. Cash) has left the Chamber, but it is at this point that I should like to reiterate the Government's strong commitment to competitive school sport. The PE national curriculum requires that all pupils are taught competitive games. After years of decline, the co-ordinators and link teachers, with support from sports clubs and volunteers, are turning the tide to breathe life back into local, regional and national school sports competitions. For example, the Ellis Guildford partnership in Nottingham has just won a national development award for setting up six new competitive junior leagues in basketball, hockey, tennis, netball, cricket, rugby union and softball, involving 1,400 children from 36 schools. This is precisely the direction that we want to take, and competitive school sports are at the heart of our PE and school sport strategy.

At the beginning of my speech, I mentioned that I wanted to place the sport strategy in the broader context of healthy living and the positive role that schools can
 
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play in promoting good health and, in particular, tackling obesity. We are working closely with colleagues in the Department of Health. Last month, we published the healthy living blueprint for schools, which re-emphasises not only the importance of PE and sport, but the broader benefits of physical activity, as well as focusing on issues such as food in schools. We want to build on that blueprint when the public health White Paper is published shortly.

Mr. Paul Truswell (Pudsey) (Lab): The two sports colleges in my constituency are concerned at their inability to engage local NHS bodies, such as the primary care trusts, in their operations and in cascading out the local schools sport partnership. Would he be prepared to have words with his right hon. and hon. Friends in the Department to try and ensure that that particular gap is filled?

Mr. Twigg: I am happy to do that.

Bob Russell: Joined-up government.

Mr. Twigg: As the hon. Gentleman says from a sedentary position, the success of this relies on different parts of government, nationally and locally, working well. If my hon. Friend wants to write to me with more details on that specific instance, I shall be happy to look into it, but I want to send out a general message that for the healthy living approach to work, it requires schools to take it seriously, which itself is a challenge, and effective working together, locally and nationally. That is the way to make a success of this, and primary care trusts have an important role to play.

Let me finish by saying something about the European year of education through sport. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Stone is back in his place for this part. He sadly missed the part of my speech in which I think he and I would have been in full agreement, on the role of competitive sports, and I look forward to hearing him give his full endorsement today to the European year of education through sport. We would all agree that, to be world class, it is necessary to be aware of the wider world, and it is encouraging that the work that we are doing on sport is increasingly regarded by many of our international partners, including in the European Union, as a positive example from which lessons can be learned.

Mr. Cash: I am sorry, but the Minister's remarks have tempted me to ask another question. He would, I am sure, repudiate the remarks of Romano Prodi, who suggested that we should be represented as Europeans at the Olympics. Could we just get that one completely out of the way?

Mr. Twigg: I am reliably informed by colleagues behind me that Mr. Prodi did not say that. However, I can certainly reiterate that we have absolutely no intention of doing anything of the sort and that we want to build on our nation's success at Athens. We hope to do that not only in Beijing, but in London in 2012.

The European Union has designated 2004 the year of education through sport and we are playing an active role in that, helping to share best practice and to strengthen links with our friends in continental Europe.
 
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The prime objective of the year, very much mirroring and complementing the approach that I have been describing this afternoon, is to identify and showcase the contribution that sport is making and can make to education and to raising educational standards.

The European Union has invested nearly £500,000 in 16 projects across the United Kingdom, including an international camp run by the Easington school sport partnership in Durham, where several hundred young people from across Europe took part in a camp focused on promoting healthy lifestyles. A project in Hull targeted young people at risk of under-performing and used sport as a medium to motivate and raise their expectations. Working with the British Council, we are developing a broader international perspective at the sports colleges and in the partnerships. For example, Angley school in Kent has developed links with a school in Bangkok, and through the dreams and teams programme, pupils at the schools have gained a greater awareness of each other's cultures and languages. The British Council is extending that programme to 21 countries, using the Department for Education and Skills' global gateway to help foster and sustain international school links—a positive example of sport as a medium not just for education but for promoting international ties and breaking down barriers between different nations and cultures.

A great deal is already happening to promote school sport and increase participation. I pay tribute to school sport co-ordinators, link teachers, coaches, volunteers and others who are working hard to see this strategy through. We are on track to meet our targets, but I absolutely accept points made in interventions that many of those targets are minimums; we want to go beyond them. I believe that we can go beyond them and, in doing so, that we are on track to transform physical education and sport and place it at the heart of what schools do. By increasing participation in school sport, we shall enhance children's health, raise educational standards and better prepare young people for adult life, laying sound foundations to encourage their lifelong participation in sport. That is a set of objectives that Members in all parts of the House can support.

4.14 pm

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