Health: Active Lifestyles

Lord Addington Excerpts

Monday 17th December 2012 Lords Chamber

[Lord Addington]

My Lords, this is one of those subjects where, whichever department answered for the Government, it would be the wrong one in regard to half of the points made. The Department of Health probably stands the best chance. Indeed, I would be in favour of the Department of Health covering sport. I say that because it is one of those subjects that touches every aspect of our lives. Whenever we talk about it, we always go round a little circuit. We talk about the DCMS because it is in charge of sport and the Department for Education because sport education should start early in schools. However, in my opinion schools are not that great at it. To be perfectly honest, I could have a nice 20-minute rant about how dreadful many of the examples of school sport are, but I will not do so tonight.

Let us take, for example, the football match from “Kes”. I am afraid this House is one of the few places that will understand the predicament of pupils who are frozen to death and disinterested, watching four or five players kicking each other and the ball in a small circle with the goalkeeper doing tricks as the ball sails past him. This is what most people experience at school. My sport, Rugby Union, has a worse reputation with those who are not interested. “Let’s cower and freeze to death on the wing while the big boys roll around in the mud”, is how someone described the experience to me.

What do we do about this? No one department can deal with it. If the Department of Health takes a lead, it must decide whether it is encouraging a lifestyle or using sport as a treatment. Which is the driver? Encouraging it as a lifestyle would probably have far greater results. If we look at what has improved health quality in our society, medical treatments come nowhere near clean water, clean air and a decent diet. Doctors and medicines cannot touch those things when it comes to life expectancy and the quality of life. That is the way it is. Everyone must be encouraged from an early age. We must ensure that those who are enthusiastic and creative have better access.

When it comes to policy on sport for young people, all Governments try hard and all get it half-right and then stop until something else is tried. The current idea of bringing clubs into school sport is a good one. It builds on some of the better ideas of the previous Government. There is a continuation of policy there that I do not think either side wants to admit to, but it is late at night and nobody is paying any attention, so let us admit that now.

Schools do not have the breadth of talent or forward thinking in their sports to encourage people to adopt a sport so that it becomes a creative process. It should not be about status. Competitive sport is not about saying, “We have played eight games and won so many”. Competitiveness in sport makes it enjoyable and fun. It comes, for example, from learning how to move a ball into a space to allow someone else to carry on and run with it. The competitive nature comes when someone tries to stop you. That is the essence of it. Whether you record it as a competitive match for the school or say, “They had a kick about and learnt new skills”, it is still a competitive experience.

One of the problems with our coaching and youth in sport has often been that we put far more emphasis on whether results have been recorded than on how well the pupils played and how their skills can be developed in later life. All the major sports develop short games that are more accessible to people in their clubs and schools. What I call prep-school culture has a lot to answer for. Are we going to encourage people to make pitches available? Then, for instance, there are places such as parks where these skills can be used casually. An informal kick-about every week is infinitely better than one organised game once a month. Is the Department of Health going to encourage all the tiers throughout government to make sure that that kind of thing is available? This is a big ask and it will not happen overnight. It will not happen within one Parliament; it will take many Parliaments, and there will have to be a process of building it up to get it into the culture. The will is there but whether we have the drive and the focus to make sure that it continues is a question that all of us involved in politics and public life have to deal with.

I turn to the idea of using sport and activity as a treatment. It would appear that exercise is the wonder drug. I have recently heard it described as aspirin and cannabis, but there is always a wonder drug and activity seems to be it. As has been said before, if you are active, it is better for you, even if you suffer from things such as arthritis. Nobody ever thought of that. We all know about cardiovascular problems and the need to control one’s weight at a healthy level. I am glad to see in the briefing that people are now referring to a “healthy weight”, as opposed to body mass index based on an inactive person in the 1950s. I declare my interest as an old rugby player. Using physical activity would seem to be a very useful, cheap and self-regulating treatment, but can it be done without education, or access to a version of it, possibly being taken up in later life? It will be difficult, as you do not willingly do something that is boring and unpleasant. This has to be tackled in a creative way. Indeed, the Royal College of Physicians says, “Well, doctors aren’t used to this, especially those who were trained a long time ago, or even a few years ago. They don’t know who to refer to, what pathways to use or who they should trust to do it”. That is the culture.

I have bored noble Lords with the idea of somebody who is physically active dealing with a lack of trust or the serious need for physiotherapy to be given at an early stage. I think that at some time all sportsmen of my generation and those who are a bit younger have said, “I’ve hurt myself, doctor”, and have been told to rest. When they say, “Won’t that mean that the muscles get weaker and the tendons shorter?”, the answer is, “Well, rest a bit more then”, which means that the doctors do not know what they are talking about. Getting doctors to admit that and to refer patients to somebody who does know what they are talking about would be a huge step forward. It is happening more often and it is very important to make sure that that culture is maintained.

I could go on for much longer but there are only so many minutes available. Effectively, unless we promote activity wisely and well, we will waste a huge opportunity to save everything from money to a little bit of personal misery for people. Social interaction can be encouraged through activities, and mostly group activities. Unless we do this and unless the Government give us an idea of how they intend to drive this forward across government, we will miss our targets. Indeed, if all political parties can come up with a coherent answer and if we can achieve something that the Olympics taught us—that sport does not have to be very political—we can probably go forward. However, it will not happen quickly and we will not do it if we have three different camps shouting at each other.