Young People: Sporting Activities
Lord Moynihan Excerpts(2 weeks, 6 days ago)
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Lord Moynihan
To ask His Majesty’s Government what is the timeline and budget to deliver the Prime Minister’s commitment made at his meeting with the Lionesses football team on 19 June to ensure young people have equal access to high-quality sport and extra-curricular activities.
The Minister of State, Department for Education (Baroness Smith of Malvern) (Lab)
My Lords, we are committed to breaking down barriers to opportunity and supporting more children to access high-quality PE and sport. The new commitment, outlined by the Prime Minister as he wished the Lionesses good luck in their future tournament, is to create links between schools, local clubs and national governing bodies of sport to help deliver this. We are working with the school and sports sectors to design the partnerships. Further details, including funding, will be outlined in due course. Following a commercial process, we expect these partnerships to be in place from autumn 2026.
Lord Moynihan (Con)
The announcement by the Prime Minister that every child across the country will be given equal access to high-quality PE and sport, as the Government have indicated, will be welcomed across all sides of the House. However, in view of the fact that some 3.9 million children—an increase this year to nearly 40% of our schoolchildren—do not meet even the Chief Medical Officer’s basic recommendation for daily physical activity, let alone have access to high-quality PE, and given the Government’s 15% cut to DCMS’s administration budget by 2030 in the spending review and their plan to remove Sport England’s role as a statutory consultee in the planning process, leading to Sport England’s view that this will have a negative impact on physical activity with the loss of yet more school playing fields, does the Minister agree that a clearly costed, additional multi-billion pound budget will be essential to avoid falling massively short of the delivery of the Prime Minister’s laudable aspirations?
Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
Of course it is important that there is a fully funded and costed programme, but when we talk about the facilities that are so important for enabling young people—in fact, all people—to engage in sport, I point the noble Lord to the increased capital investment in schools announced as part of the spending review, part of which can be used for maintaining their facilities, and DCMS’s announcement of an additional £400 million for community sports facilities. It is also important that where we have strong local clubs and national governing bodies—which are, to give them their due, providing lots of opportunities for young people—we also need something to bring those things together to ensure that, however much investment we make in the system, we maximise it for children to be able to benefit. That is the intention of the new partnership.
Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill
Lord Moynihan Excerpts(3 weeks ago)
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Baroness Bull (CB)
The noble Lord returns to a theme he has raised before.
To conclude, children have 13 precious years to gain the knowledge and the skills that will set them up for their adult lives. All children need to be ready to take advantage of that from day 1, including children who learn differently and therefore need different support from the very beginning.
Lord Moynihan (Con)
My Lords, I rise in support of the amendments in the name of my noble friend Lady Cash on a national strategy to promote the health, development and school readiness of all children from birth to the age of five. I agree with everything that has been said in this Committee on this subject. The Minister will know that I will always take an opportunity to rise in support of what we will eventually come to: a national strategy for schools, sport, health and well-being.
But, as my noble friend Lord Young highlighted, this should not be just at primary or secondary level. It is vital also to think about this in the context of early years intervention. I see the noble Baroness, Lady Longfield, in her place—she is a passionate champion for children and has done an amazing amount of such work in her life. The Centre for Young Lives emphasises the importance of the expertise in this Committee in looking at the early stage of development and focusing not on a postcode lottery of accessibility to services but on a national strategy and trying to bring together all the good work that is under way.
In that context, the noble Baroness, Lady Bull, would normally also talk about early years activity and the importance of physical activity for young children’s development, promoting play and an active lifestyle, building physical literacy, enhancing learning readiness and encouraging habits that can be sustained throughout life. Getting confidence into young children through physical activity is vital. I commend to the Committee the work done by many organisations specialising in early years physical activity programmes—Early Movers comes to mind. It has highlighted that there has been a decline in physical activity among young children, and its work therefore brings our attention to that decline. The Youth Sport Trust’s Healthy Movers recognises the importance of providing training and resources for early years staff to support physical and emotional well-being in young children. There are many other organisations—Hidden Talents, Tiny Tots Yoga and BBC Tiny Happy People—all offering different programmes.
The common denominator among Committee Members this evening on this subject is that we really do look to see whether it is possible to bring together a lot of the evidence of best practice in a national strategy. I urge the Government to look at that carefully, because the benefits of early physical activity are undeniable. Improved physical development is the first. Enhanced cognitive development is undoubtedly a benefit. Social and emotional development comes from building confidence, teamwork and social skills. Long-term health is critical in early years intervention. A focus for those early years is important, as are outdoor activities that match those objectives, such as walking, playing in the park and exploring nature, as well as indoor activities such as dancing, playing with blocks, messy play—finger painting with rice—and using climbing frames. These are all important components of early years activity, and we need to structure those activities. That is where Sure Start was so good, as my noble friend Lord Young said. It showed that one could bring all this together and that it was possible to have a strategy that focuses on best practice for all young people, rather than, as I say, having a postcode lottery whereby some were the beneficiaries of the many charities and initiatives.
I have made a short intervention on this, but a really important one on the wider strategy, as far as I am concerned. I hope that the Minister will be able to say that the Government are thinking about responding positively to try to bring together all best practice, in the interests of all our young people, because there is no doubt at all in my mind that the issues and objectives that I have set out should be universally available, and I very much hope that through this Government they will become so.
Baroness Bousted (Lab)
The noble Baroness, Lady Longfield, was not here at the beginning of this debate, so she has asked me to say that it is really important that there is good liaison between education and health.
I really feel that I am in a bit of a parallel universe. We are being told about the importance of integrated early years help, and we had such a programme with the Labour Government, which was enormously successful. Yesterday, I read an Institute for Fiscal Studies analysis that showed that it reduced hospitalisations for mental health among 12 to 14 year-olds by 50%, and that it
“improved the dimensions of school readiness—communication & language and problem-solving”.
It was most effective in targeting the most deprived communities—so the stories about how the children who needed it most were least likely to get it were not true. The first 700 Sure Start centres were set up in the most deprived areas—and, actually, there was a lot of work that showed that it was the universal element that made it so important.
It is like a parallel universe, when we know that, during the period from 2010 to 2024, there was an exponential rise in child poverty, which is at the root of lack of school readiness and childhood illness, as well as family dysfunction. Nine children in every class of 30 on average will be living below the official poverty line, and that exploded under the coalition and previous Governments as a result of austerity. So, absolutely, yes, we need an integrated approach—but I sometimes feel it might be helpful for the Opposition to acknowledge what their role was in destroying that provision, which was there for the most deprived and for all children and young people.
Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill
Lord Moynihan Excerpts(3 weeks, 4 days ago)
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Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to take part in this group of amendments and to follow all noble Lords and give more than a nod to many of the amendments that have already been debated. I also wait in anticipation for my noble friend Lord Moynihan’s amendment, which I would have signed if I had been quicker with my drafting pen. I shall speak to Amendment 186 in my name and I thank my friend in sport, the noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, for co-signing that amendment. I am also grateful to all organisations that have been in contact with me on the issues this amendment addresses.
The Government have set out their plans for breakfast clubs, but in many ways those plans are silent when it comes to children with special educational needs and disability. There is a whole series of risks with not being clear in the Bill in relation to the issues that are specific to those groups of children: not least the question of food itself and the attendant issues; transport—how those young people get to school in the first instance—and the specialist support that is often required throughout the school day. Without consideration of those three issues, it is likely that the plans will leave children with special educational needs and disabilities with suboptimal—or potentially no—ability to access the breakfast club provisions.
Current data shows that a third of children with special educational needs are entitled to free school meals but do not access them. That stat would increase if you considered the specific context of breakfast. The evidence is clear that, as other noble Lords have pointed out, when it comes to good-quality, nutritious food there is an academic benefit and a mental and physical benefit—food for thought, food for sport.
If a third of young people with special educational needs and disabilities are not enabled to take the opportunity of free school meals, it seems clear that the Bill needs to be far more specific when it comes to the nature of provision that can be inclusive for all those who would wish to benefit from such provision. It is a question not just of the nutritious food but of the social network and the relationship element. If SEN and disabled children are unable to access the breakfast clubs, they are cut out of not only the food provision but that important part of the social network—the relationship nature of the whole school day experience. What happens if the transport is structured in such a way that it does not get to the school until the official start of the academic school day? Again, SEN and disabled children are effectively excluded.
For many people, food can be a difficult subject to discuss. There are specific issues when it comes to those with disabilities, particularly those who suffer from ARFID and other such conditions. The relationship to food can be complex. The Bill is largely silent in this respect. If the Bill does not specifically address the issues around transport, the provision of that specialist support and food provision, breakfast clubs will not be inclusive and will not enable and empower those with SEN and disabilities. There are many start points in life that impact people’s educational career and, subsequently, their work career. They can be positive or otherwise. Breakfast clubs need to be in that positive bracket. Currently they are somewhere short of it.
In short, the Bill needs to be clear that breakfast clubs are inclusive for all. As ever, “inclusive by design” does not just mean making provisions that benefit those with special educational needs or disabilities. It means benefiting the whole school population and the whole school experience. If the Government do not make amendments to this effect, the outcome is far more likely to risk those children with special educational needs and disabilities being disadvantaged before the school day has even begun.
Lord Moynihan (Con)
My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow my noble friend Lord Holmes. I am a little surprised that we are making such fast progress in this Committee. The noble Baroness, Lady Grey-Thompson, is making her way here as quickly as possible from chairing another meeting, her amendment having been reached mildly in advance of when she thought. She is passionate on this subject. If anybody can get here quickly from a meeting, it will be one of our finest Paralympians in history. I hope that she will be joining us shortly.
I welcome that we have grouped the importance of food with that of physical education and activities. To use the words of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, if she had got her act together, I hope she would have also signed my amendment and the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Addington. When it comes to activities, it is exceptionally important. The noble Lord, Lord Watson, a passionate sports fan and an exemplar of fitness and well-being from Lanarkshire, would also have added his name to this amendment. It is great to see the Minister for football now taking her seat on the Front Bench for this important debate, even if she is not wholly focused on the importance of the UK Chief Medical Officers’ Physical Activity Guidelines, which are the subject of my amendment.
Before I come to Amendment 185A, I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Walmsley, that I thought she spoke outstandingly well about the Healthy Start scheme, but while the Healthy Start scheme focuses on nutrition, physical education in schools contributes to physical activity and overall well-being, which are essential to a healthy start in life. I also thought that the noble Lord, Lord Addington, in focusing on provision before the start of the first school session to improve well-being, highlighted an important point about not just community sports but arts and music and their engagement in the schools programme.
In my Amendment 185A, I talk specifically about
“the provision of activities consisting of physical activity which contributes to the UK Chief Medical Officers’ Physical Activity Guidelines before the start of the first school session on each school day”,
although, as the noble Lord, Lord Addington, said, we could stretch that out throughout the whole school day. In that sense, this is a probing amendment.
By any educational measure, physical activity in our schools would be placed in a category of concern. It requires improvement. It needs special measures. Physical activity in schools, sport, physical literacy, teacher training, the opportunity to engage in sport and the benefits that come from sport in schools have been in decline over not just the past year but the past 20 years. I have said many times that one of the greatest sadnesses in my life has been the fact that despite an outstanding London 2012 Olympic Games, with the fantastic changes that took place in the East End of London, we did not leave a legacy for school sport or in opportunities for young people to engage in sport.
The Chief Medical Officer expects young people from five to 18 to engage in moderate to vigorous-intensity physical activity for an average of at least 60 minutes per day across the week. This can include all activities, such as physical education, active travel, after-school activities, play and sports, including walking to and from school. That is a very low bar. In Australia and New Zealand, the chief medical officers add on top of that several hours of light physical activity. The chief medical officers in both those countries take walking and playing out. The UK Chief Medical Officer’s focus on one hour includes those things, so we have a very low bar.
Let us look at what is happening in the UK when it comes to delivering on those guidelines. I mentioned the Chief Medical Officer’s basic recommendation for physical activity. The reality is that 30% of children do less than 30 minutes of exercise a day, and a further 22.7% average between 30 minutes and an hour. That means that more than half our children, some 3.9 million, do not meet the Chief Medical Officer’s recommendation. If that is not the definition of a crisis of physical education in schools and a crisis of opportunity for our young people, I do not know what is. It is essential that in an important Bill such as this, on well-being, we have at least some mention of physical activity, some mention of sport, some national plan that remedies and addresses one of the biggest crises that we face in schools at present.
I put today’s amendment out there as a probing amendment to set the scene for many amendments that are going to come before this Committee much later in the Bill when we will look in detail at what can be done. Right across the board, it is important to look at the curriculum, teacher training, facilities, and co-operation and engagement with local authorities and local clubs, maximising the opportunity for young people to participate in physical education and sport in schools.
Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
What I have been absolutely clear about is that the point of the early adopters scheme is to enable us to design the national rollout. If the noble Baroness wants me to commit to bringing back further information to the House, I am of course willing to do that. My point is that the information will in fact be much more widely available in terms of all of the issues that have been raised by noble Lords. I thought that I have been pretty clear about that.
Lord Moynihan (Con)
My Lords, I thank the Minister for repeating the statement that was made by the Prime Minister earlier this afternoon, which is very welcome. It is very similar to a proposal made by Prime Minister Gordon Brown, which, sadly, did not happen, in the build-up to the London 2012 Games. One reason why it faltered was because the cost associated with delivering those objectives was very high indeed. I happen to believe it was well worth the budget. Can the Minister confirm whether the costs associated with what has been announced this afternoon will be covered by her departmental budget, or are they coming from elsewhere in government?
Baroness Smith of Malvern (Lab)
No, I am not going to go into those details, and neither would the noble Lord expect me to. He challenged me about whether any announcements had been made, and I pointed him to one made today. I will just point out, however, that the reason why the plans outlined by Prime Minister Gordon Brown did not come to fruition was because, of course, after 2010, Gordon Brown was not the Prime Minister anymore and those who were did not choose to take forward those plans. That is why we have had to wait until this point, under a Labour Government, for another commitment to the sort of sporting entitlement that he asked about earlier.
To move on from breakfast clubs, I turn to Amendments 190 and 194 in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Walmsley and Lady Boycott, which seek to establish a school food improvement scheme and to update the school food standards. I recognise the importance of these reforms and the vital work that noble Lords have done to raise the profile of school food policy. That is why I am pleased that my honourable friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State was able to announce in the other place, on 5 June, that we are working with stakeholders and experts from across the sector to revise those standards, to ensure that they support our work to create the healthiest generation of children in history. We will share further details on this consultation in due course. I invite noble Lords to engage on this, including on the important question of how we can ensure that schools comply with the updated school food standards. I am sure that that will build on the work already done by the compliance pilot and by the work done to support governors to challenge and assure the quality of food that is being offered in their schools.
There were several questions raised relating to free school meals and entitlement. We will of course have the opportunity to return to those and to deal with them when we come to the group that is specifically about free school meals. That is why I am not covering them now.