School Sports Funding

Lord Foster of Bath Excerpts

Tuesday 30th November 2010 Commons Chamber

[Mr Don Foster (Bath) (LD)]

My hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Bob Russell) feels as strongly as I do that we need to find a way forward, which is why he was concerned about the polarisation of this debate. I would have no difficulty in attacking the previous Labour Government if I wanted to enter into such a debate. I would point out that, for several years, they failed to protect smaller playing fields after they had promised to do so; that, under them, obesity increased; that, when they claimed a wonderful participation level of two hours of sport a week, they failed to mention that that included changing time; that, under them, participation in recent years hardly increased and that, sadly, the participation of women and disabled people has fallen; and that they made little or no dent in the drop-off in sports among people who had left school. That is what I would say if I wanted to be negative.

[Mr Andrew Smith (Oxford East) (Lab)]

rose—

[Mr Foster]

I will give way to the right hon. Gentleman before I talk about the positives.

[Mr Smith]

While the hon. Gentleman is not being polarising, and in the spirit of consensus that he says he espouses, does he agree that it would make sense for the coalition Government to respond positively to the constructive offer that my right hon. Friend the Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) made? Common cause can be made and we can find a way to save the essential infrastructure for the invaluable work that those partnerships—

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle)]

Order. Interventions must be very short. The right hon. Gentleman should know better; he has been here long enough.

[Mr Foster]

The answer to the right hon. Gentleman is, broadly, yes, as I will say in my conclusion.

If I wanted to be positive, I would praise the previous Government for their work, for example, in building up the links between schools and sports clubs. Above everything, that increased the opportunity to provide a wider range of sports, so that more children are more likely to find a sport that they like. I would also praise the work that they did in developing the amateur community sport status, which gave tax benefits to sports clubs, and the way in which they restructured and simplified the landscape of the various sporting bodies. In particular, I would praise them for the excellent UK school games, which had a great effect on very many young people—it took place in my constituency of Bath.

The debate has also been polarised on the question of whether the school sport partnerships scheme was excellent or varied. The obvious truth is that there are examples of very good practice and of not such good practice.

Surely the House wants to ensure that it provides a lasting sporting legacy from 2012. That is what we are all about. We know that if we are to do that, we must ensure that we have coaches, volunteers, sports facilities and many other things, including a proper support structure for sport, whether for school, amateur or elite level sport. The one thing that is clear to me is that school is where it all starts. If we can get sport provision right in school, particularly by linking schools with clubs, we have a real opportunity to provide that sporting legacy from 2012.

The Government are right to have introduced the innovation, building on the UK school games, of the schools Olympics—or whatever it will ultimately be called—because that will boost the amount of inter and intra-school competition.

[Stella Creasy (Walthamstow) (Lab/Co-op)]

The hon. Gentleman mentioned the UK games for young people. Who will organise the UK schools Olympics if we do not have school sport partnerships? The school sport partnership in Waltham Forest organises 112 competitions each week.

[Mr Foster]

I will come to that very fair point at the end of my speech.

The Secretary of State is right to point out the amount of red tape and bureaucracy in the existing scheme, and to say that we should devolve responsibility for decisions to the lowest possible level, and, within our education system, to governors and head teachers. However, there are two problems. First, if schools buy in services, they need to have a broad framework from which to purchase. Unless we take action quickly, we will discover that all aspects of the school sport partnership network have disappeared. That is why it is important to accept the principle that we need to find a way to maintain a base level of support within some sort of structure. Schools need something to buy in to.

I agree with the Secretary of State that there ought to be ways of slimming the bureaucracy and of the number of bodies. Within my own constituency, the county sport partnership—another excellent set of bodies that do excellent work—already work with our schools and some of the excellent staff who are involved with the school sport partnership to see whether they can find a way to build a framework into which schools can opt. With a little bit of additional support from the Government, that could be a way forward. I do not think that it is necessary to have county sport partnerships and school sport partnerships. Indeed, the divisions between school sport and community sport have been too great under the current structures and, as I have said, bringing them together has been beneficial.

To my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, I say that I agree with the shadow Secretary of State that while some slimming of the structure is necessary, it has provided some excellent things and, with a smaller budget, there is a way of providing a basic framework whereby schools can bid.

[Annette Brooke (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is also a matter of timing? Schools, rightly or wrongly, have great uncertainty about their future budgets and therefore are not prepared to commit to a pool. I am concerned that we could lose everything by acting too precipitately.

[Mr Foster]

My hon. Friend is right, which is why I have said that time is not on our side. People are being issued with redundancy notices—and that is a problem—and schools are not clear about how much money may be available in their budgets.

Broadly speaking, we are moving in the right direction, but we need a framework. I urge my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State to talk urgently to the Youth Sport Trust and Sport England, because if they worked with him, he could put together a package that satisfied Members on both sides of the House.