Sport in the UK

Maggie Throup Excerpts

Monday 4th February 2019 Commons Chamber

[Maggie Throup (Erewash) (Con)]

rose—

[Mims Davies]

I am going to set out my thoughts on participation, but I give way first to my hon. Friend.

[Maggie Throup]

My hon. Friend talked about junior parkruns, which reminds us that habits formed in childhood often last a lifetime. Initiatives such as the Erewash school sport partnership do just that. They start in primary schools and hopefully, some of those children will continue with sport throughout life, which is so important. Does my hon. Friend agree?

[Mims Davies]

I feel that my hon. Friend has read the next part of my speech. Participation and a culture of participation within families and communities is absolutely vital. I would be delighted to set out some of my thoughts on that, so let us talk about participation. We are making good progress on getting more people active. We want half a million people to be more regularly active across England by 2020, with at least half of those being women. Over 470,000 more people are already active compared with when we launched the strategy in 2015, but delivering long-term change in habits requires persistence. We know that we need to do more to get and keep people active.