Culture, Media And Sport

Nigel Huddleston Excerpts

Tuesday 30th June 2026 Commons Chamber

[Nigel Huddleston (Droitwich and Evesham) (Con)]

I thank the Chair of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Gosport (Dame Caroline Dinenage), for her work, for her impressive speech and for securing the debate today. I pay tribute to her and all the members of the Select Committee from all parties for conducting the review on community and school sport that forms the basis of today’s debate. I also thank everybody for their contributions today.

This important report has highlighted the concerning reality that England’s community and school sport system is not currently delivering either the opportunities that people want or the benefits that we know sport can provide. All too often, the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and the sectors it oversees are dismissed as “nice to haves” or a bit fluffy, when in fact they are pivotal—indeed, essential—to our economy and society. DCMS sectors—sport, culture, tourism, film, TV, music, heritage, civil society and much more—enrich our lives and make them more fulfilling, while supporting over 5 million jobs in the UK and generating well over £220DCMS’s total expenditure fell 3.3% from 2023-24. The Government have chosen to abolish the National Citizen Service, to undermine horseracing and legitimate gambling, and to cut spending on tourism promotion, on business events, on listed places of worship and even on school sport, while implementing policies that are loading up costs on DCMS sectors, especially through tax rises. The business rates and national insurance rises are decimating DCMS sectors, depriving tens of thousands of young people of their first job opportunity and causing unemployment. Of the nearly 200,000 job losses since Labour came to power, over half were in tourism and hospitality and many of them involved young people. I respect the Minister, and have a lot of time for her, and many of those things were not her Department’s decisions, and that must be intensely frustrating.

We all understand the benefits of an active population. When children are active from an early age, they develop confidence, resilience and social skills, and are more likely to enjoy better mental health, improved wellbeing and healthier lifestyles. If we fail to give every child the opportunity to be active, we risk storing up significant challenges for the future, from rising obesity and poorer mental health to greater pressure on our NHS. Allowing even more development on sports fields and playgrounds is clearly not going to help.

The evidence is clear that there is strong public demand for sport provision, but as the report highlights, fragmented policy, inadequate investment and poor cross-Government co-ordination are preventing sport from delivering its full potential—whether improving health outcomes, supporting children’s development, strengthening communities or contributing to economic growth. There is also a gender dimension to this issue, as the Chair of the Select Committee outlined and as a recent report by Sky demonstrated. Investment in sport delivers some of the clearest returns of any area of public spending: Sport England estimates that every £1 invested in community sport and physical activity generates more than £4 in social and economic value.

The Government announced in January that they were investing £85 million to build and upgrade grassroots sport facilities across the country as part of a £400 million boost for grassroots sport facilities by 2030. However, the £400 million figure is the same amount that we announced when we were in government, so thanks to inflation, it is a real-terms cut. There is also little detail on who will receive the money and when. Many sports governing bodies, including those for cricket, swimming and tennis, say that they have plenty of projects that are ready to go, but without clarity on funding, they cannot pull the trigger on key projects across the country.

I have particular concerns about school sport, where there has clearly been a bunfight between the Department for Health and Social Care, the Department for Education and DCMS about funding. The Government announced £1 billion for school sport over the next three years, but the devil is in the detail. The Department for Education announced that the £320 million annual PE and sport premium for primary schools will be scrapped in favour of a new partnership network. Let us be clear: that is a cut. In fact, it leaves schools around 22% less well off in terms of annual funding than the current scheme. As the report outlined, we need structural reform, sustained investment, clear accountability and a joined-up national strategy.

The Government have committed to publishing a national plan for physical activity later this year, and we look forward to scrutinising it. Sport and physical activity cannot solve every challenge facing young people, but they can be one of the most powerful tools for improving health, building confidence, developing skills and strengthening communities. Investment matters—of course it does—but we also need a long-term plan and structural reform. The Committee has provided Ministers with a road map; the challenge is whether the Government have the ambition to follow it.