Labour launches its manifesto promises on sport and recreation

In this blog, Alliance Policy Advisor Jo Swarbrick discusses the launch of Labour's 2015 Manifesto and what it means for sport.

Between all the balancing of books, battle buses and bluster that goes along with a manifesto launch, the detail of Labour’s document, out today (Monday 13 April) does contain some promises for sport and recreation.

Initially, in Labour’s Health Manifesto, A Better Plan for the NHS, Health and Care, published this morning, they set out a commitment to put physical activity at the centre of public health policy. This will include ‘new, easily understandable recommended levels of physical activity and a new national ambition to help people get more physically active’.

On top of this there is gda commitment to reinstate the goal of all children doing a minimum of two hours PE a week, while there is also an assurance to ‘look at how we can better support local communities so that they have the opportunity to use sporting facilities in schools outside school hours, including outside term time’.

With regards to the main Labour Manifesto document, sport gets its own short section. Along with reiterating the commitment about school PE, the manifesto explicitly sets out two measures regarding football.

‘Labour,’ it says, ‘will provide the means for supporters to be a genuine part of their [football] clubs. We will introduce legislation to enable accredited supporters trusts to appoint and remove at least two of the directors of a football club and to purchase shares when the club changes hands. We will also review the role of fan participation in other sports’.

In addition to this, there is also a commitment to ‘ensure the Premier League delivers on its promise to invest five per cent of its domestic and international television rights income into funding the grassroots’.

Outside of this specific section, there is a recognition that sport, recreation, and physical activity have a role to play in wider society. In emphasising the importance of public health, there is a commitment to ‘set a new national ambition to improve the uptake of physical activity’.

We will have to wait for details of what this national ambition would entail, but it is certainly a good sign that physical activity is recognised as playing a key role in public health.

There is also a broad acknowledgment of the value of nature and the outdoors. The document sets out, fairly unequivocally, that ‘Labour has always believed that everyone should have access to nature, whoever they are, or wherever they live’.

Specifically, this involves a pledge to ‘keep our forests in public ownership’ as well as commitment to ‘promote access to green spaces in local planning’.

This mirrors some of the Alliance’s recommendations in our Ministers’ To-Do List, particularly around local authority planning guidelines and access to the outdoors. Beyond this, there is also a commitment to ‘support the work of the Natural Capital Committee to protect and improve wildlife habitats and green spaces, and make them an important part of our thriving tourism industry’.

Sport and recreation issues often get bumped off the first (and second, and third) pages of documents like this, though this Manifesto does set out some specific commitments as well as demonstrate a broader recognition of the role sport and recreation can play in other parts of society.

We will have to wait and see if any of these pledges are expanded upon as the campaign continues. We now await the other parties’ manifestos to see what plans they have for the future of our sector.
 

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