Sector Update - March 2023

London Sport to distribute ￡5.7million to help schools provide more opportunity for activity

London Sport will deliver ￡5.7m of investment to schools in the capital, over the next three years. The funding is being distributed through London Sport as a result of the Department of Education renewing its Opening School Facilities Fund for 2023, providing an opportunity for schools to gain investment to broaden access to physical activity outside of school hours. Read more .

London Sport joins the Sporting Chance Prize Draw 2023

Fancy winning Paris 2024 Olympics Tickets? Enter the Sporting Chance Prize Draw for just ￡10 to be in with a chance of winning this prize, and over 80 others! 100% of the entry sales go towards supporting our vital work. Enter the Draw here.

Mayor launches Go! London fund to help underserved Londoners get into sport and physical activity

The Mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, has today launched the capital’s biggest-ever community sports fund to help under-served and vulnerable young Londoners access and enjoy sport and physical activity.?Go! London will see ￡19.5m being spent on improving the lives of young Londoners facing physical, social, economic, or educational challenges.?The fund has been established as part of a ground-breaking new partnership between City Hall, which has given ￡4.5M, The London Marathon Foundation and Sport England, which have given ￡7.5M respectively, supported by London Marathon Events and London Sport, to improve the accessibility of sport across the capital.

London Sport announces new partnership with Exergame

Exergame, a leading supplier of interactive fitness and gaming products, has signed a three-year partnership with London Sport to support the charity’s mission of helping Londoners live longer, healthier and happier lives through being active. Read more on the new partnership .

London Sport announces new partnership with Play Innovation

Play Innovation, a global leader in interactive play equipment and inclusive sport, has been announced as an Official Partner of London Sport. Over the next two years, Play Innovation and London Sport will be working together to create spaces to help young Londoners enjoy being active and build positive physical activity habits for life. Read more .

London Sport & Art Invest Real Estate partnership to embed physical activity into Canada Water Dockside

Art-Invest Real Estate (Art-Invest) and London Sport are pleased to announce a partnership that will see London Sport support the provision of sport and physical activity at Canada Water Dockside, Art-Invest’s 4.5-acre office-led scheme in Canada Water, Southwark. This partnership is one of the first major initiatives that London Sport will be working on with large developments in the capital.?

Vacant shopping unit transformed into an active space for women and girls

London Sport has launched the first phase of its Space for Girls project in Lewisham, transforming a vacant retail space in Lewisham Shopping Centre into a health and wellbeing space. Read more .

Plus the top headlines from...

Funding

Mayor launches Go! London fund

the capital’s biggest ever community sports fund to help under-served and vulnerable young Londoners to access and enjoy sport and physical activity. Go! London will see ￡19.5m being spent on improving the lives of young Londoners facing physical, social, economic, or educational challenges.?

Building Strong Communities Fund

The Mayor of London is offering funding for London equity-led voluntary and community sector organisations to enable communities to shape their recovery from COVID-19, through community-led projects. Find out more here.

Children and Young People

￡130m scheme for free school meals

London's mayor Sadiq Khan has announced he is launching a ￡130m scheme to give every primary school pupil free school meals for the next academic year. The mayor's office said it estimated the one-off funding could help more than 270,000 children in the capital during the 2023-24 academic year. Read more here .

Fewer than half of primary schools say that could keep children active if sport funding was cut

Young people are likely to become more inactive and suffer poorer health as a result of critical school sport funding delays, a children’s charity is warning.

Fewer than half of all children in England (47.2%) are active for the Chief Medical Officer’s (CMO) recommended 60 minutes every day. New research from the Youth Sport Trust suggests that children’s activity levels are likely to deteriorate further unless government urgently commits to vital school sport provision beyond this summer.?

Inclusion and Disability

This Girl Can launches the latest phase of its campaign

This Girl Can’s research shows that 2.4 million fewer women than men strongly agree that they enjoy getting active – this is what they call the enjoyment gap.?And because enjoyment is one of the biggest drivers of activity, it’s a gap they are intent on closing. They have now launched a new phase of the campaign to help tackle this barrier: This Girl Can -?With You.?Access the latest resources and tools here .

Dementia-friendly sports clubs and venues guide

Visiting sports clubs and venues to watch live sport can cause challenges for people living with dementia that may not always be obvious. Dementia-friendly sports clubs and venues ?is a practical guide for those organisations wishing to tackle these challenges by becoming more accessible and inclusive for people affected by dementia.

Facilities and Space

Cold swimming pools and youth clubs closing

According to UK Active, 29 leisure centres, pools, or gyms have closed in the past year due to the energy crisis. This piece explores why the UK government must accept that gyms and pools are as fundamental to our health and wellbeing as a GP surgery or a pharmacy – and help them accordingly.

Physical Activity for Health

Social Prescribing Day 2023?

As we celebrate the fifth annual Social Prescribing Day, it’s incredible to consider the profile that Social Prescribing now enjoys. This blog from London Sport’s Physical Activity Advisor, Rob Mclean, explores social prescribing, from its origins to the vast impact it has on the nation today. Read the full blog here .

Five reasons physical activity is important for cancer patients

Colleagues At Loughborough University's 'Centre for Lifestyle Medicine and Behaviour' discuss five ways physical activity could be beneficial to patients during and after cancer treatment in this article on the National Centre for Sport and Exercise Medicine website.??

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