§ 10. Mr. Simon Hughes (Southwark, North and Bermondsey)If he will make a statement on his targets to increase the number of hours each week spent by (a) adults and (b) young people on participating in sport. [128206]
§ The Minister for Sport (Kate Hoey)Increasing participation in sport across all age groups and abilities is a key feature of the recently published Government sports strategy, "A Sporting Future For All".
§ Mr. HughesThat was a bit of an unspecific answer. Will the Minister use her enthusiasm to try to change the current statistics? Although more young people are participating in sport, the average length of time that they spend doing so is about seven and a half hours a week, whereas they watch television for about 11 and a half hours a week. The amount of time spent on physical education in schools across all age groups has dropped considerably over the past five years.
Will the Minister have a word with her colleagues in the Department for Education and Employment to ensure that school timetables do not drive out swimming, PE and participation in sport, so that there is a chance that the appetite for sport and the opportunity for excellence will 615 be encouraged? We might then win a few more things later, as well as give much greater satisfaction to many of our fellow citizens.
§ Kate HoeyThe hon. Gentleman is right. The more participation, the more chance there is of spotting the talent, getting to the top and winning, which is what the country wants.
On working more closely with the Department for Education and Employment, I assure the hon. Gentleman that I have been spending a lot of time on precisely that. Part of the reason for having a very good strategy was to show how what was happening in education and outside schools mattered. That kind of working together is so crucial.
I agree with the hon. Gentleman. Sports governing bodies and everyone involved in sport must recognise that these days there are many more attractions for young people. They must be more imaginative about how they sell their sport. That is why part of the implementation group for the sports strategy is looking at precisely those issues.
§ Mr. John Greenway (Ryedale)Does not Labour's sports strategy owe a huge debt to the last Government? One billion pounds of lottery funding has gone into 3,000 grass-roots sports projects. Given that so many initiatives mentioned in the Minister's own White Paper depend on the continuation of lottery funding—for instance, the space for sports and the arts initiative in schools—and on destroying the arm's-length principle in regard to the lottery that Labour thought so important when in opposition, can the Minister tell us who has overall responsibility for investment in schools projects? Is it her Department, the Department for Education and Employment, or the lottery funding bodies?
If the sports strategy does not go according to plan, can the Minister promise that neither she nor her successor will say, as she has said in respect of our failed world cup bid, that the policy was doomed to failure from the start?
§ Kate HoeyThat is nonsense. As the hon. Gentleman will hear if he listens to the tape, what I said was that many people felt from the beginning that those who could not secure the support of their own region obviously started at a disadvantage. I said nothing that others have not said—nothing that the chairman of the Football Association, for instance, has not said in the past few days. I hope that we shall all learn the lessons of what has happened with the world cup bid.
As for the hon. Gentleman's specific question, he should be aware that more lottery money than ever is being invested. It was originally forecast that only £1.8 billion would be invested over the lifetime of the current licence; the amount will now be more than £2 billion.
This Government believe in partnership, which means taking all opportunities to make money available. Those involved in sport do not care where the money comes from, as long as it is there.
§ Mr. Dennis Skinner (Bolsover)I hope my hon. Friend can tell me that the Labour Government are not carrying out Tory party policy, because Tory party policy was to close all those playing fields and sell them off. On top of 616 that, the Tories closed 600 pits—which meant that nearly half the miners' welfares, all with massive playing fields, were closed and sold off as well.
The last thing that this new Labour Government ought to do is take any notice of that lot. Ought we not to stop selling off playing fields, and make sure that the miners' welfares that remain have plenty of lottery money so that we can provide sport for the many, not the few?
§ Kate HoeyMy hon. Friend is absolutely right. That is why we have been so determined to stop the compulsory sale of playing fields. The last Government sold many of our young people's opportunities down the river by selling so many. We are ensuring that that does not happen now.
§ Mr. Nick Hawkins (Surrey Heath)Does the Minister not recognise that many sales of school playing fields were carried out by Labour local authorities, and that, despite her much vaunted policy, few projected sales have been stopped by it? It is all very well to have the rhetoric; the practice is entirely contrary to it.
§ Kate HoeyIf the hon. Gentleman looked at the figures, he would see that the rhetoric is the fact—and the fact is that now, rather than 40 playing fields being sold on a regular basis, three have been sold.
What we did was stop compulsory sales. Some local authorities, and even the National Playing Fields Association, now happily accept that it is sometimes better to sell a playing field, and to use the money to provide another sporting facility that can be used by all. We could never have a policy stating that no playing field would ever be sold. The important question is how playing fields are being replaced. We must ensure that those with an interest—Sport England, the local community and local schools, for instance—all have a say before a decision is made.