§ Mr. PikeTo ask the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport if she will make a statement on the contribution made by volunteers in the field of sports coaching. [70666]
§ Mr. CabornSport, particularly at local club level, would be unable to flourish without 1.5 million volunteers, who include administrators, mentors and officials, as well as coaches. The Government's Plan for Sport recognised the critical importance of volunteers and the need to invest in maintaining numbers through training. The Step into Sport project aims to meet this need by investing £7 million over two years in training 60,000 young people and 8,000 adults to volunteer in sport, and by assisting the national governing bodies of sport to produce volunteer support strategies. A further initiative, Come into Coaching, will aim to attract volunteer coaches and administrators from March 2003.