The Leisure Review: news in brief

Edition number 89; dateline 16 October 2015

API backs cross-party call for child development focus
A new report from the all-party parliamentary group on a fit and healthy childhood calls for the government to adopt a holistic strategy to support child development and on politicians from all parties to acknowledge the vital role of play in children’s lives and particularly in helping tackle the physical inactivity crisis. Speaking at the report’s parliamentary launch, API chair Mark Hardy said: “This comprehensive report covers many aspects of play and play provision but a single unifying message is that children will always play provided they are given the opportunity to do so. We must ask ourselves if our children today have the same or better opportunities to play than we did. If they do not, then we must address that. This report makes some strong recommendations which if followed will have a positive impact on creating more opportunities for children to play. High-quality public play facilities bring innumerable benefits to local communities that reach far beyond simply providing children with a fun place to play.” Recent research by the API amongst families shows that over 80% of parents think there should be funding for more high-quality public play facilities.

Seven Up: Looking Forward
The LGA will be hosting a one-day event to celebrate the NLCF Leading Learning Programme on Thursday 19 November [please note amended date] in London. The event, titled Seven Up: Looking Forward, will include keynote presentations, networking and skills sessions. It will also serve as part of the programme’s annual evaluation programme. Programme director Sue Isherwood explained that the event was an opportunity to bring together everyone involved with the programme. “We want to get as many as possible together to celebrate seven years of the Leading Learning Programme, explore new challenges, learn and network together, and also decide on future directions for the programme,” Sue said. “The event has been designed in response to feedback to our annual evaluation exercise from our alumni, who remain our best ambassadors and supporters.” Seven Up: Looking Forward will be held at LGA House, Smith Square in London on Thursday 19 November from 10.30am to 4.30pm.
• For further details of the programme and to confirm your attendance please visit www.ncfleadinglearning.co.uk

New BSI code of practice for swim teaching
BSI (formerly but still widely known as the British Standards Institution) has published a new standard relating to children’s swimming. PAS 520, titled Safeguarding 0 to 4 year old children within the teaching of swimming, including any associated professional photography, is a code of practice that has been developed with the assistance of a number of swimming-focused bodies, companies and agencies. BSI describes PAS 520 as “based on self-regulation by the industry and sets a minimum standard for providers and reduces risks from new entrants”. The code of practice covers all aspects of operation, management and development of a commercial swimming business or programme.

Having built it, will they come?
If you like architecture, you will love Chicago but the city that includes birthplace of the elevator, crucible of the skyscraper and home to more Frank Lloyd Wright buildings than you could shake a scale rule at on its honours list is going all-out for the architectural tourist dollar. An estimated 50 million tourists come to Chicago every year, many drawn by the architectural attractions, but the city’s mayor, Rahm Emanuel, wants to see 55 million a year by 2020 and he thinks that a Chicago Architecture Biennial is the way to do it. This year’s inaugural event is a $6.5 million project to ensure that the city will “continue to be seen worldwide as an epicentre of modern architecture.”

Profit warning but positive feedback for Merlin
Merlin Entertainments, the company that includes Alton Towers among its sites, reported that theme park revenue fell by 11.4% in the first nine months of the financial year. Sales have fallen significantly since the Alton Towers rollercoaster crash in June in which four people were seriously injured. The company indicated in July that it expected profits to fall short of its stock market predictions and a warning in September suggested that it would take two years for the level of sales to return. The profit warnings coincided with Victoria Balch, one of those injured on the Smiler ride, being interviewed on BBC2 about the accident and injuries that required the amputation of one of her legs. Balch revealed she had been receiving weekly visits from Alton Towers staff, who had been “doing everything they can”.

Diary date for Tate
The extension to Tate Modern will open on 17 June 2016. Tate has raised and spent £260 million on the scheme, which will extend the available gallery space by 60% mainly via a 10-storey extension that has significantly changed the original Bankside building’s silhouette. The new galleries will also provide an opportunity for a total rehanging of the existing collection.

Finding fault with Fenchurch Street’s finest
The building officially known as 20 Fenchurch Street and more commonly referred to as the Walkie Talkie has been awarded the Carbuncle Cup, a prize given by Building Design magazine to mark the worst building of the year. That its upper reaches, the so-called Sky Garden, was the subject of a recent Leisure Review feature is apparently unrelated.

In the offing: a new strategy for sport
The DCMS published a consultation document titled A New Strategy for Sport on 31 July. The consultation is seeking the views of the public on ten specific themes: participation; physical activity; children and young people; financial sustainability; coaching, workforce and good governance; elite and professional sport; infrastructure; fairness and equality; and safety and wellbeing. Launching the consultation period, which closes on 2 October, sports minister Tracey Crouch said: “Sport has such a positive impact on people’s lives and I want to embed participation into this nation’s DNA. I want to make sure that the sports sector gives everybody – no matter who they are and what their ability – the chance to take part. However public funding is a privilege not a right and has to go to the organisations that can make a real difference. I want to hear views from people and groups on what more we can do to strengthen sport in this country across the board.” Noting the success of Great Britain’s teams and athletes at elite level, she added: “Britain has punched above its weight in elite sport in recent years with fantastic results but we can not be complacent. I want sport to do all it can to bring on the next generation of talent so that the nation continues to enjoy success and inspirational performances.”
• The consultation document is online at www.gov.uk/government/
• Martyn Allison offers his own response to the consultation in this issue of the Leisure Review.

Report lauds Leading Learning Programme
The Leading Learning Programme has maintained its quality and relevance while successfully delivering individualised and specific learning to professionals working in local government, according to a long-term evaluation of the sixth year of the programme. Based on surveys of six annual cohorts of alumni, the evaluation report found that members of the Leading Learning Programme were overwhelmingly positive about the impact of the programme on their professional lives, whether through aspects of personal development that the course provides or the taking of skills and perspectives learned during the programme into their work. The surveys of alumni show that each year participants’ expectations are that the programme will enable them to achieve career ambitions and that these expectations are consistently realised. The report also notes the scale of the challenges that Leading Learning Programme alumni are encountering in their professional working environments. “What comes through the comments from participants loud and clear,” the report states, “is the extent of change that they are in the throes of navigating, whether those changes are to do with outsourcing and restructuring services, staff turnover, political upheaval and budgetary restraints.” However, the report also makes recommendations for areas of improvement. Recruitment of participants from a all regions remains a challenge that needs to be addresses, as does the development of a process by which the growing numbers of alumni can be offered an incentive to remain engaged with the programme and the role of leadership development across the sector.
• The full report can be found online at www.ncfleadinglearning.co.uk

BMA recommends sugar tax
The British Medical Association has urged government to use regulation and a tax on sugar content to prevent a new generation growing up with the regular consumption of processed and fast food as the norm. In a report titled Food for Thought, the BMA suggests that a “strong regulatory framework should be central to the approach to reducing the burden of diet-related ill health in the UK”. Proposals include a 20% tax on sugar-sweetened drinks, including colas and lemonade to subsidise the supply of fruit and vegetables to schools, along with restrictions on advertising and sales promotions of unhealthy foods. The BMA states that action should be “focused on interventions that limit commercial influences on people’s dietary behaviour and encourage healthy dietary patterns”. Launching the report, chair of the BMA board of science, Sheila Hollins, explained that the experiences of other nations shows that tax levies on unhealthy foods can improve health and that the most effective measure is a tax on sugar-sweetened drinks.
• Read the Food for Thought report via the BMA website at bma.org.uk

Active People Survey sends sport back to the drawing board
The number of people playing sport once a week is 222,000 smaller than it was six months ago, according to the most recent Active People Survey published by Sport England. The figures, which also show a 1.2 million increase in the number of people doing no sport at all when compared with last year, were described as “very disappointing” by minister for sport Tracey Crouch, “a disaster” by the shadow minister for sport and “not much of a surprise” by sport, leisure and culture professionals who have been observing the declining momentum of the Olympic legacy programme almost as soon as the Games were won for London. Between October 2014 and March 2015 the figures show 15.5 million taking part in sport once a week. Shortly after the London 2012 Olympics the figure was 15.9 million, since when it has steadily declined. Crouch announced a widespread consultation, with a promise to “focus support on those that can deliver the goods and look to take a more joined-up approach to sport and physical activity across Whitehall”. In the face of such a profound failure of the Olympic legacy ambition, it would be flippant to point out that physical activity levels by those “across Whitehall” is probably sufficient but the reality is that among lower socio-economic groups the decline in participation has been most marked.
• Read the Active People Survey report via www.sportengland.org

Olympic legacy offers London political capital
London mayoral candidate Tessa Jowell has added her voice to those who have lamented the failure of the London 2012 Olympic Games to deliver a legacy of a generation transformed by physical activity and sport. The former Olympics minister laid the blame at the feet of ministerial successors, claiming “a generation of children have been robbed of the chance to discover a sport they’re really good at”. Removal of secure funding for school sport and the maintenance of funding for sporting policies that were not delivering results were, Jowell suggested, part of the problem. While one aspect of the 2012 legacy – the regeneration of a swathe of east London – was delivered, the opportunity to change the whole nation through activity has been lost. “And the most wicked and negligent part of it was winding up school sports partnerships,” she said. “We’re back where we started in 2002.”

New training programme to “dramatically change perceptions”
ICON Training has presented a new portfolio of its qualifications designed to offer accredited courses applicable to leisure professionals at any stage of their career. The new structure, launched in September, runs from level 1, which is aimed at the ‘aspiring professional’, through to level 7, the ‘masters level’, with five themes: fitness and physical activity; leadership and management; leisure operations; aquatics and swimming; and education and learning. Introducing the revised programme, ICON chief executive Julian Leybourne commented: “For too long our industry has evolved through incidental management where staff have been put in place without the correct training or support, resulting in high staff turnover, and an undervalued sector. We need to dramatically change perceptions of the sport and leisure industry, not just as a career option but as an integral part of the future health and wellbeing of our people and the communities we are part of.”

Domestic homage to leading light of Manchester’s music
The flow of riches into Greater Manchester’s cultural cup continues with another music-related amenity in the offing. A house in Barton Street, Macclesfield, described by the selling agent as a “double-fronted character cottage”, has recently been sold for twice the asking price of £115,000 to a certain Hadar Goldman, a musician and entrepreneur, who also happens to be a Joy Division fan. When Mr Goldman discovered that the house, the former home of Joy Division frontman Ian Curtis, had been sold he moved swiftly to offer substantial incentives, including £75,000 of compensation, to persuade the purchasers to let him take over ownership. This done, Goldman is planning to create a museum to the heritage of the band. However, there has been some disquiet given that the property is where Curtis took his own life at the age of 23. Goldman has spoken of the project being “sympathetically conceived with the involvement of “fans, music lovers, friends and family”.

Art gallery part of Prada’s new season
Milan also has a new museum. Prada, the Italian fashion house that has maintained its cutting-edge credentials even as it grew to one of the most recognised global brands, has established a headquarters for the Fondazione Prada, the foundation established in 1993 to curate the company’s art collection. The 19,000m2 gallery has been designed by architect Rem Koolhaas, who has been a regular contributor to Prada projects over the last 15 years within an old distillery and follows the first permanent home for items from the Fondazione Prada in Venice in 2011. Tickets to the museum will cost €10.

Laureate logs on with daily drawing
Chris Riddell, the new children’s laureate, will be using his time in the post to draw attention to the role and value of school libraries. “I’d like to got to places and say, this is fantastic, have you seen this? And encourage parents to go into their schools and experience their school libraries and meet the librarians.” He emphasised the role of school librarians as “custodians of literacy”, explaining that “they lay the stepping stones that start the journey from one book to another, widening horizons and the reading experience.” Riddell will also be encouraging everyone to embrace the creativity of drawing, urging parents and children to pick up a pencil and make a mark every day. By way of example, he will be creating a drawing everyday and posting it on a “laureate log” during his time in the laureate role.
• Find the laureate log online at chrisriddellblog.tumblr.com

Zoo events cease after “regular review”
Zoo Lates, the Friday-night party events hosted by London zoo, have been dropped from the zoo’s event programme. As readers of the Leisure Review will know [see TLR news passim] , the events were the subject of complaints from animal charities, who suggested that the combination of large crowds and loud music were having an adverse effect on animal welfare. The Zoological Society of London said that the disappearance of Zoo Lates was part of a regular review of its events programme.

Sports minister shocked – shocked! – by football finances
The sports minister, Tracey Crouch, has declared herself “appalled” by the amount of money that finds its way to community football from the Premier League’s broadcasting rights contracts. “I don’t think enough of the money has gone into the grassroots from the last TV deal,” she said. “I really want to make sure the Premier League make a decent contribution to improving [facilities]. I am genuinely rather appalled that they don’t.”

NEWS IN BRIEF

The ASA has appointed Mike Thompson as chief marketing officer with a brief to “build on the popularity of swimming and promote the sport to new and existing swimmers”. UK Center Parcs has been sold to Brookfield Property Partners, a Canadian investment company, for £2.4 billion; some two million visitors are expected across the five Center Parcs sites this year. RLSS UK has confirmed Martin Symcox as the new director of its training subsidiary, IQL UK; Martin has served as interim director since January 2014, when the former director Tara Dillon was seconded to CIMSPA. RLSS UK has appointed water safety and lifeguarding expert Jo Talbot to the new role of national vocational qualification manager.
Active IQ has established a partnership with Ad-Lib Training to deliver training for Active Futures, a community programme that supports people aged 14-35 with learning disabilities and mental health issues to overcome barriers to employment and wellbeing. Smart Connection, the Australian consultancy best known as the home of managing director Martin Sheppard, has received the Parks & Leisure Australia (Vic/Tas Region) Research Award for its development of the Smart Guide to Synthetic Sports Surfaces. Colin Wilkie has joined Precor as sales representative for Scotland. Meanswhile, Precor will be producing a new line of Spinner indoor cycling equipment and taking on all commercial Spinner bike production following an agreement with Mad Dogg Athletics.