Our members stand ready to work in partnership with Government to prevent further closures and accelerate our progress towards a sustainable leisure network.
Rt Hon Jeremy Hunt
Chancellor of the Exchequer
HM Treasury
1 Horse Guards Road
London
SW1A 2HQ
Rt Hon Michael Gove
Secretary of State for Levelling up, housing and communities (DLUHC)
DLUHC
2 Marsham Street
London
SW1P 4DF
Cc Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
Cc Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport
23 January 2023
Dear Chancellor and Secretary of State,
Urgent support for public sport and leisure through crisis and transformation
We write as the lead organisations representing local authorities in England. Our members are responsible for the country’s public sport and leisure infrastructure, which is facing an extraordinary financial crisis due to the ongoing impacts from COVID-19, the cost of living and the energy crisis. In light of these pressures, we have significant concerns about the decision to exclude swimming pools and leisure centres from the list of sectors eligible for extra support under the Energy and Trade Intensive Industries scheme and the Energy Bills Discount Scheme.
Since 2019, evidence from our leisure providers shows energy bills have risen by 300 per cent. During the pandemic councils across the country invested £159 million to keep facilities afloat, alongside £144 million of provider reserves, and in addition to the Government’s welcome £100 million national leisure recovery fund. This money now risks being wasted if we allow these facilities to close. At the close of this letter we set out three clear actions Government can take.
This is not a call for a hand-out. Councils and their partners have been working together to transform facilities into assets fit to meet the challenges of the future, whether co-locating with GP surgeries to create wellness hubs, retrofitting with solar panels and heat pumps, or energy-efficient newbuilds that boost participation and cost less to run. Many Levelling Up Fund bids from councils are aimed at continuing this transformation and Government has chosen to invest in many of these bids. But if council-run and commissioned facilities, including Trusts and Community Interest Companies (CiCs), close because of unaffordable running costs, these transformations will not happen and a core plank of the levelling up approach will fail. (See annex for case studies)
Without further Government support a November survey by Ukactive showed that 40 per cent of council areas will likely see leisure centres close or services reduce before 31 March 2023. Three quarters (74 per cent) of council areas are classified as ‘unsecure’, meaning there is risk of closure or reduced services before 31 March 2024. Many provider contracts also have legally binding schedules that transfer the risk of energy price increases to their local authority meaning pressures will likely come to a head at the end of this financial year, affecting council budgets for 2023/24.
Facility closures will undermine the Government’s commitment to support vulnerable communities, protect vital public services, tackle inequalities and grow the economy.
Leisure centres and swimming pools are more than a lifestyle choice, they are a vital service because:
- They provide affordable opportunities for communities to be active and healthy with 8.9 million users annually and 165 million unique visits; and are especially important for users in more deprived areas, where data tells us users prefer to exercise in a leisure centre over other informal settings.
- People’s health and wellbeing, and therefore NHS performance relies on leisure facilities. Leisure centres deliver two thirds of cancer rehabilitation services and 79 per cent of social prescribing initiatives. Swimming alone saves health system £357 million per year according to research by Sheffield Hallam University and Swim England.
- Seventy-two per cent of schools use public swimming pools to deliver their statutory responsibility for learn to swim and the water safety curriculum. And 75 per cent of grassroots sports clubs rely on public leisure centres to operate.
- Being physically active prevents many serious physical and mental health conditions, calculated to save £9.5 billion per year (Sport England). Of this amount, £5.2 billion is in healthcare savings and £1.7 billion is in social care savings, while a further £20 billion of value comes from stronger and safer communities.
- They provide an estimated 585,000 jobs in the UK, in particular offering career opportunities for young people who make up a large proportion of the paid workforce: 45 per cent are aged 16-24 and 21 per cent are aged 25-34.
Many councils have commissioned out leisure services helping to deliver improved outcomes. 94 per cent of councils report using leisure centres in schemes to tackle health inequalities and 97 per cent of councils and leisure providers wish to commission these services to do more. Recent health economics research shows that an increase in healthy life expectancy by 3.7 years could be achieved over a decade if leisure centres were used to deliver a national physical activity improvement scheme (DCN). Leisure providers have done a sterling job delivering these outcomes; providers operate on small profit margins, ploughing money back into the service to support communities, but this has left them vulnerable and unable to do more.
The failure to identify support for the sector will be the final straw for certain facilities and services across the country – especially for swimming pools, which cannot be replaced by limited private sector provision and where Sport England data shows swimmers do not transfer to another form of activity. Leisure, sport and swimming pool closures on a national level will unequivocally damage our national health, the economy and will increase pressure on the health service. Action taken now will be far more cost-effective and will prevent costly knock-on impacts for society and the public purse in the long-term.
We therefore urge the Government to act swiftly with three key measures:
- Reclassify pools and leisure centres as energy intensive in the Energy Bills Discount Scheme so they can access the higher level of energy price discount.
- Set out what tangible support it will provide to the wider sector – including gyms and sports facilities – to help navigate the energy crisis across 2023 so that service restrictions and facility closures can be minimised.
- Set out a “plan for the growth” for the sector by aligning the proposed new Sports Strategy with the Spring Budget to unlock the potential of the sector to support the economic, health, and social wellbeing of the nation.
Our members stand ready to work in partnership with Government to prevent further closures and accelerate our progress towards a sustainable leisure network.
Yours sincerely,
Councillor Gerald Vernon-Jackson
Chair, Culture, Tourism and Sport Board, Local Government Association and Leader, Portsmouth City Council
Professor Jim McManus
President, Association of Directors of Public Health
Mo Baines
Chief Executive, Association for Public Service Excellence
Councillor Linda Taylor
County Councils Network Unitary Spokesperson and Leader, Cornwall Council
Debbie Kaye
Chair, Chief Cultural & Leisure Officers Association
Councillor Sam Chapman-Allen
Chairman, District Councils’ Network and Leader, Breckland Council
Councillor Elizabeth Campbell
Executive member for London's Future: Business, Economy and Culture, London Councils and Leader, Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea
Sir Stephen Houghton CBE
Chair, Special Interest Group of Metropolitan Authorities and Leader, Barnsley Council
William Benson
Solace Spokesperson for Finance and Chief Executive, Tunbridge Wells Borough Council
Annex: Case studies
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