News Date: Monday 28th June 2004
Obesity a growing problem - a third of kids do less than 2 hours per week of sport
Tim Loughton, MP for East Worthing and Shoreham last week exposed the fact that despite regulations set in 2001, still only 62% of school children are spending the minimum of 2 hours per week on high quality PE. The remaining 38% of children are failing to be engaged in the target number of hours per week of sport, contributing to the problem of childhood obesity and subsequent onset of diabetes.
It is difficult to see how the Government will reach the target of 75% of all school pupils doing at least two hours of sport by 2006, given that many schools are not yet part of a partnership so will not be three years into the process by 2006.
Tim commented:
'With 18,000 children in the UK suffering from type 1 diabetes, it is time for the Government to get real and motivate all pupils to be more active, play more sport and eat healthier food.
'This is another example of the Government setting meaningless targets which cannot be achieved purely for the purpose of ticking boxes and producing meaningless statistics. In any case, this two hour per week target is woefully unambitious when compared with countries such as Sweden who aim for 10 hours of sport per week in schools.
'We cannot expect the situation with childhood obesity and development of long term chronic diseases such as diabetes and heart disease to improve unless we change the culture of inactivity amongst young people by improving choice of sports in schools, and promoting healthier eating habits.'
ENDS
Note to Editors:
Parliamentary Written Question: Physical Education
1. Tim Loughton: To ask the Secretary of State for Education and Skills what percentage of schoolchildren are meeting the school sporting target of participating in two hours minimum a week of sport or physical education. [178443]
Mr. Stephen Twigg: The results of the 2003/04 PE, School Sport and Club Links survey indicated that 62 per cent. of school children within a School Sport Partnership spend a minimum of two hours in a typical week on high quality PE and school sport within and beyond the curriculum. A copy of the full report has already been placed in the Libraries of both Houses. The survey is used to measure progress towards meeting our target to increase the percentage of pupils spending a
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minimum of two hours each week on high quality PE and school sport within and beyond the curriculum to 75 per cent. by 2006.
2. For 2001-2004, DCMS has a Public Service Agreement target to raise significantly, year on year, the average time spent on sport an physical activity by those aged 5-16.
The DCMS 2003 Annual Report admitted that the average amount of time spent on sport and physical activity by 5-16 olds has declined since 1999. Sport England's most recent survey of young people in sport in July 2002, indicated that the average time per week on sport and physical activity by 5-16 olds has fallen from 8 hrs 23 mins in 1999 to 8 hrs 12 mins.
The Department has a new Public Service Agreement target for 2003-2006, shared with DfES, of increasing the proportion of school children who spend a minimum of two hours a week on high quality PE and school sport within and beyond the curriculum from 25% in 2002 to 75% by 2006.
