📣 ConnectSport Weekly Digest 🌍🏀
'Groundbreaking' awards celebrate Muslim sporting community; Activity Alliance publishes new strategy; GB star supports 'Walking with Purpose'; SJA announces 'Sport for Change' winner, plus much more!
👋🏾 Welcome to ConnectSport’s weekly digest on Substack. Each week you can read news, features and innovation from the UK's sport for development sector, and beyond. This edition covers the week ending 6th December 2024.
🏆 AWARDS: The inaugural Muslim Sports Awards were held this week in Birmingham. The Awards, which are co-ordinated by the Muslim Sports Foundation, aim to recognise and celebrate the achievements of the Muslim community from grassroots and community level. Read more.
⚖️ SDG 10 REDUCED INEQUALITIES
On International Day of Disabled People (December 3), Activity Alliance unveiled its new strategy alongside research which demonstrates there is social value of £6,200 per disabled person per year if supported to meet the official Chief Medical Officers’ (CMO) guidelines of 150 plus minutes a week. This works out three to four times’ the value of non-disabled people being active. To give a comparison of size, this figure is almost equivalent to being employed rather than unemployed, which has a social value of £7,000. Read more.
Learning Disability Rugby League’s long-term partnership with Community Integrated Care was showcased at a special event at Parliament. Sir Lindsay Hoyle, the Speaker of the House of the Commons who is nearing the end of his two-year term as President of the RFL, brought together politicians, advocates and organisations supporting people with disabilities. Read more.
🥊 SDG 3 GOOD HEALTH AND WELLBEING
Record-breaking GB race walker Tom Bosworth MBE has launched the ‘Walking with Purpose’ programme in partnership with Fitmums and Friends. Tom recognises the barriers that many people face when looking to start exercising, so wanted to make the programme as simple and accessible as possible for people to get involved with. “I wanted to pitch walking as a form of movement rather than exercise and so, starting with a basic 15 minutes of walking regularly I thought how could I make this truly accessible,” he said. Read more.
A community group for senior citizens in Essex is participating in the ‘Cool Rowings’ programme which is encouraging people of different ages to get active. Read the full story at bbc.co.uk/news.
The Spurs Foundation is celebrating after its Move4You programme was named Best Sports Community Scheme at the Sport Business Awards in London. Move4You is a transformative programme of physical activity sessions for residents of Haringey, Enfield and surrounding boroughs who have had a cancer diagnosis in the last five years. Read more.
🌍 SDG 13 CLIMATE ACTION
English Premier League football club Brentford has published its first Sustainability Report, which covers the 2023-24 season. The report outlines the club’s work so far in sustainability and the approach it plans to take going forward. The club’s sustainability manager, James Beale, said: “This report sets out the way we are approaching this issue, as well as some of the progress we’ve made to date. As this is our first report, we know it is just the beginning. We’re committed to continuing this work with transparency and accountability as we move forward.” Read more.
“We are starting to put numbers on ‘what is the cost of adaptation’ and ‘what is the cost of inaction’.” Listen to this podcast on sport and environmental sustainability from ISC Business of Sport featuring Sam Shave and Susie Thomson from Think Beyond. Listen now.
🌇 SDG 11 SUSTAINABLE CITIES AND COMMUNITIES
Everton in the Community CEO Sue Gregory has been reflecting after her organisation was named ‘Community Club of the Season – Premier League’ award at the prestigious 2024 Armstrong Northwest Football Awards for the third consecutive year.
“To win Community Club of the Season is a significant achievement in itself, but to retain this esteemed title for the third year in a row is just remarkable,” said Sue. “I can’t thank our incredible staff and volunteers enough, they’re at the heart of what we do and without them, our success at both awards wouldn’t have been possible.” Read more.
The English Football Association this week published its updated Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Action Plan, entitled ‘Communities Together’ which outlines its commitment to drive positive change by connecting, supporting and inspiring local communities through football.
👉🏽 WEBINAR Tune in on December 12 for Racing Together’s free webinar which will focus on highlights from its British racecourse community programme. Community Engagement Manager, Lucy Gurney explained: “The aim of our webinar series is to inspire viewers to take ideas back to their own initiatives.” Register here.
📣 IN OTHER NEWS...
The Culture, Media and Sport Committee is inviting evidence for the inquiry 'Game On: Community and School Sport'. The inquiry will examine the health of sport in local communities and schools, and whether more can be done to sustain and grow opportunities for all, including around funding available for sport in the community.
Chair of the Culture, Media and Sport Committee, Dame Caroline Dinenage, said: “Taking part in sport and physical activity is tremendously valuable both for our health and wellbeing and our communities. With alarm bells ringing about disappearing facilities and declining participation, we’re firing the starting gun on an inquiry into what more can be done to ensure sporting opportunities exist for all, from playground to pitch.” Respond to the call for evidence.
The Name of the Game has announced two Leadership Summits for community sports programmes, in England and Scotland. Hear from fellow executives and experts at sporting foundations and charities in Birmingham on January 14, and at Social Hub Glasgow on February 11 (both 1000-1630). Contact angus@thenameofthegame.org for more information.
REMINDER! The Sports Journalists' Association will reveal the winner of its 2024 Sport for Change Award, sponsored by Altair Ltd, at the Houses of Parliament on December 9th. Read about the shortlisted organisations here.
The last word….
🙌🏽 Thank you for reading our weekly Substack round-up of news from across the UK’s sport for development sector. ConnectSport CIC is a not-for-profit Community Interest Company which works in partnership with UK Universities to increase awareness and investment for local charities and sport for development organisations.
Our aim is to help more organisations to be able to contribute effectively to globally-recognised Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Read about the contribution of sport to the SDGs. For more information, visit connectsport.co.uk or email hello@connectsport.co.uk