The Government has announced plans for the removal of Sport England’s role as statutory consultee on planning applications.
Sport England said the purpose of the statutory planning remit is to protect playing fields and community spaces for sport and physical activity.
"Britain’s childhood obesity crisis is rising and low physical activity levels cost our economy £7.4billion a year, making it vital we protect the places that local communities can be active,” it explained.
"We support growth and exercise our powers carefully and quickly, ensuring local neighbourhoods are designed to help people live healthy, happy and active lives.
"We look forward to taking part in the Government’s consultation exercise and arguing the importance of protecting playing fields and places where local people can keep active."
In December 2024, it released statistics showing that in its
role as a statutory consultee, 94% of all concluded planning
applications involving playing fields result in the protection or
improvement of facilities.
It meant Sport England protected more than 1,000 playing fields between April 2022 and March 2023. The annual playing field statistics show it
protected 1,007 in the year to March 2023, continuing its commitment to
protecting and enhancing playing fields across England.
At the time, director of planning and active environments, Nick Evans, said: “The figures. . .once again demonstrate Sport England’s unwavering commitment to protecting and enhancing playing fields,” he said.
“Playing fields are a vital resource that offer flexible opportunities to take part in sport and physical activity, providing wide ranging health and wellbeing benefits to communities across England.
“It’s crucial we continue to protect these spaces to enable people, regardless of their background to be active in their local communities.”
