today to see four and five year olds taking part in the Youth Sport Trust’s ‘Start to Play’ programme, Children’s Minister Dawn Primarolo said:

“School sport has been transformed in recent years - with nine out of ten children now taking part in at least two hours of PE a week. We are committed to building on this to help children get five hours of PE and sport, in school and in the community. But we know that it’s not always easy to motivate children to do exercise.

“The new Active Lifestyle programme will help schools target children that are less physically active through fun, innovative and engaging activities. This will help children to develop confidence in their abilities and establish a healthier lifestyle throughout childhood that will last into adulthood.”

The Government is also publishing today ‘Healthy Weight, Healthy Lives: Two Years On’,a new report highlighting the impact of the cross-government obesity strategy on individuals and communities.

Key findings show that:

· shoppers are looking for healthier options in the supermarket;
· families are joining in with Change4Life;
· children are eating healthier meals at school;
· communities are becoming Healthy Towns; and
· health professionals are supporting patients who want to lose weight.

The Government is committed to reducing, by 2020, the proportion of overweight and obese children to the levels in 2000.The latest evidence shows that the rapid rise in childhood obesity is levelling off - thanks to the hard work of families, schools, businesses and the NHS across England, supported by the Government.

Public Health Minister, Gillian Merron said:

“Everyone has a role to play in tackling obesity, and the strategy has been crucial in bringing everyone together. It’s about creating an environment that promotes healthy lifestyles and providing more opportunities for people to be active. Change4Life is a key part of this, and is helping people change their behaviour so that they can eat well, move more and live longer.

“Looking forward, we’re going to broaden our focus to adult obesity and continue to build on our partnerships with charities, industry and across Government to work together to achieve our shared ambition – supporting everyone to maintain a healthy weight and live healthier lives.”

The report says:

A child’s first years are crucial for developing healthy behaviours and enabling young children to grow-up a healthy weight. Families, carers and health professionals are working with families to give them clear, easy-to-follow guidelines about eating and active play for under-fives. The Healthy Child Programme, Start4Life and Change4Life will continue this work in the coming year.

Change4Life has been highly successful in giving families with school-age children helpful messages on eating well and being more active. Change4Life has now broadened out to adults.

Overweight adults are being given the information, advice and support they need to achieve a healthy weight – whether that is through referral to a weight management service or a better understanding of the impact of their BMI on their health.

The new Pupil Guarantee will entitle all children to attend a school that encourages their health, including healthy food and an offer of five hours of physical activity inside or outside the school day. Even more nutritious Free School Meals will be provided.

Healthier food choices are becoming more readily available thanks to the efforts of manufacturers, caterers and retailers. Calorie labelling on menus, healthier versions of favourite foods and a greater selection of fruit and vegetables in local corner shops all contribute to this progress. During the next year, the Government is looking for progress from caterers, a continued commitment to the Food Standard’s Agency’s saturated fat and energy work, and for links to be made between healthy and sustainable food.

Healthy Towns are creating whole communities geared up to make physical activity accessible. Schemes like Free Swimming and Bike4Life are making it easier for families to walk, cycle and play together.

There are now 1,100 upgraded playgrounds across England as part of the £235 million programme to improve play areas.

Steve Grainger, Chief Executive of the Youth Sport Trust said:

“Creating more and better opportunities for all young people to take part in sporting and physical activity continues to be at the centre of the work of the Youth Sport Trust. We know sport does not naturally appeal to some children which is why, through developments such as Active Lifestyles, we continually strive to offer every young person the opportunity to be inspired through physical activity.”

Notes to Editors

1. Active Lifestyle coaches are recruited by School Sport Partnerships (SSPs) and can come from a range of backgrounds from teaching assistants to volunteer parents to lunchtime supervisors – as long as they have the right skills to work with the children taking part. They receive high quality training and a range of resources and equipment to deliver fun activity sessions themselves where suitably qualified, or support children to access activities more appropriately delivered by sports coaches..

Active Lifestyles is being delivered through the Government’s Cross Government Healthy Weight Healthy Lives Strategy and supports the PE and Sport Strategy for Young People. It will encourage children to do at least one extra hour of sport and physical activity per week and will support them to continue to take part in regular physical activity and increase their participation in PE and sport.

The programme has already started and the target is to get 20,000 children involved in the first year. There will be a final evaluation report by January 2011.

DH and DCSF are jointly providing the Youth Sport Trust’s (YST) with £1 million for Active Lifestyle coaches. A number of School Sports Partnerships delivering the project have also gained match funding from local partners such as the PCT or Local Authority.

2. The reported figure for child obesity prevalence among 2 to 10 year olds in 2008 is 13.9%, compared with 15.5% in 2007 and 17.3% in 2005. This is the lowest reported figure since 2001.

3. In January 2008, the Government published “Healthy Weight, Healthy Lives: A Cross-Government Strategy for England” which set out how the Government will reduce obesity through its £372 million three year strategy. The Government is taking action to tackle obesity by helping people to make healthier choices; creating an environment that promotes healthy weight; ensuring effective services are available for those at risk; and strengthening the delivery system. http://www.dh.gov.uk/en/Publichealth/Healthimprovement/Obesity/HealthyWeight/index.htm

4. The Youth Sport Trust is a registered charity, established in 1994, with a mission to enhance the quality of young people’s physical education (PE) and sporting opportunities through increasing their participation in and enjoyment of PE and school sport, experiencing and enjoying different types of activity at whatever level is right for them, and receiving the best teaching, coaching and resources possible with the chance to progress if they show talent. The Trust is a delivery partner in the PE and Sports Strategy for Young People.

Case studies: Healthy Weight, Healthy Lives: Two Years On

1. Jointly funded by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport, Department of Health, Department for Work and Pensions, the Department for Children Schools and Families and the Department for Communities and Local Government we made a splash with the launch of the Swim4Life Free Swimming programme for those aged 16 and under and 60 and over.

With more councils joining up over the course of the year, offering more people the chance to swim for free we saw 5.9 million free swims during the quarter covering July, August and September 2009 – up from 4.5million in the first quarter since the scheme began in April 2009.

2. Walk Once a Week (WoW) is a simple behaviour change programme for use in primary schools that aims to increase walking levels in children but can also have a beneficial impact on other family members. WoW is run by Living Streets, a national charity, as part of their wider work to create safe, attractive and enjoyable streets, where people want to walk.

Children participating in WoW are encouraged to walk to and/or from school at least once a week. The children keep a record of their participation by completing a diary or wallchart. If a child does this for one month they are rewarded with a collectable metal badge. There are 11 different badges and these are designed by school children in an annual competition. A recent evaluation of WoW showed that in schools running the scheme, 19 per cent of those taking part had started walking to school as a direct result of WoW. Levels of walking in WoW schools was also found to be higher.

Living Streets has been granted £800,000 to expand the scheme to new areas outside London with a focus on those where overweight and obesity is particularly high. Work will also take place in London to further develop the scheme so that walking becomes more integrated as an 'everyday' activity and first choice mode of travel. Participation in WoW may either be through Local Authority School Travel Advisers or by direct contact with Living Streets.

3. Dudley Healthy Town is focusing on the outdoors with its 'Lets go Outside' programme. Five ‘family health hubs’ have been created in local parks to encourage people to take more exercise and these parks will be transformed with new play areas, green gyms, better lighting and toilets. Stakeholder consultation has already taken place with good feedback and construction is due to begin by the end of 2009. Similarly, good progress is being made on the development of ‘active travel corridors’ from residential areas to parks, which will provide increased walking and cycling opportunities to, from, in and around the hub sites.

4. In the North East a Change4Life programme to promote fruit and vegetables in convenience stores has shown an average increase in fruit and veg sales of around 47 per cent in participating stores, with the most significant increases in stores that made the greatest changes. In addition, customer perception of stores has changed with more people now saying that they would be likely to buy fruit and veg from that store. The programme is having a real impact on customer lives:

One customer in a Londis store had been advised to eat more fruit and veg by her doctor. She had previously eaten a lot of processed food and ready meals but was now cooking at home far more using fresh ingredients. She claimed that she had only been able to follow this through because of the improved selection of fruit and veg in her local store. In the space of a few months she felt years younger, she had lost over a stone and had ‘tons more energy, even my friends have noticed. I feel loads better and it has made me feel better about myself as well, having lost some of my extra pounds. I guess I have this store to thank as if they had not been doing this thing with fruit and vegetables, I don’t think I could have stuck to the change. It’s easier with it being round the corner so I have no excuse.’

Contacts:

Department of Health
Phone: 020 7210 5221
NDS.DH@coi.gsi.gov.uk