05.07.18
Lords peer and former Paralympic athlete renews call for £1bn cross-sector NHS investment
Regenerations schemes worth £1bn aiming to “save the NHS” has been reaffirmed by one of its leading advocates to take stress off the frontline of the health service.
Head of UK Active and former Paralympic athlete Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson said cross-sector funding to replace “1970s-era leisure centres” with community wellness hubs would encourage more people to be active and combat against risk of diseases including heart disease, type-2 diabetes, and cancers.
Renewing her calls for government approval of the scheme, Baroness Grey-Thompson labelled the government “stagnated” and pressured culture secretary Matt Hancock to act before the parliamentary summer recess.
The scheme, which has created 25 new leisure centres since Grey-Thompson introduced the plans in November 2016, aims to combine swimming pools, gyms and sports halls, with GP drop-in centres, libraries and police services, to create a ‘one-stop-shop’ for public services and empower the public to take greater responsibility for leading a healthy lifestyle.
Funding body Sport England’s strategic investment model for these facilities is able to leverage £1bn of private sector funding for every £100m of public money invested.
The arms-length body estimates that 1,000 wellness hubs created over the next 10 years could supplant the 2,000 ageing leisure centres currently in need of renewal, leading to net savings of up to £500m per year in operating costs alone.
“When someone goes to a GP and tells you to be more active you’re very enthused in the chair but you don’t necessarily know what to do,” Baroness Grey-Thompson said to LGA crowds yesterday. “What we can do with this scheme is they can take you by the hand into a tailor-made fitness session made directly for you.”
The proposals have not been received entirely positively, though — around 1,000 leisure centres would be closed due to the scheme.
Green councillor Lambeth Rebecca Thackray said at the event: “I had alarming bells ringing when Tanni talked about a billion pounds going into efforts to transform leisure centres with this partnership with the private sector.
“In Lambeth with have a situation where a gym has been shoehorned at the base of grade-II public library which locals do not want nor do they need.”
Baroness Grey-Thompson stressed that the public-private deals have “got to work for the community,” adding that a current GP surgery in Sheffield is a strong example of the scheme, and that the existing 25 hubs around the country address acute and relevant needs to locals in that area.
“It’s not about sticking in a Sushi bar in a public building to get people to eat healthily — it’s got to be something which is really sensible,” she noted.
The former Paralympic gold-medallist said the coalition of local government, leisure operators and the construction sector are behind the leisure hub plans, but she does not know why the plans aren’t going through from the government.
She commented: "Because if we don't think smart about the money we have, we're actually going to run out of money. We have to think much more strategically about this— I’m hugely frustrated by the lack of progress.”
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