“Measurement is the first step that leads to control and eventually to improvement. If you can’t measure something, you can’t understand it. If you can’t understand it, you can’t control it. If you can’t control it, you can’t improve it.” H. James Harrington
This quote is taken from the first page of a recent report into the state of the nation’s kids – UK Active Kids – which could well have been titled “Stating The Patently Obvious“.
It has brought predictable responses of either denial or dismissal from various organisations tasked with promoting the good health of our kids aided by staggering annual budgets post the extinction of the PE teacher in the state system circa the 1980s.
That organisations with direct responsibility for our kids cannot – or will not – see the blindingly obvious suggests they may have one agenda; that of covering their own gilded arses.
Take Sport England with a staggering £1bn budget for the period 2012-17. A quick look at their website and strangely no mention of the above; so all’s well then?
Or The Youth Sports Trust which advises on the PE and Sport Premium providing ring fenced money to primary schools “to improve the quality of the PE and sport activities they offer their pupils.”
Currently worth £150 million per year, this is provided jointly by the Department for Education, the Department of Health and the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. As taxpayers surely we are entitled to seek value for money?
In the last few decades a lot of money has been spent hiring in external providers; having witnessed a few first hand this is simply not an efficient use of funds. Short-run “taster” sessions have very little impact on kids.
So why with all this money washing around – £350m a year just in these two examples – do we find ourselves the fatties of Europe? Or look at it another way?
What if we did away with these clearly hopeless organisations and simply had a dedicated, high-quality PE teacher in every primary school? What if they were tasked with re-introducing competitive activities?
There are approximately 24,000 primary schools in the UK and say an average PE teacher got £30k; this equates to – crudely I accept – £720m a year.
I accept this is double the current money outlined above but as we are clearly getting nothing at present and given the potential savings re the NHS – read on – then surely this would be money well spent?
Finally, there is yet another organisation – the Association for Physical Education – to further muddy the waters. I’ve no idea what they do or who for but it hardly seems to matter; our kids are too fat.
How on Earth did it get so complicated?
Back to the original document and I don’t expect you to read it cover to cover so I’ve done it for you. I can offer some summary points as follows:
1 – it starts from a simple premise that the ever-increasing burden of poor health from inactivity on the NHS is unsustainable and estimates the annual cost to the economy at circa £20bn. This is two and a half times the cash shortfall the NHS is widely accepted to require by 2020.
2 – the argument goes that this is the “least active generation in history.” Given this quote comes from Lord Coe one of the dreamers that promised the Olympic legacy this is a touch ironic. I’m tempted to say “told you so but didn’t you do well out of it all” but I doubt he reads this.
3 – less than half the schools surveyed actually know how much time their kids have in PE once they exclude time spent changing. I know this from experience where an hour’s PE is much more likely to be half that time. Imagine a business using it’s assets for only 50% of the time?
4 – if a child cannot read measures are taken to tackle this. If they leave school looking like the back end of a bus and unable to grasp a healthy lifestyle, we simply pass the buck to the NHS.
It is a weighty report but, rose-tinted glasses to one side, you cannot help but wonder what was wrong with the system my generation enjoyed.
Of course not everybody relished school sport but we were probably one of the last bunch educated by the state that had competitive PE; which stood us up well for this brutally competitive world.
What we have today is a raft of publicly funded quangos – nice work if you can get the clipboard and tracksuit – presiding over a generation of kids with a life expectancy less than their parents. These do-gooders have wrecked generations.
Of course, if you can afford the private system then the chances are your pride and joy may well escape this but for over 90% of kids this is not an option. It is inequality in it’s barest form.
Simply put we are failing millions of kids and condemning them to lives of misery and dependency all funded by taxpayers money.
Birds, Bees And Avocados
Responsible adult that I am, I have yet to have the fireside chat with our overseas Pro as to the pros and cons of the local womenfolk.
My only advice so far has been to avoid the village after dark, be aware they don’t look the same the following morning and that the village tattooist is dyslexic and colour blind.
Seeking bandaging for his dodgy ankle so I could get some productivity out of him on the Dyson, I took him to Morrisons and, merely by chance, we were stood adjacent to the Durex display.
Obviously, I felt it my timely duty to point out the availability of such products and how much grief they may well save him in later life. Hauling back Two-Ton Tessie from the village with a bun in her large oven would not be a good start to adult life.
“Normally you need two on if you end up down the village” I generously informed him (He assures me his Mum does not read this) “and you can bet your bottom dollar that if you do buy any from here you will bump into someone you know.”
And as we turned away there she was – not looking at condoms I might add – my old Mum just back from ten days on the lash with my Dad in Benidorm tripping the light fantastic, still wearing her “Kiss Me Quick” hat.
Unaware of her eldest one’s presence, I gripped her by the shoulder as all sons must and whispered gently in her ear.
“Don’t make a fuss love…store detective…just come quietly.”
I cannot repeat her reply but suffice to say you don’t mess with my Mum and the bruising is coming out slowly.
This week David is cooking for me…sort of. A native product of South Africa, the avocado apparently grows on trees and people eat them smeared on toast in Mandela country.
I grew up thinking they grew in Marie Rose sauce, swam with prawns and were guaranteed to impress a woman every bit as much as the latest Sade CD; you live and learn.
Finally, as a stroke of pure good fortune Lidl are selling discounted mosquito nets this week. That heatwave must be just around the corner.
Vandalism
Predictably the dimwits at City Hall have rolled over and allowed a developer to shaft them once again; very soon the wrecking balls will be arriving at the old Hutton Middle School and another part of the City’s heritage will be flattened so Anonymous from Leeds can make a few quid.
The Muppets have decreed that as it’s not in their backyard then who gives a stuff? And, as few can hold them to account what risk of any challenge?
Lame old Bradford Council bumbles on.
On Another Planet
A few years ago I questioned the worth and relevance of the BBC in today’s commercial world.
Last week the Daily Mail revealed that of the incredible £5.1bn annual budget, less than 50% of this is spent on making the crap they serve up. Channel 4 was quoted as spending at least two-thirds.
The luvvies running this out of date monster live in cloud cuckoo land and it cannot be right that, as individuals, we continue to fund the bunch of parasites.
Bowler Fails Dope Test
Hand up I bowled like a pillock last Saturday but, strangely so too did our veteran seamer Molly. As this long lens shot proves though he had been nobbled by the Critics.
Mo Farah innocent…maybe…Molly…guilty as charged!
Ooh Miss!
Rain stopped play the other day at one of the primary schools where I provide a mix of cricket coaching, crowd control and selective early recommendations for sterilisation.
Drenched as we were, Miss & I decided to continue the session indoors in True Brit style. Thirty excitable kids, a tiny hall and balls flying everywhere was probably not likely to discover the next England hero.
In an attempt to restore order I blew on my whistle as hard as I could as Miss joined in to help.
“Hold your balls!” she cried, to which I winked at her and said “Ooh Miss!”
Cue uproar and a hall full of 11 year-old boys obeying Miss diligently for the first time all afternoon. The afternoon was lost in an instant.
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