Lords Committee on National Plan for Sport and Recreation hears evidence from Scandinavian experts

The House of Lords Committee on National Plan for Sport and Recreation today heard evidence from:

• Mads Andreassen, Head of Activity Development at Norwegian Sports Confederation
• Dr Josef Fahlén, Associate Professor at Umeå University
• Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv Professor of Sport Sociology at Inland Norway University of Applied Sciences

The following is a partially-edited transcript based on voice-recognition software which will therefore contain some typographical errors. The full transcript will be sent as soon as it is available.

Mads Andreassen [00:00:03] Let me just give you a brief overview of our Norwegian sports first. We're a volunteer based organisation with over 2.2 million memberships in a population of five and a half million. We have around almost twelve thousand sports clubs all around the country. And you'll find a sport club in every municipality in Norway and.

[00:00:30] First of all, I would say that the maybe the difference between us and several other European countries is that we have all sport together in one organisation where the participatory grassroots sport in the same organisation as the elite sport, the Paralympic sport and also corporate sports, which means we have a kind of strong relationship with government because we are only one body.

[00:00:54] And that that kind of commences and discusses with the government. And that gives us also a unique position. Of course, gathering all this together also creates a lot of tension and discussions. But then the discussions are within the sport organisation and not necessarily taking decisions at the national level. I would say to the national policies coming from government, they're very similar to the organisations. So what comes first if it's the government policy or if it's to support organisation policy? It's kind of a chicken and egg discussion because it's very similar. The main policy of it is to create opportunities for everybody to be active in sport. And our vision is the joy of sport for all. In Norway, if you ask youth today 93 per cent of all youth will say they have been part of a sports club during their years as children. And they've also participated in youth sport between 13 and 19. Seventy-five per cent of them have been part of youth sport as well. So we have huge responsibility also to include everybody, because if we are only 20 per cent of the population, maybe you could go more narrow to the policies. But that being such a big organisation, it's also important to look for everybody. So I guess lifelong participation in the ground value of it and then facilitating that, that would be the main policies you asked about the municipalities. I wouldn't say that they are necessarily a grounding the sport policies, but they have very important role in building facilities and then both facilitating land for it, but also financing and building facilities. So most of the facilities are built with one third finance between governments, the municipality and the sports club. So there's close cooperation, so to speak, between those.

Josef Fahlén [00:03:01] Sweden and Norway are very similar in many ways, especially what Mad said about the chicken and the egg, whose policy is that really? The official sport policy in Sweden is three main objectives: its public health, its social cohesion, its entertainment. And all these three should be strived for by participation and the club-based sport. That is the the main objectives. As regards to the division between central and municipal governments, the policy exists only on a national level, even though we see many municipalities in Sweden, 290 in total, having their own policies. But they are very much in line with central government. We can see also when it comes to funding, central funding is about 200 million euros annually to club sport, while the municipal support is amounting to some 700 million euros. So even though it's difficult to see municipal impact on policy level, there is a big impact concerning funding.

Lord Willis of Knaresborough [00:04:26] So you said 200 million with the central government and 700 with the municipalities. That's mostly spent on capital investment; that is it in sport and recreation?

Josef Fahlén [00:04:38] It is the main part of it. Even though some goes to the organisations in the system, the national sport organisations, the regional sports organisations, the the the majority of the the funds go straight down to sport clubs for activating children. So in Sweden, a normal sport club would get a sum from the central government and a sum from the municipal government for each participant and each time they arrange an activity. And that amounts to a third of sport clubs revenues in Sweden.

Lord Willis of Knaresborough [00:05:15] Does a sports club itself have to have some form of registration in order to qualify for those grants? and what are the qualifications they have to meet?

Josef Fahlén [00:05:26] They have to be registered as a nonprofit, volunteer membership based sports club and being a member of their specific. And so the Swedish Skiing Federation or what have you. And the requirements for them to to get that registration is that they have to be open for all. They have to be nonprofit and they cannot accumulate capital.

Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv[00:06:01] I would add to thank you first for the invitation. It's an interesting scene, I to say that and I hope I don't or we don't let you down, because we when I had some indications about the questions for today, I would say that we probably have to have the same challenges as you have. So it's interesting that you look to us for the answers. But anyway, I do admit that we have good numbers compared to the population. We have many expert participants compared to the overall population of the country. I would add to those, too, we have very similar systems as you of sketched from Sweden. We have some money going straight from the state government and the Ministry of Culture, where the sport policies to sign down to the clubs. And the simple registration for that is that they need to be members of the Norwegian Confederation of Sport and then by definition and a nonprofit organisation.

[00:07:07] So of the approximately 300 million euros, that's my Norwegian calculation, just over half goes to making or building facilities. And as much sketched is very often a one third agreement between the central government, the municipal government and a volunteer organisation making it for their own activity or building it and maintaining for their own activity.

[00:07:41] So most of the central policy is money for facilities. Then most of the rest of it goes to the Norwegian sports confederation in one or another form to the central administration...to the national federations like the skiing, football and so on, associations and also to regional sports organisations.

[00:08:11] And the difficult part and in my view, in the question, is the municipal involvement. It's as as they have already said, the two of them, that at least in Norway specifically, you need the property to build something. And that's a city council municipality council issue. And you also usually get some economic support from that.

[00:08:39] And and but when it comes to more than that, it's very hard when we teach these issues in sport, politics because the municipalities vary. So they vary so much. And they often say that when we teach sport policy, we teach the central government because that's for all over the country.

[00:09:01] And the municipalities differ very much in how rich they are and how interested the politicians are in sport or other cultural activity, which is the definition of sport in the Norwegian system. It's defined as culture, not as health or defense or its culture, so it competes with other soft policy issues, if that's the way to put it.

Lord Willis of Knaresborough [00:09:37] We are particularly interested in actually increasing the number of UK citizens who lead active lives. So sport and recreational activities are part of that. Do you make that division in Norway and Sweden or not? Yes, we do. Let me give you an example, if I was a yoga club. Or a dance club, put our affiliate and therefore get a drawdown of money from central government in order to sponsor and support that activity.

Mads Andreassen [00:10:24] Well, I think it's important to understand that sports clubs are driven from the bottom. People living in an area go together because they have the same interests and they want to go together to go skiing, for example. So they want someone to organise it. Then you form a sport club and at some point, some of them in this club, want to compete with other sport clubs and do competitions. So they organise a federation which can help them organise sport competitions. On the next level, the federations see that what we need is someone helping us to do framework facilities, financing, so they organise the sport, the sport organisation on top. So the sport clubs are members of their own National Sports Federation and of of the of the sport organisation on top. But they have to kind of they have to do one of the activities where the national sport associations are doing. So you have to kind of fit into the 55 different national federations to be part of that. And then there's, of course, different demands on how you're organised. You have to be a volunteer-based democratic organisation and such. So there's kind of low distinctions on going in and you can't earn money.

Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv[00:11:54] I just wanted to add that I would say a clear yes to your question, because - and this is a slight difference between the goal, of course, of the organisation and the government - because the government's vision for sport policy is sport and physical activity for all and physical activity include also yoga or anything. Skiing, perhaps is the typical Norwegian thing these days and that you can do either within or with or outside an organised sport club. So I went skiing yesterday. I used to tracks of the ski clubs, so I pay a membership there. But because I'm over average interested in sport, probably. But I didn't have to. I could just go outside and do my skiing.

[00:12:47] So it's, um, it's a tricky question when it comes to politics, because you need the channels to get things done and the conversation is the channel. But but also just providing facilities help.

Earl of Devon [00:14:42] I have a question on diversity and inclusion. The committee understands that countries like Norway and Sweden achieve better results in terms of gender equality in sports and recreation participation than England, at least in certain age groups. What approach do Norway and Sweden take to promote gender equity and participation among, for example, women and girls, people from lower socioeconomic groups and LGBTQ people?

Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv[00:15:24] It's a good and hard question because what do we do? We would say we struggle with the same issue, especially when it comes higher up in the age groups. The graphs are very clear that during primary school, the numbers are relatively similar between boys and girls and participation. I can't exactly say because there are some issues between sport disciplines, but it increased the differences, the inequality increases with age.

[00:16:10] So it seems to be the normal thing for all children starting school to just to start playing sport. When you start school in Norway, the first day of school, you go home with your bag full of papers. If you have 10 paper, 10 notes from different clubs and organisations, there would be approximately seven from sports clubs. Everybody then goes to the football club the next week for joining some parents meeting. And then there are some other music and dance clubs information. I would say it's a kind of grassroots culture that there is an expectation among at least primary school age groups that you play sport regardless of gender or ethnicity. And then and then the divisions, they appear later.

Earl of Devon [00:17:46] Is it the same for minority groups in society as as for society as a whole?

Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv [00:17:52] Very good question. I would say that for the Sami people, we we can't see any difference. They are well integrated. The big challenge when it comes to gender equality is immigrant girls from certain, I would say, Middle East and East countries. Those are huge challenges when it comes to participation for for for girls, especially in the big cities.

Josef Fahlén [00:18:47] From a policy perspective, the idea is to to provide quite extensive block grant to support nationwide sport club presence. That is the main vehicle for reaching everyone. And by these funds allow sport clubs to provide activities to a very low cost. So that would be the the the main idea behind reaching all groups. In addition, both policymakers and support of organisations are struggling with inequalities and in different ways. We have just installed gender quotas in the sport governing bodies to that's one way to address things from the top, so to speak, hoping for a trickle-down effect. But we also have big national programs from which sport clubs can apply special funds from to keep costs even lower, to address specific neighborhoods, to address specific ethnic groups or girls or what have you. So I think it's it's combined efforts of trying to to do policy measures from the top in terms of gender quotas, but also to stimulate from the bottom, making it possible for sport clubs to offer what they usually offer via these these block funds, but also to go the extra mile for certain groups and providing them with extra funding.

Earl of Devon [00:20:40] Thank you. And could you comment maybe on the point that they've made with respect to school-age children being more equal in gender participation and then as you go up the age groups that are becoming less so? Is that the same in Sweden?

Josef Fahlén [00:20:59] I'm not familiar with the percentage, but we we used to say that nine out of 10 kids in Sweden has been a member of a sport club at some point during their upbringing. So the numbers are very high. Everyone starts when they're six years old and the most quit during their 13, 14, 15 years of age, girls do quit more so than boys do. In Sweden, it's between middle school and secondary school, where the girls tend to to find other interests and boys being more devoted to the competitive elements of sport, usually hang on a few years more before they are out of the competition, so to speak.

Mads Andreassen [00:22:13] Looking at women and girls in sport it's very equal. And if we look at the organisation at whole, it's around forty-two per cent girls all ages part of the organisation. What I think is important to you to bring in here is that there's a huge difference in this gender balance between the federations. In some of the federations, you will find almost 100 percent men, and in others, you will find the average that is higher, for example, gymnastics or dancing or horseback riding, where the percentage of women is much higher than men, handball as well. So so there's a difference between the different federations and they have different challenges. As Eivand ws talking about, I was looking at the inquiry for the committee, very interested because a lot of the same groups we have special efforts of, including the same groups as you guys have, have scheduled out here. For example, girls from immigrant families has been a priority. And we see quite a good increase of that group in the Norwegian sport because there are targeted efforts from sport clubs and municipalities definitely developing. I would say our main focus is increasing the number of female leaders in sport clubs and in the organisation and in general. We're all the way down to twenty four percent of all leaders of sport clubs are women. So definitely we need to improve that and very politically enhanced. On inclusion, we're working a lot, with money coming, down to 15 of the biggest cities where sport clubs work directly into areas where there is a higher percentage of immigrants trying to include more. So definitely extra effort there. We're doing extra effort on children living in families with the financial barriers, both on helping those children and those families, but also looking at how the sports structure and how the costs of being part of sport is is established. So also trying to reduce the barriers. And you asked also about the LGBTQ work. We've had the special emphasis on this since 2012, but then especially looking at harassment and using, for example, gay as a curse word. And the work here is is especially important to increase the openness in the sport clubs and making coaches aware that or actually telling their players or their team that if you're a gay or lesbian, it doesn't matter. You're all welcome here. So it's kind of opening the arena to be open about it. But definitely an awareness, but a long way to go.

Baroness Brady [00:25:16] Both Mads and Eivind mentioned targeted policies and projects to increasing equality, particularly among young girls and the LGBTQ plus community. I wonder if you can give us any examples of anything specific that we could have a look at. And if you can't tell us on this call, maybe you could you could follow up with us.

Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv [00:26:01] ...there are special arrangement for sport clubs to to to support them in targeting underprivileged, especially in the inner cities, because they're the density of immigrants is higher than in other parts of the population. I did my Ph.D. on the forerunner of that program. And what they actually do is to support sports clubs, perhaps paying stuff to do what usually parents do as voluntary work. And that's a big related issue to the one we speak about, because we say that that the sport is colour blind, but the volunteer work is white and tells quite much. And because it's a cultural barrier for immigrants to understand and to, yes, to understand the Norwegian sports system, it's very much a voluntary base.

[00:27:05] It's based on, I would say, privileged parents or families with higher education, perhaps not elite athletes necessarily, but some sort of cultural competence with sport and sport organisation taking part and more or less running their voluntary sport clubs at the grassroots level. So, so and if you combine that with the and that the white person is usually a male and girls and especially an immigrant, girls have close to non-local idols and coaches. And so so that's the specific program I think this is actually targeting and getting immigrant coaches also into the sport clubs to attract and facilitate for immigrant participation.

Lord Addington [00:28:14] How do you balance between organised sport and general participation and what is the balance that's taking place in other countries? Also, I wondered if I could just ask one other question. In Britain, you have a culture that sports and sports clubs tend to maintain their own property. Would it be that way in your nations that, for instance, you're not requiring the local football club or the football association to maintain pitches, it's something that would be done by the state. I think it might be a big cultural difference.

Josef Fahlén [00:28:56] Thank you. Very good questions. I would say that the balance this is drawn to the favour of formal sport participation. Since one of the main objectives of supporting. organised sport and Swedish sport policy is social cohesion and community. The government want people to get together, so that's why most of the money is poured into to organised sport. Even so, also in Sweden and Norway, we acknowledge the fact that some groups don't find themselves being wanted or being attracted to club activities for different reasons or religious or what have you. So being aware of that money is also allocated to mainly facilities, as in Norway, to keep tracks open, to keep skiing slopes open.

[00:00:08] Regarding facilities, I would say that even though many facilities in Sweden are owned by local municipalities, especially in the bigger cities, you will also find a lot of facilities being owned and maintained by the local sports club. So you will see all sorts of arrangements from the municipality owning it, the club renting it, or the club maintaining it, or the club owning it and the municipality taking care of it. So there are no clear patterns. I would say perhaps a third of each.

Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv [00:00:55] I guess I would say something similar in Norway, because if I combine the answer to these two questions. Some cities - I often use the example of the city of Bergen in the West - they have a huge unit in the municipal administration taking care of the sport facilities. So it's it's cheap and it's easy for the sports clubs to to, I guess, more or less rent it for free. While here where I live, it's it's a small town where I wouldn't say the municipality doesn't care, but it feels like that when you represent local football club. In Oslo, the municipal park system, the units for the parks, cut the grass and mark the football pitches but where I live now, I have to pay more as a parent to the football club. So they do it themselves. So there are huge differences.

Mads Andreassen [00:02:26] There's definitely an interest in government of increasing and the self-organised or informal activities and that for us as a support organisation, I would say that building facilities opens for that self-organised sport as having talked about the ski slopes are open and most of the facilities around are open to self organised activities when children and youth are not using it. Which means if you facilitate or build facilities or open areas and think about how people can be more active in that area, it will be open for self-organised activities. There's also a unit that got money outside of the organised sport and for looking into how the municipalities can build facilities or build activity areas around to enhance the possibility of doing self-organised activities that would say there's definitely a way of it. And it's not contradictory to to do doing organised sport because I think it facilitates each other. And I would probably bring in one more aspect of that, and that is when children and youth are active, a lot of the parents do self-organised sport and it's kind of connected to the sport club, but still, it's self-organised. Do you have, for example, a driver's cup in table tennis, which means those that have been driving the children and youth go together and play? You have maybe different exercises done while the children are training organised. So a lot of the activities self-organised is also kind of going on around the sport clubs because the sport clubs are such a strong environment. And the third thing about it is that we I would say we would encourage municipalities to look at how you can combine facilities built for school with facilities built for sport clubs so that they can be used both in the daytime and in the evening. And they will also then be open to the public in general because they're owned by the municipality.

Lord Addington [00:04:37] Do you in both nations, do you actually have a culture where a sports facility that's known for a school or, for instance, a club, there was an expectation and pressure put on to make sure it is available outside use because we have an under-usage here in Great Britain.

Dr Josef Fahlén [00:05:01] Yes, I would definitely agree. I don't think it's possible for a municipality to build a facility these days without having a voice concerned over the access for outsiders or for those who are not organised in sports clubs. I think in the municipality where I live, they have actually formed regulations stating that a certain amount of the available time in that facility must be not possible to book so that my kids are well, I guess some other kids could go there when they please and do whatever they want.

Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv [00:05:55] In Norway we have the same arrangements, usually the facilities, very often their facilities are connected to schools. And when the school day and it's booked time for sports clubs, but also and especially smaller football pitches, smaller and facilities are regulated. So they should be open for for self-organised, as we call it.

Baroness Morris [00:06:33] I wanted to ask you about sports in school and how you think what part does that play in your national approach to sports and recreation? And in particular, we noticed two things that seem to be different in Norway and Sweden than what we've experienced in here. And one was the focus on children's rights and particularly what seemed to be noncompetitive in terms of openness and the under thirteen's. And then we were also interested in the recreation declaration in Norway, which seemed to give children an entitlement really to get involved in one sport. So those are two specific things. But I think the question really is about how you see what happens in sport in schools fitting into what you've already said and how influential it is.

Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv [00:07:27] We always say we don't have sport in school. And like I think you are used to. I have stayed half a year in New Zealand, so I think that's similar to your system and that was very interesting to me because it was very different. I would say that we have P.E. in school and then we have sport outside school. As simple as that. And then, therefore, it's very easy also to say that in Norway, a sport is a voluntary, organised system outside. And when it comes to the children's rights, it's so interesting that you ask about it, because my feeling is that it's very contested in Norway. Some. would say that it hinders elite athlete development to deny people being ranked before the age of 12, 13, while some would say because of that we make a very, very broad base before we really select the top. So because it probably makes youth stay longer in sports. So if you can pick among hundreds 17-year-old talents, it's better than picking among 10 because the rest of them quit before 12. There are different opinions.

Mads Andreassen [00:09:23] We have something called the Declaration of Recreation, which is signed between government and different ministries of the sport federations, but also all different other NGOs coming into this - music, Boy Scouts and so on. And this is to ensure that all children have the opportunity to participate in at least one organised recreational activity with others. And it's interesting cooperation because, of course, it's mainly words on paper. But what it gives us is a sporting organisation is a way of of trying to get the ministries to work together and to combine their different efforts and to talk together. It creates an arena to discuss between all the volunteer organisations and see what kind of efforts are we doing to reduce costs or what kind of mechanisms do we have to to capture those that can't afford to participate. So so in many ways, it's it's just a declaration, but in other ways it works effectively for creating such a discussion.

Baroness Morris [00:10:50] What do you mean by PE as opposed to sports? How does that differ from sports outside school? Is it not team-based? Is it more skill-based?

Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv [00:11:12] Physical education is a subject alongside Norwegian language and history and maths and it should include both team sports, individual sport and skills.

Baroness Morris [00:11:31] One of the things we struggle with is if somebody is very keen on something in school, the link when they leave school to join a club is quite difficult. That's one of the points which they drop off. Would you say that your approach makes it easier for children and young people to move from sports in school to sporting clubs?

Mads Andreassen [00:11:51] Just to emphasize on Eivind's points, we don't have school sports. There are a few single competitions between schools but those are the exception. People don't join one sport in school. They will do different sports and just get introduced to different physical activities.

[00:12:15] You were talking about the rights of the child and how we organise children's sport. I think that's maybe the single reason that we're so organised in sport. And it's also, I think, one of the most important reasons, why we are the best sporting nation in the world as well, according to statistics, of course. And because we combine these two. We make sure that as many as possible participate as early as possible. We have both the rights of the child, which is led from the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, looking at safety, mastery, influence, for example, the freedom to choose whichever sport you want to do, or several sports, making sure that competitions are open for everybody, and also that family income or family support isn't necessarily the basis of or if you can participate or not. The other part of it is what we usually get reactions from. As Eivind says, there's there's different opinions on it. But actually the all the national federations have confirmed these provisions on children's sport and said that they agree that this is the way to organise it. And the way we organise it is whether we have different levels of how far you can you can travel to compete, when we introduce rankings and result lists and, for example, that prices should be given to everybody. So from six years old, you're only allowed to participate locally, which means within your own municipality for most sports, then you can go regionally at nine and national at 11 and then also go to the other Nordic countries. But you're not allowed until the age of 13 to compete outside of that again. And the reason we do this is, of course, it's cost-related because you have to travel less, but it's also to reduce the focus on competitions and results because if you reduce the focus on the competitions and the results, we bring them into thinking about development instead of results and by by making sure that we don't make the competitions too serious, too early, we maintain many more children in sports longer, and we know that for every year they participate in organised sport, they will increase their skills and interest for the sport. So public health-wise, it every year they participate in organised sport increases the chance of being physically active also after they quit organised sports. So so it's also a public health argument to keep them inside an organised sport as long as possible.

Dr Josef Fahlén [00:14:59] I'd like to add something that hasn't been said already concerning the sport divide in Sweden, the advocates of PE teachers and unions for teachers have struggled for a century to distance themselves from sport, having legitimacy as a school subject and not as a leisure time activity. So the link really is to to to provide schoolchildren with the joy of learning how to move and then they will eventually find their way into sport clubs. That is the model that they are going for in Sweden Sometimes they bring in sport clubs, perhaps one time per semester so that local sport clubs can introduce themselves so students can meet the local sports clubs and learn about squash or table tennis or skiing or what have you. But the main purpose of PE in school is to to to to train students to be versatile and to enjoy moving their body. And hopefully, this will lead to a lifelong, interesting and physical activity inside or outside of sport.

[00:16:32] As for the children's rights perspective, we recently put in put into law the UN convention. So all sport activities must adhere to the the rules stipulated in the convention. We have for many years, I would say 20 years, looked very envious of our neighbors who have been more progressive in dictating rules against competing outside of your region, the rules of doing this or that before you are 13. A lot of Swedish, both scholars and people interested in sport, have questions about why we haven't gone the same way in Sweden. Instead, we have installed ombudsmans, whistleblower functions, educational programmes and gone that way instead and go you try to use soft policies instead of hard measures. But when I teach about this, I always take the Norwegian example as the most progressive example.

The Earl of Devon [00:17:47] This is just a follow up for Mad because he explained how competition is obviously not an evaluation for children under 13. How are sports clubs evaluated and how do they compete? Obviously, in the U.K., they all love to talk about their records and successes. How are sports clubs in Norway evaluated on performance? Is it numbers of participants or some other measure?

Mads Andreassen [00:18:13] I would say that and in many ways, they're not really measured, but I would say that the recognition is in two ways. It is, of course, producing elite athletes in the future. I mean, that's also important. And especially parents of young athletes becoming huge talents are recognized. So I wouldn't say that this is totally nonexistent, but I would say that the participation rate is very, very important. And keeping youth as long as possible is maybe the highest political goal for the Norwegian government - to have youth continue as long as possible. And the challenge there is, of course, that by the end of high school, there's only 25 per cent of 19 year olds participating in organised sport. So there's a huge drop out during the youth years, but we see it pushing longer and longer. So so participation, I would say, is that is the most evaluated. And if you look at evaluation, the more members you have, the more money you get, both from national funds and from local funds. So that's that's kind of a way of valuing that. The efforts to keep youth, for example, and you get more money for retaining youth than you get for retaining adults or children, for example, the Baroness Baroness Brady.

Baroness Grey-Thompson [00:19:44] I'm really interested in how you work with disabled children and adults and enable them to be active. I mean, figures were published in the UK today to show the huge gap that exists for disabled people. And I'm just interested in the sort of model of inclusion and how the governing bodies of the different organisations have come together to deliver activity and then maybe sport.

Mads Andreassen [00:20:13] I'm head of the activity development and in my department, I also have the guy working with people with disabilities. This is also a subject on which there is a high effort from government. There is money coming from government given to us to to be used for sport, for the disabled. And we also give the national federations money that is specially marked for working with people with disabilities. And I think that was an important factor when we went for an inclusive model. In 2007, the National Sport Organisation for the Disabled was dissolved and that was their own goal - to be fully included in all the special federations. Which meaning if you're doing alpine skiing, as I was, it was important to be part of the skiing federation and having the the the skilled ski coaches available, not necessarily having coaches good at telling me about how it was to be disabled. So I think mainstreaming sport for disabled has been important both politically and for our sport organisation. And that has also increased increased the variety of activities that we can participate in. In the National Sport organisation, for example, there were maybe 10 or 15 sports. Now at least the 54 federations and over two hundred and fifty sport disciplines are in principle available to everybody. And there are a lot more people working towards including people with disabilities. So it's a high, high effort, but definitely not an easy one. I mean, recruitment and information is challenging, but we see raising the competence of the coach, for example, is maybe one of the most important aspects of it, because the first meeting when parents with a disabled child come to a club, the first meeting with the club is so important for them to feel welcome and to also stay in the activity.

Dr Josef Fahlén [00:22:31] Yeah, similarly, as I said about the the U.N. convention, we in Sweden lag a bit behind our Norwegian brothers and sisters. Two years ago, we started the the dismantling process of the Swedish Parasport Federation with the same goals as Mads talked about that Norway did way back. So the goal is I think it's next year or the year after that, all of sports or para sports should be included in their respective discipline. So if you are a disabled downhill skier, you will be a member of the Swedish Skiing Federation, not a member of the Swedish Parasport Federation. So we're going the same way and also in this regard, but lagging a bit behind.

Lord Snape [00:23:30] Yeah. Can I just ask you to return to this question of participation, if you like, for the sake of participation compared to winners and losers, the right-wing press in the U.K. belittle this concept and say winning and losing is part of training for life. Do you get similar criticism in Norway and Sweden about participation for the sake of being involved in sport rather than winners or losers.

Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv [00:24:02] And it's a very good question. Yes, the answer is yes, there are voices. On the other hand, I have been in the last couple of years involved in some research into elite sport culture and we have several elite national teams in Norway and I think seven different sports. And I think that it's already mentioned during the conversation that the key word here is the focus on development because you can focus on development when you are 11 years old and you can focus on development when you're 32 and on top of your career in the national handball team or whatever. And it's and it's blowing sunshine over Norway, perhaps to say the national team coaches in, for example, handball and swimming. I can say that because they are already identified and they really emphasize themselves that and the result is a byproduct of good development work. So I would say that it's probably not the only answer, but that's a main key word in my answer to the relationship between participation and elite achievements.

Baroness Sater [00:25:29] National campaigns can be hugely successful at encouraging getting more people engaging in physical activity. Can you give examples? For example, we had the Daily Mile and This Girl Can campaigns. Can you give us any examples of successful campaigns that have been run in your country? And do you think that they are a positive to encourage more of these difficult groups that we're trying to get more active?

Mads Andreassen [00:26:09] I don't think I can refer to any successful campaigns on physical activity, and I don't believe in campaigns for physical activity. I'm sorry to say that. I think that the main important thing for us to communicate and what I think differs from from our organisation, from other countries is that I don't think politicians should get too focused on public health or inclusion or integration or diversity. I think the main goal is to deliver quality sport.

[00:26:45] If we deliver quality sport, people will participate and if you try to motivate children with inclusion or health or other object objectives, they will leave sport because they're there to have fun, to be with their friends and to do physical activity. After the Lillehammer Olympics in 94, we had huge activity campaigns concerning getting people into shape before the Olympics. But these campaigns are so short term and they die out and I don't know if they worked at that time either. So I'm sorry, I don't know any campaigns. I think the most important activity we do to include people in more physical activity is to make sure that the clubs deliver quality sport activities, including people, seeing everyone, good coaches and make sure we deliver quality activity every day. And then everything else will be consequences of that. Also elite sport.

Lord Moynihan [00:28:20] My question focuses on what you believe will be the future direction of sport and recreation policies in your country and Josef, if I can ask you when answering that, to focus on one aspect in the UK that is happening. We are moving away from the formal sector of sport to focusing on policies which use sport as a catalyst for engaging a healthy lifestyle and recreation, for example, in the criminal justice system and health, education as well as sport. And do you see your government also moving in that direction to recognize that policies towards an active lifestyle will become increasingly important?

Dr Josef Fahlén [00:29:08] Yes, thank you. Very good question. First of all, we see that in Sweden as well. The politics surrounding the idea of using sport as a catalyst for for a wide range of objectives, obesity, criminality, what have you. But we also see that sport organisations don't want that because they think - and we have good research supporting that - that whatever objective you're aiming for, you need sport club presence. Whatever catalyst you're aiming for, you have to have a sport club. And in order for for us to have sport clubs all over Sweden catering for all kinds of groups, we need block funding. No campaign can can can solve that in the long term as block funding can. So I would say moving forward, even if you want to use sport as a catalyst, and that's fine with me because that's a political decision and not a decision for us researchers to have an opinion on it, I would say that you need a you need someone to address. You need someone to send programs to or do campaigns with. And in order for that to happen, you need a speaking partner. And in Sweden, the sport club or the Swedish Sports Confederation on top have been the go-to guy for a hundred and eighteen years. And if we are just to pick out something that seems to have worked in Sweden and Norway, I think it's that that relation has, despite all disadvantages and drawbacks, I think that both parties, both government and sport organisations, agree on the fact that they are in in the same boat together, so to speak, and they both need each other. So if I would say anything as an advice for the future, I would advise to to try to do something for the longevity of the just the common sport club, because if you don't have them in place, it doesn't matter what programme you have.

Lord Moynihan [00:31:48] Baroness Grey-Thompson, in her question, was reflecting on a very dark day here because of the reports of the Activity Alliance for Disabled People, which showed that the pandemic was widening existing inequalities for disabled people and also creating new ones. And that's to be found in the world of sport as well. Do you think that the sport recreation policy direction for your government in the future is going to focus more on opportunities for the disabled in sport? And what will be the priorities for the sport and recreation policy going forward?

Mads Andreassen [00:32:30] I think that the support policy of which we have in the Nordic countries and Norway especially will continue to be there. Mass participation among children and youth and also emphasizing on using government money on good children and youth sport. I think that will continue. We see that some of our federations want the government to put more money into to the adult sport because of public health discussions. But I think the cross politician meaning on that is that we need to emphasize on putting money into children and youth sport. So I think that will continue concerning the people who support for people with disabilities. It is already very highlighted area. And I would say probably around 10 per cent of the money going to the federations are specially marked for doing sport for people with disabilities. So there's a lot of resources been put on this. And this is one special subject which we have to report on every year. It also aligns with our organisation's goal of joy of sport for all. So it fits well into our policies also.

Lord Moynihan [00:33:49] Eivind, what do you think of the key policy changes that will come in the next five years? What will be the drivers behind them? Is the focus going to retain a spotlight on the club structure, or do you think the informal structure will be more prevalent in policy-making decisions?

Dr Eivind Å. Skilleiv [00:34:05] A very good question. My answer to your last question would be yes. The same structure and there will still be a focus on children and youth within organised sport, but the complexity increases and there is more focus on informal participation. So trying to merge those. I think if if there's one advice, it's to make facilities and preferably administrative facilities through the public sector system. So it could be free of use for both sport clubs, other sports organisations and public population.