The National Leisure Recovery Fund, which opened in
December 2020, was established to provide a solid
funding platform for the leisure sector to successfully
reopen. It has been funded by the Government and
managed by Sport England.
Allocations will mean that publicly-owned leisure
centres and gyms can begin preparations for reopening
as part of Step Two of the Prime Minister’s roadmap,
secured by financial backing from the Government. The
lifting of restrictions will be subject to approval.
It follows the Prime Minister’s ambition to ‘building
back fitter’ from the coronavirus pandemic, underlined
by the multi-billion pound support for the sport and
leisure sectors over the past year.
Sports Minister
said:
We know that Local Authorities have faced significant
financial pressure as a result of the pandemic so
this £100 million for leisure will be vital in
helping them recover.
Communities across England rely on their local
leisure centre or gym to help them keep fit and
healthy and this funding will assist those public
facilities to make ends meet.
Sport England Chief Executive Tim Hollingsworth said:
Leisure facilities have a vital role to play in
supporting the health of the nation and in particular
in serving our more disadvantaged communities.
They have been hit especially hard over the past
year, so this investment is crucial and will help
thousands to reopen when it becomes possible to do so
– supporting the recovery and helping people get back
to the activity they have badly missed.
Sport England has worked at pace to enable the
distribution of the investment to happen as quickly
as possible and remains committed to doing what we
can to continue to support this crucial part of our
sector.
The £100 million comes on top of Local Authority
funding also being increased in the Budget, with an
additional £1.5 billion for 2021/22 financial year to
be made available to councils.
This takes the total Government contribution to local
government finance to over £6 billion for the course of
the pandemic, which has helped councils to deliver
critical local services such as leisure centres and
gyms.
As announced in the Prime Minister’s roadmap, leisure
centres and gyms will be part of the Step Two
reopening. They will be permitted to re-open their
doors to the public no earlier than 12 April for
individual socially distanced use, with this £100
million providing a significant capital injection to
help with restarting.
As part of Step Three, indoor adult group sports and
exercise classes will be permitted to resume from no
earlier than 17 May.
The financial support comes on top of the sport and
leisure sector benefiting from more than £1.5 billion
worth of business support that has been made available
by the Government, including the furlough scheme,
business rates relief and business interruption loan
scheme that has helped many sports clubs and leisure
businesses to survive.
Grassroots sports and the physical activity sector are
also benefiting from £270 million in emergency funding
delivered by Sport England. Earlier this month, the
Chancellor announced that the Government will provide
an initial £25 million to support the growth of
grassroots football, which will be enough to build
around 700 new pitches across the UK.
