Uniting the Movement | Sport England

Sport England completes Executive Leadership Team

Angela Balakrishnan will join as Executive Director for Policy and Communications in September. Uniting the Movement

New appointments to our Executive Leadership Team

Nick Percy and Amy Rice will join the organisation in the next few weeks. Uniting the Movement

How game-changing place work is helping to get England active

For too long, efforts to get people active followed a familiar pattern – launch a campaign, start a programme, open a facility and hope people turn up.

When engagement was low, especially in communities facing deprivation, ill health or isolation, the blame often fell on individuals.

But the real issue runs deeper.

Today’s Active Lives Adult Survey data shows overall activity levels are improving, yet inequalities remain – and in some cases are widening – highlighting the limits of this approach.

Through our place-based work, we are flipping that script.

Our approach isn’t about parachuting in with short-term initiatives. It’s about changing local systems and putting power, funding and decision-making into the hands of communities themselves.

It’s about reshaping the conditions that make movement possible.

A teacher demonstrates how to play 'Beat the Street' to students in Cornwall

This is a structural shift – from national delivery to locally-led systems; from fragmented interventions to collaboration; and from doing things to communities to working with them.

Crucially, this way of working is starting to show signs of impact, particularly for adults who have historically been least active.

From programmes to places

At its core, place-based working recognises a simple truth: where you live shapes how active you are.

Access to safe green space, transport, income, health, and social networks all matter. So instead of generic national solutions, we are investing up to £250 million into over 90 communities with the greatest need.

But funding is only part of it. The real change is in how decisions are made.

With our support, councils, NHS bodies, charities, community groups and residents are working together (over years, not funding cycles) to design local solutions.

Power is moving closer to communities.

Below are examples of how that power is moving and the impact it's having.

Birmingham: leisure as local infrastructure

Birmingham's Leisure Transformation Programme shows what happens when physical activity is treated as essential infrastructure rather than optional provision.
Read more about Birmingham: leisure as local infrastructure
With investment from us, leisure centres in areas such as Erdington, Ladywood, Northfield and Stechford have been transformed into modern, accessible community assets.

At Stechford Leisure Centre alone, there were more than a quarter of a million visits in the past year, up 7.4 percent. Engagement is strong among women and residents in lower-income groups – communities often least likely to be reached by traditional sport programmes.

The impact goes beyond activity. The site generated £1.6 million in social value in a single year, reflecting the wider benefits in wellbeing, connection and community resilience.
Read less about Birmingham: leisure as local infrastructure
Cornwall: making movement part of everyday life

In Cornwall, Active Cornwall has taken a different approach and looked to remove the barriers between exercise and daily life.

Through Beat the Street, delivered as part of their Let’s Go campaign, whole communities are being turned into active play spaces. Walking and cycling are becoming part of a shared game, rather than a formal intervention.
Read more about Cornwall: making movement part of everyday life
In under a month, over 3,200 adults have taken part, 40 percent of whom were previously inactive. The lesson is clear – design activity around real routines and engagement follows.
Read less about Cornwall: making movement part of everyday life
East Yorkshire: inclusion as a system outcome

Our work in local places is also changing who gets to be active.

In East Yorkshire, our investment has helped significantly improve participation among disabled adults.

The proportion who are fairly active has risen from 10% to 28%.
Read more about East Yorkshire: inclusion as a system outcome
This shift was not achieved through a single programme. It came from redesigning opportunities to be active, improving accessibility, building confidence, and working through trusted local organisations.
Read less about East Yorkshire: inclusion as a system outcome
Doncaster: when systems align, behaviour shifts

Doncaster shows system change most clearly.

Through Get Doncaster Moving, we’ve worked since 2018 to align transport, health, community and culture around physical activity.
Read more about Doncaster: when systems align, behaviour shifts
The result is measurable – over 12,600 more adults are active compared to 2015, a rise of around 5% in Doncaster’s adult population.

This came from sustained coordination between organisations, shared priorities and a long-term commitment to working as one system rather than many services.
Read less about Doncaster: when systems align, behaviour shifts
Blackpool: the power of collaboration

In Blackpool, our partnership with Move Together Blackpool shows how collaboration changes outcomes.

Over 150 leaders from health, education, housing and the voluntary sector now operate within a shared framework. A cultural shift is happening – we are seeing physical activity becoming a shared responsibility across the system.
Oxfordshire: designing with communities

In Oxfordshire, the approach is deliberately targeted.

Active Oxfordshire is focusing its efforts on 10 priority neighbourhoods, many in the most deprived 20 per cent nationally. Partners use Active Neighbourhood Scans to understand barriers such as safety, accessibility and cultural perceptions.
Read more about Oxfordshire: designing with communities
Local groups are then supported to design solutions that include walking programmes, community activity, and informal movement opportunities tailored to real needs.

This is place-based working using small-scale insight to drive meaningful impact.
Read less about Oxfordshire: designing with communities

The system impact is scaling

Across all place-based work, our impact is increasingly visible at scale.

In 10 of our original 12 Place Pilots, physical activity is now embedded into health and care pathways – meaning movement is supported through GPs, social prescribing and community health teams.

In Doncaster, this approach has mobilised 757 organisations and 1,500 local leaders to create a coordinated local system where physical activity is no longer a standalone service but part of how the whole area works.

In places like Essex, our investment has helped them unlock around £65 million in additional funding – turning relatively small seed funding into large-scale investment that reaches far more people and creates longer-lasting change.

Leadership capacity is also expanding. Over the last two years around 1,000 local leaders have been trained through our Leading the Movement programme, strengthening the ability of places to sustain change beyond our initial funding.

This is not just a collection of local success stories. It is a different operating model. It's a quiet revolution – one that is reshaping how communities think about movement, health and wellbeing from the ground up.

Because lasting change doesn’t come from programmes, it comes from places.

Find out more

England is getting more active but not everyone is benefiting

Several older adults use stretch their legs using resistance bands during a seated exercise class in a community hall.

Latest Active Lives data shows continued progress as focus remains on tackling inequalities and supporting those facing the greatest barriers. Research Tackling inactivity Uniting the Movement

Active Lives Survey 2024-25 Year 10 – technical note

Three pregnant women stand talking outside while holding yoga mats.

Technical note to accompany the Active Lives Adult Survey 2024/25, conducted by Ipsos. Research Uniting the Movement

Stepping up our support for places to tackle inactivity

A crouching mum helps her son hold his bow and arrow while he aims during an archery session.

We’re investing £25 million in our Place Universal Offer until 2028, working with 30 Active Partnerships and other local organisations to drive community-led change. Local authorities Place-based working Uniting the Movement

Who's who in the System Partner investment universe

Sport England’s system partner investment has committed over £500 million, since 2022, to more than 130 partners in support of the organisation's Uniting the Movement strategy.

This long-term funding provides up to five years of financial security and stability for organisations to focus on addressing the systemic changes needed to tackle the inequalities stopping individuals and communities from being physically active.

Moving forward together

The latest findings from the evaluation of the System Partner portfolio, based on insights gathered throughout 2025, matures the understanding of how partners’ collective efforts are creating change.

It also shines a light on four distinct, yet interconnected, roles that System Partners play to influence change.

It’s important to say that while many organisations naturally combine these roles, understanding them helps us to be more strategic and effective.

Whether you are funded through the System Partner investment or from elsewhere, we encourage you to reflect on the roles your organisation play.

We hope this insight can prompt you to consider how you can strengthen your collaborations and benefit from the expertise and reach of others as part of your work towards addressing inequalities and increasing physical activity.

The four roles identified are:

The Improver. This role is the foundation of a safe and professional sector. Improvers focus on raising standards in governance, safeguarding, and equality, diversity and inclusion. They not only enhance their own practices but also support other organisations to do the same. An example is The Angling Trust, which – in response to a surge in demand for angling for wellbeing – introduced a 21-point checklist and new training to ensure its delivery partners met high standards for safety and quality.
The Influencer. Influencers work to shape the conversations and conditions that make it easier for people to get active. They advocate for policy change and champion the needs of specific communities. The Richmond Group of Charities, a coalition of health charities, exemplifies this role. By acting as a collective, they have achieved greater reach and successfully embedded physical activity resources into the healthcare system.
The Deliverer. This is where strategies are translated into opportunities for people to be more active. Deliverers create and adapt on-the-ground programmes for people to participate in sport and physical activity, with a focus on reaching under-represented communities. Chance to Shine’s ‘Street’ cricket programme illustrates this. By targeting deprived areas, recruiting local coaches and empowering young leaders, they have grown a programme that is youth-led and community-driven.
The Connector. Connectors bring people and organisations together at a local level. They use their understanding of a place to guide funding and activities where they are most needed. Active Partnerships such as the Yorkshire Sport Foundation demonstrate this role. They bring people and policies together to link regional policy and community action, using formal agreements and data-driven insights to translate high-level strategy into targeted, grassroots support.

The latest findings from the evaluation of the System Partner portfolio, based on insights gathered throughout 2025, matures our understanding of how partners’ collective efforts are creating change.

The insights emerging from the evaluation suggest that the benefits of these roles stem from how they connect as no partner plays just one role.

The magic of collaborative work

The System Partner investment has given organisations the opportunity to think beyond their primary function, build stronger relationships and adopt more collaborative, system-focused approaches.

We are sharing this emerging learning, and our revised theory of change, so that these insights can be used as a tool for conversation.

By understanding the unique contributions and how they fit together, we hope this evaluation is helping Sport England and others to better understand its place in the system.