Play and the Children’s Plan

Leisure and the Environment welcome the publication of the government’s ten year Children’s plan and see it as a further huge boost for Children’s Play. All local authorities responsible for delivering a Children and Young People’s Plan will be able to access new funds for Play. This means, for example, that in 2 tier areas the County Councils will need to take the lead role. The preparation of bids to secure this funding will be a pressing task for many and if you need help we can provide it.

Programme outline

The overall programme will see 30 Play Pathfinders each receiving around £2m of capital (taking into account regional variations in building costs) and around £500k revenue. The remaining 120 authorities will receive Playbuilder capital averaging £1m (weighted by child population, deprivation and taking into account regional variations in building costs) to develop 20-25 play areas, whether new or substantially refurbished. The first wave of 15 Pathfinders will be announced by the end of March, along with the authorities invited to start spending their Playbuilder capital in year 1.

A second wave of 15 Pathfinders will be selected this November, and all authorities will have the opportunity to express an interest. All remaining local authorities will be offered Playbuilder capital in 2010-11, but will be expected to prepare for how they will spend this ahead of that date.

Partnership Working and Accessing Funds

As play may sit outside children’s services in local authority organisations, there will also need to be a strong partnership between Departments of Children’s Services and colleagues in environment, leisure, planning, transport and housing. In two-tier authorities there will be the need for strong joint-working between top-Tier and District councils, often also pulling in Town and Parish councils given the very local nature of play provision. This will often mean close working with District-level play partnerships in order to develop a county-level partnership approach with community and Third Sector groups for the planning and commissioning process.

Leisure and the Environment Support

We have a proven track record in strategic planning for children’s play.

• We helped prepare national guidance on Play Strategies for Play England and the Big Lottery Fund (BIG).
• Our team includes Play England appointed national ‘Play Enablers’
• We have prepared many play strategies and associated funding bids for local authorities.

We work regularly and extensively with local authorities on a host of play related themes and projects.

If you wish to discuss any of the above to explore how we could help you move forward just e-mail us using the contact form on the website.