The report of a Youth Stakeholder Forum on Sport hosted earlier in the year by Minister of State for Sport and the Gaeltacht, Jack Chambers, was published yesterday and highlighted a demand for more diverse sports offering to young people as well as better access to facilities and gender equality.

The forum, which was attended by over 100 young people from across Ireland, produced, according to the Minister: “highly useful findings that will greatly help us to combat young people dropping out of sport in their teens.”

“The level of engagement and interest in this topic was evident all the way through the day-long forum, something that I found to be really encouraging.”

“The variety and depth of the ideas and suggestions coming from these young people convinces me that we can solve this persistent problem in youth sport participation.”

Discussions at the Forum which took place at the National Sports Campus revolved around findings of the Children’s Sport Participation and Physical Activity Study 2018.

It found that only one in seven young people are sufficiently physically active to benefit their long-term health.

“This situation is not an acceptable state of affairs. No matter what the reasons, we simply have to achieve improvements in this area. We now have a menu of potential remedies and actions which my Department are now urgently examining,” continued the Minister.

The Forum also heard from winners at the 2022 PExpo, one of our favourite events of the year and one which will take place again in 2023, hopefully, with some additional commercial support from the Sponsorship 20:20 Showcase event we ran in September.

Nine main conclusions emerged from the Forum:

1. More sports facilities to address current gaps.

2. Share existing facilities more, especially between schools and local communities.

3. Prioritise the development of multi-sport facilities to improve range and variety.

4. Develop coaching standards and capability.

5. Have a physical activity-friendly school uniforms policy.

6. Better access for young people to sports facilities during peak hours after school.

7. More active travel to and from sports facilities and improve public transport availability, especially in rural areas.

8. More time dedicated to a more diverse physical education (PE) curriculum.

9. Need for Gender equality

“It would be wrong to say that Ireland is doing poorly across the board,” added Chambers. “Far from it. At younger age levels, Ireland is doing reasonably well, with most school children being regularly active every day, whether through a formal sport, or just running about and playing in the outdoors. That is a good situation but there is unfortunately a very discernible deterioration in participation numbers during the post-primary period.”

“The fact that this is a trend replicated in many other countries overseas is of no comfort to me or to the Government and we need to change that trend. With the benefit of the views expressed by young people themselves at this forum I’m confident that we will change that trend for the better in the coming years.”

The Forum was also attended by Kellie Harrington who spoke eloquently of her own involvement with sport through childhood and how important that was in her whole life, well beyond the triumphs in the ring all the way to an Olympic Gold medal.

The full report can be downloaded here.