Covid-19

Tracey Crouch Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd September 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Prime Minister]

What we have done, as the hon. Lady possibly knows already, is to target testing and enhance protection for those in frontline groups, many of whom come from black and minority ethnic groups. What we are also doing, to stop the spread of infection in some communities, is working much harder with local government and local communities to get the messaging into those communities about the risks of transmission and the basic rules about hands, face, space. Those are among the things that we are doing.

[Tracey Crouch (Chatham and Aylesford) (Con) [V]]

Sport and physical activity contributes more than £16 billion to the UK economy. It directly employs more than 600,000 people and indirectly employs many more. It has an ecosystem that reaches beyond the pitch, field, court or pool, and its social value, which includes physical and mental wellbeing, is estimated at more than £72 billion. Right now, however, both codes of rugby, football, cricket, netball, hockey, tennis and swimming, to name but a few, are in a perilous situation because spectators cannot return and venues cannot host income-raising events such as conferences. Sport, and all that it directly and indirectly involves, cannot continue to face such losses. Given today’s announcement that pauses the return of spectators, will the Prime Minister elaborate on his comments about a financial support package to ensure that sport is not left decimated after the pandemic?

[The Prime Minister]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right to draw attention to the huge importance of sport to our national economy and our wellbeing. That is why my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport is now working flat out with the Premier League and others to identify ways in which we can keep these clubs going and support sport at all levels throughout the pandemic. One of the things that we are not doing today, as my hon. Friend will appreciate, is stopping outdoor physical exercise or team sports outside. We want that to continue. That is why it is vital that we enforce the package of measures that we have outlined today.