Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment he has made of the level of access to high-quality coaches for girls in (a) football and (b) rugby in (i) single sex and (ii) mixed secondary schools.

The Department does not collect information on the use of coaches in schools and has not made a specific assessment of their availability for girls. Schools have a responsibility under the Equality Act 2010 to allow girls equal opportunities to participate in comparable sporting activities to boys.

Many primary schools are using their Physical Education and School Sport Premium funding to target less active groups. In our survey on use of the premium, 31% of schools reported that they used their funding to target girls: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/pe-and-sport-premium-an-investigation-in-primary-schools.

The School Sport and Activity Action Plan, published in July 2019, set out actions to support schools to work more closely with sports clubs and providers to increase access to high quality team sport.

The Government is continuing to work to promote girls’ and women’s sport more widely. Sport England will provide £1 million funding to help girls’ confidence to take part in sport and activity as part of the successful This Girl Can campaign, which has already inspired over 3.9 million women and girls to take steps to get active.