‘Inspiring everyone to be more active, more often.’
North Kesteven's District Council's refreshed Sport an Physical Activity Strategy is about inspiring more people to be more active more often. It will help us to continue to deliver our stated vision in the NK Plan for Our Communities, which is to enhance the wellbeing, safety and health of everyone - inspiring and supporting a sustainable and flourishing future.
As we are all too familiar, the pandemic has presented us with many challenges. However, one positive aspect has been that it emphasised the importance of sport and physical activity, which is essential for our individual and collective physical and mental health. It also contributed greatly to our local economy as well as helping to bring our communities together.
Local authorities play a vital role in this area and are the largest funders of sport, leisure, parks and open spaces. NKDC has invested 7 million pounds in its leisure facilities in recent years, and user satisfaction continues to be very high speed. Pre-pandemic numbers show over 1 million visits annually to our leisure and cultural centres, and we are confident that we will surpass these in the future as people return to familiar, or identify new, routines.
We will also work in partnership with others on creating healthy and sustainable community-based programmes to address inequalities, social isolation and other barriers to physical activity and health prevention.
Our vision remains "to inspire everyone to be more active more often". We recognise that this will require a whole-Council and stakeholder approach, engaging with and motivating all those involved to ensure lasting success. Despite the setbacks caused by Covid-19, our Council and partners have risen to the challenge; they have continued to work hard, adapt, and to focus on the future, and our strategy and action plan clearly demonstrates that.
