PE Facilities 9/1/08

INTO Press Release: Statement by John Carr, INTO General Secretary, on the need for modern Physical Education facilities in Primary Schools to tackle rising levels of childhood obesity.

9th January 2008

Future Shock: Fat Nation

The Department of Education and Science must wake up to the fact that it is failing to play its part in combating rising levels of obesity said INTO General Secretary John Carr. He was speaking after the broadcasting of the Future Shock: Fat Nation programme on RTE1 television this week.

The INTO today demanded that every school:

• have access to an indoor physical education facility
• be paid an annual grant for physical education equipment.

Mr Carr said the failure by the Department to improve facilities for physical education opportunities in primary schools meant that many children are not even getting the minimum lesson time recommended in the curriculum. “On paper, the time recommended for physical education in our schools is the lowest in Europe,” he said. “In practice it is far worse than that because in too many of our schools bad weather prevents physical education being taught. This is because too many of our schools lack an indoor facility for PE. In Ireland PE is weather dependent."

According to Carr, one in four children living in Ireland are either overweight or obese. “The problem of childhood obesity is becoming more common,” he said. “The modern child will watch TV or play computer/video games for hours and they are therefore at a higher risk of obesity than any previous generation of children. This risk is compounded by a diet that includes increasing amounts of fast foods and fizzy drinks.”

“A clear opportunity is being lost to provide an alternative to these children in schools,” he said. “All pupils should be able to take part in PE lessons for at least an hour a week.”

He said Department inactivity was reinforcing the message that sport for all is not a priority. “It is reinforcing the message that it for the talented or the elite. It is past time that the Department of Education showed a real commitment to developing PE as a core subject in primary schools.

He said the programme clearly showed the length to which primary schools go to promote healthy lifestyles. “But they cannot do it alone. It is time government made the present and future health of children a priority. Relying on commercial companies to make good government shortfalls in education spending is unacceptable.”

Mr Carr strongly criticized the comments of John Tracey, Chairperson of the Sports Council on RTE news on Monday night in relation to commercial sponsorship in schools. Mr Tracey confirmed to RTE news that schools were crying out for equipment but argued that commercial sponsorship was a good way of doing this. Carr said, Mr Tracey’s comment that “if someone can come up with a better alternative, let them come up with it” was met with derision by many teachers.

“The response from teachers was that government should fund primary education, not supermarkets,” he said. “Such schemes are exploitative and inequitable, designed to promote products and not to fund physical education in schools.”

Ends.