Report of the Chief Operating Officer (Neighbourhoods)

This report updates members on Widening Access to Culture and Leisure and on Leisure’s approach to ‘poverty proofing’.

The Committee received a report of the Chief Operating Officer (Neighbourhoods) which provided an update on work to understand resident engagement in services provided by Leisure, Libraries, Galleries and Culture and to explore routes to increase participation among groups or communities that might be less engaged.  The report also provided information about leisure’s approach to ‘poverty proofing’.

The Executive Member for Schools, Culture and Leisure referred to the main points and themes within the report, which included:

• Data improvement;
• Wider access for under-represented groups;
• Examples of recent initiatives in the different service areas;
• Communication and resident engagement; and
• Next steps.

Some of the key points that arose from the Committee’s discussions were:

• The work of Age Friendly Manchester (AFM) Culture Champions;
• The condition of playing fields in parks;
• Request for further information on the conversations which were due to take place with Manchester Health and Care Commissioning (MHCC) in relation to Arts and Leisure;
• Request for ward level data of the people obtaining MCR Active cards and using the leisure facilities;
• That poverty proofing services was not just about the cost of tickets for events or activities but also the cost of transport to venues; and
• Barriers affecting disabled people’s access to leisure facilities and to request a further report focusing on protected characteristics.

The Executive Member for Schools, Culture and Leisure recognised the value of the work of AFM and its Culture Champions in ensuing older people were aware of what was going on in the city and felt welcome to participate.  The Sport and Leisure Lead updated Members on work to improve playing pitches and the Manchester Playing Pitch Strategy, which the Committee was due to receive an update report on at its 8 November meeting.  He reported that the MCR Active card had been successful in enabling the Council to gather data on the people using leisure facilities, including casual users.  He advised Members that he could provide data on which wards the users of individual leisure facilities lived in.  He informed Members that the data showed that some groups were under-represented, which included women and girls, disabled people and people over the age of 50, which reflected a national trend, but that Manchester was performing better than the national average on people from BAME (black and minority ethnic) groups accessing leisure facilities.

The Strategic Lead (Libraries, Galleries and Culture) informed Members that the Council had now started the conversation with MHCC on the contribution of Arts and Leisure to the Our Healthier Manchester Strategy and he offered to provide further information to the Committee at a future date.  The Culture Lead (Libraries, Galleries and Culture) acknowledged that transport was a big issue and outlined some of the approaches being taken to address this such as basing activity in local places and cultural organisations negotiating with transport companies to put in place transport schemes to enable cheaper travel to their events.  The Executive Member for Schools, Culture and Leisure advised that the Council needed to work with Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) to address this. 

Decisions

1.            To request a further report on Widening Access and Participation focusing specifically on protected characteristics.

2.            To request that data on which wards the users of individual leisure facilities lived in be circulated to Members.

3.            To note that further information on the conversations with MHCC on the contribution of Arts and Leisure to the Our Healthier Manchester Strategy will be provided in a future report.