Agenda item

The public will have seen the vast coverage that our local newspaper has recently given to the Medway School Games and the Mayor has publicly given his support to the School Sports Partnership by making it one of his charities.

I understand that Medway Council has withdrawn their support of the Secondary School Games from 2013/14. Could Councillor Doe give me a clear explanation as to why this decision was taken? 

The public will have seen the vast coverage that our local newspaper has recently given to the Medway School Games and the Mayor has publicly given his support to the School Sports Partnership by making it one of his charities.

I understand that Medway Council has withdrawn their support of the Secondary School Games from 2013/14. Could Councillor Doe give me a clear explanation as to why this decision was taken? 

Councillor Doe stated that since April 2011 the Council had charged secondary school academies £750 per annum to take part in the Secondary School Games series. This was because academies were funded directly rather than via the local authority.

This service was offered via the schools service level agreement and it was advertised to all academies. The overwhelming number of secondary schools in Medway were now academies.

For the academic year starting September 2012 none of the academies took up the offer, via the service level agreement, to take part in the secondary school games. Instead the schools informed the Council they would be arranging their own competitions.

As they were arranging their own competitions and do not want to take part in the Secondary School Games the Council was not in a position to be able to hold them. However, the continuance of the games was welcomed even if they were going to be run by the academies and that the Council was still willing to be involved should the academies wished the Council to organise them again upon a payment towards the Council’s costs (which would still be less than it cost to put the games on).

Councillor Doe stated that he understood why the academies wanted to run it themselves, as they were entering into self-governing arrangements, however, if they needed informal advice the Council would be very happy to provide it to them.

Councillor Smith stated that she understood that it was a decision by the schools not to contribute the money towards the senior school games and that she was sure they would continue. However, she believed it was  very sad that those games will continue next year without the support of Medway Council.

Councillor Doe reiterated that the academies had made a decision that they did not wish the Council to run those particular games and this had been a decision within the academies’ gift.

Equally, the Council was open to give the academies informal advice given the Council had a great deal of in-house knowledge. He also stated that if the academies wanted the Council, after a couple of years, to come back and organise the games, this would be fine.

However, he did not think it was fair or reasonable to give the impression that the Council was pulling the plug on these games, as they were not. It was the academies who had decided that they want to organise the games themselves. The Council was prepared to help them to make sure the event was a success, if they wanted advice, but he suspected that the academies would get on with it themselves.