Commitment to playing field protection continues

Thursday 12 Dec 2024 @ 16:20
Sport England

Our role as a statutory consultee saw 94% of all concluded planning applications involving playing fields result in the protection or improvement of facilities

We protected more than 1,000 playing fields between April 2022 and March 2023, new figures published today show.

The annual playing field statistics show we protected 1,007 in the year to March 2023, continuing our commitment to protecting and enhancing playing fields across England.

Our commitment means 94% of all concluded planning applications involving a playing field have resulted in improved or safeguarded facilities, according to data published today.

And our director of planning and active environments, Nick Evans, is pleased with the continued efforts of our planning team.

“The figures released today once again demonstrate Sport England’s unwavering commitment to protecting and enhancing playing fields,” he said.

“Playing fields are a vital resource that offer flexible opportunities to take part in sport and physical activity, providing wide ranging health and wellbeing benefits to communities across England.

“We are pleased to see the importance of our role has recently been endorsed by a government planning inspector in relation to a proposed housing scheme on a playing field in Yardley, Birmingham, who in dismissing the planning appeal gave great weight to Sport England’s objection to its loss.

“This was just one of over 1000 applications that Sport England were consulted on over the year that culminated in safeguarded or improved provision.

“It’s crucial we continue to protect these spaces to enable people, regardless of their background to be active in their local communities.”

Sport England must be consulted whenever anyone wants to develop on a playing field and we’ll always object if we believe sports provision in the community will be diminished as a result.

Today’s data, which covers the 2022/23 financial year, shows we continue to act to protect and enhance playing fields across the country.

The data show:

94% (1,007 out of 1,075) of concluded planning applications affecting playing fields resulted in improved or safeguarded sports provision
of the 140 applications where we maintained our objection, 72 (51%) were either withdrawn by the applicants or refused planning permission
in 69% of the cases where we originally objected to an application, further negotiations led to development being approved with improved or safeguarded sports provision.

The stats

Playing field stats tables 2022-23

Table 1 - planning applications affecting playing fields by outcome

	2014-15	2015-16	2016-17	2017-18	2018-19	2019-20	2020-21	2021-22	2022-23
Applications	Total/%	Total/%	Total/%	Total/%	Total/%	Total/%	Total/%	Total/%	Total/%
Received	1281/100	1235/100	1219/100	1274/100	1209/100	1160/100	1038/100	1181/100	1141/100
Approved¹	1141/87	1060/86	1054/86	1100/86	1005/84	963/84	839/81	964/82	921/81
Refused or withdrawn¹	140/11	140/11	133/11	130/11	139/11	120/10	139/13	156/13	154/13
Applications yet to be decided¹	27/2	35/3	32/3	44/3	65/5	67/6	60/6	62/5	66²/6

Notes

Of those applications received during the financial year
As of 30/11/24

Playing field stats tables 2022-23

Table 2 - approved applications by category

	2017/18	2018/19	2019/20	2020/21	2021/22	2022/23
	Total/%	Total/%	Total/%	Total/%	Total/%	Total/%
E5	253/23	246/24	203/21	199/24	183/19	204/22
E4	108/10	76/8	75/8	61/7	68/7	65/7
E3	421/38	349/35	328/34	313/37	343/35	294/32
E2	239/22	258/26	296/30	214/25	319/33	290/32
E1	5/1	10/1	6/1	4/1	4/1	0/0
Maintained objection 1	58/5	55/5	44/4	30/4	37/4	55/6
Maintained objection 2	16/1	11/1	21/2	18/2	10/1	13/1
Total	1,100/100	1,005/100	973/100	839/100	964/100	921/100

Notes

E5=New/improved sports facilities with overall benefit to sport
E4=Replacement playing field provision incorporated as part of proposals
E3=Development involving playing field land but where usable playing field not materially affected
E2=Ancillary facilities such as changing rooms and sports lighting that support use of playing field
E1=Development where a robust assessment of need and playing pitch strategy showed a strong case for releasing the land from playing field use

Applications where Sport England maintained an objection and following referral to the National Planning Casework Unit the application was subsequently approved
Applications where Sport England maintained an objection but referral to the National Planning Casework Unit was not required and the application was subsequently approved

Regional breakdown 2022-23

Planning applications affecting playing fields, by region

East

159 out of 167 (95%) concluded planning applications affecting playing fields resulted in improved or safeguarded sports provision
Despite formal objections from Sport England, the number of applications which led to a detrimental impact on sport was 8 (5%)

East Midlands

108 out of 114 (95%) concluded planning applications affecting playing fields resulted in improved or safeguarded sports provision
Despite formal objections from Sport England, the number of applications which led to a detrimental impact on sport was 6 (5%)

London

58 out of 61 (95%) concluded planning applications affecting playing fields resulted in improved or safeguarded sports provision

Channel website: http://www.sportengland.org/

Original article link: https://www.sportengland.org/commitment-playing-field-protection-continues

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