Having attracted a high level of interest and in the face of strong competition, England Golf (EG) has awarded the contract to deliver this vital work to KKP. This decision is based primarily on the strength of the Company’s track record delivering comparable projects for a variety of national governing bodies of sport (NGBs) and our specific experience delivering golf-related needs assessments.

The process will incorporate development of the first ever national strategy for needs assessments for golf facilities in England. The intention is to strengthen the NGB’s position as the national lead agency for golf supply/demand insight optimising its capacity to address provision gaps and protect golf facilities. This is key to achieving its ambition to get ahead of its demanding facilities planning workload and proactively improve the quality, scale and robustness of its input to local plans, ANOG-based outdoor sports assessments and golf planning per se.

KKP will analyse EG’s present data and intelligence on the sector and the golf facility mix in England and evaluate how to best utilise and extend this. The process will culminate in development of a data platform which makes EG the go to agency for golf-related supply/demand information setting out how it will, for example:

– Strengthen the robustness of its input to all planning applications which affect golf provision.
– Lead on the integration of ‘traditional’ golf provision with new and alternative formats including indoor golf, short courses and driving ranges etc., enabling improvement to the mix of facilities nationally.
– Better identify non-membership and ‘nomadic’ pay and play based participation so that all types and formats of play are fully factored into the assessment of demand.
– Advocate/apply mitigation options to strengthen pathways into longer-term participation.
– Establish a clear framework for handling planning enquiries, determine ‘best practice’ and consider how golf needs assessments can be aligned to the NPPF, ANOG and Sport England’s Playing Fields Policy.
– Inform consultation with Sport England and LAs to identify golf provision that may currently be at risk.

Key to this is ensuring that local councils and other spatial planning authorities better understand golf provision in their area and the sporting and environmental benefits that it and its facilities bring to the community.

In taking on this assignment, KKP brings to the table its experience delivering similar, complex national facility strategies for other NGBs including, in recent years, the RFL, England Hockey, England Athletics and Badminton England. This is in addition to its current work (commissioned by London Sport and Sport England) to review and provide guidance about how to better protect and tackle issues associated with loss of access to, and the closure of, playing fields in the capital.

It also builds on the Company’s direct experience of assessing supply/demand for golf (utilised in delivery of more than 40 local authority facilities strategies) the wide range of golf-specific needs assessments delivered and its other work assessing, planning for, developing/improving the performance of, and supporting the protection and development of golf facilities. EG’s current approach will also be benchmarked with other NGBs to determine whether lessons can be learnt and improvements made.

Gavin Anderson at EG commented “we are delighted, with the support of Sport England, to be working with KKP on this strategy. It put forward the strongest case for developing a standardised methodology to establish a robust supply and demand framework and had the best track record delivering other similar projects for a variety of sports…it was also the best positioned agency when it came to tackling the more pressing need of developing the support frameworks required to ensure a more consistent and nationally recognised approach.’

Steve Wright, principal consultant and director is leading KKP’s project team. He commented: ‘KKP is proud to be entrusted with this vital work at a crucial time for the sport. We shall work closely with EG to ensure that it is best placed to both protect and develop golf facilities (of all forms) and to build its role and profile as the key source of authoritative supply/demand intelligence for key facilities planning processes’.

Steven Wright is available for interview. Please contact KKP via (0)161 764 7040 or email steve.wright@kkp.co.uk

Notes for editors

KKP is a leading UK-based multi-disciplinary national and international sports consultancy practice. It offers specialist advice and impartial, objective and creative support to a wide range of clients. This commission builds on our extensive track record in this field – which includes national and local indoor and outdoor built sports facilities, playing pitch and open spaces planning.

KKP’s golf needs assessment local authority client portfolio includes Blackburn-with-Darwen, Horsham, Leicester, Coventry, Solihull, Rushcliffe, Wakefield, Kirklees, St Helens, Sunderland, Blaby, South Ayrshire and the London Borough of Redbridge. We also deliver assessments for other planning consultancies and private sector clients – these include Arcadis, Wain Homes and Anwyl Homes.

More detail about KKP’s work, clients and projects is available at www.kkp.co.uk

 

Coventry is the most central and ninth largest city in England with a population of 361,000.  Its growth particularly among younger adults, in part parallels the expansion and success of the city’s two universities and the increasing numbers of better-paid jobs in certain sectors of the local economy.

It is a ‘Marmot City’, which means that partners and the Council are taking a whole systems approach to tackling health inequalities and to creating and developing healthy, sustainable places and communities. This strategy will set out the role that physical activity and sport can play in helping to address this.

Coventry has performed well relative to national trends and comparable towns and cities. However, while the situation in the City has improved notably when comparing its Indices of Multiple Deprivation position in 2015 and 2019 it still ranks between the 64th and 81st most deprived local authority area (out of 317) in England and 28 (14%) of the City’s 195 neighbourhoods are amongst the most deprived 10% in England. Levels of inactivity, obesity and ill health are challenging, and it ranks particularly high for income deprivation affecting children and older people (IDACI and IDOPI).

The current Coventry Sports Strategy and its Physical Activity Framework “Coventry on the Move” both run to 2024. The City Council is keen to develop a new overarching strategy which encompasses both elements and has commissioned KKP to support this process.

The Council is (and will be) via its multi-partner Strategy Development Group (SDG) working closely with a range of agencies to create and deliver the strategy. These include, among others, the City’s Public Health Service, CV Life (which operates all its main sporting facilities and cultural venues), Think Active (the active partnership for Coventry, Solihull and Warwickshire), the Positive Youth Foundation, the West Midlands Combined Authority and Sport England.

To initiate and inform the process, the SDG has collated and analysed national and local data. KKP will critique and build on this so that helps create a foundation for a robust strategy – one which will inform and drive physical activity and sport delivery, planning, accessibility and opportunity in the City over the next 5-10 years. Aligning to Sport England’s ‘Uniting the Movement’, the City Strategy will:

• Set a strategic framework vision, aims and objectives which align with CCC corporate plans, local public health and physical activity policies and objectives.
• Incorporate an action plan designed to ensure that impact is optimised – making a real difference tackling the City’s commitment to health inequalities in defined groups and in specific geographic areas.
• Specify required actions, particularly in relation to key target groups, and recommended KPIs – in a five-year action plan, schedule and ‘road map’ and associated monitoring framework.

In addition to drawing on KKP’s substantial experience in this area of work, the process will optimise the value and knowledge acquired via the Company’s delivery of a range of strategic facilities and services planning assignments with/for Coventry.

Cllr Kamran Caan, Cabinet Member for Public Health and Sport at Coventry City Council, said:

“We are delighted, with the support of Sport England, to be working with KKP on this strategy to build on the progress we’ve made over recent years. We are fully aware of the depth, breadth and quality of its work and welcome its support for our SDG, its review of what we do, where, why and how – and its delivery of the strategy consultation process in the City.

“This strategy isn’t just about sports facilities; it’s about making physical activity accessible for everyone in Coventry. By focusing on our communities and being smarter about where resources go, we can tackle health inequalities and make sure our city is moving forward together.”

Andrew Fawkes, principal consultant at KKP is leading KKP’s project team. He commented:

“It is great to be able to follow up our strategic facilities planning input in the City with this assignment. We shall be working closely with the SDG, Council and key agency staff and stakeholders to look at where and how its whole systems approach can be strengthened and analyse where and how resource can be best applied to deliver the physical activity and related health and social outcomes the City is looking for”.

Notes for editors

KKP is a specialist consultancy practice in the sport, physical activity, wellbeing and leisure field. Company sport/physical activity strategy clients include Westminster, Nottingham, Glasgow, Liverpool, Preston, Bury and Coventry itself. Over the last four years, we have produced comparable strategies for Birmingham, LB Bromley, Bridgend, Blackpool, St Helens, Wyre and the States of Jersey.

Our team brings specific expertise referencing/absorbing wider strategic contexts, analysing and supporting whole system and place-based approaches to strategy and action plan development. This encompasses steering/working group support, consultation (individual/focus groups/workshops) plus, proactively and reactively, identifying, defining and refining strategic themes and goals.

Andrew Fawkes is available for interview. Please contact KKP via (0)161 764 7040 or email andrew.fawkes@kkp.co.uk

Full details about KKP’s work, clients and projects are available at www.kkp.co.uk