Active Lincolnshire invited partner organisations and stakeholders from across the county to come together for this event. Over 60 people joined us at ‘Active Arena’ in Lincoln on Tuesday 21 September.

Sport England have recently launched the national Uniting the Movement ten year strategy and we were delighted to invite Mike Diaper, Executive Director at Sport England to come to Lincolnshire to present the strategy. Sport England provide funding to Active Lincolnshire as one of the national network of Active Partnerships to deliver the strategy locally.

There is a significant opportunity in Lincolnshire for us to come together as system partners to understand what it means to Unite the Movement in Lincolnshire, to tackle the local challenge of inactivity and inequalities. This event provided a starting point for our collaboration, for conversations and for us to build understanding and trust providing a base for innovative collaboration and co-design of opportunities that will help tackle the challenge of inactivity and bring significant benefits to the population of Lincolnshire.

Scott Hartley from Press Red presented recent data and insight about activity levels across the county – and he explained how important activities such as walking are, and how in Lincolnshire some of the key challenges we face are with older adults and in areas of deprivation. You can see more of the insight Active Lincolnshire have commissioned here.

Ian Fytche, Chief Executive of North Kesteven District Council presented the work the District have been leading on to provide more options for residents to be active; including providing relevant leisure services but also importantly developing accessible products around the District such as well waymarked walking routes. Ian posed the question to the audience, ‘can we crack it this time?’.

On behalf of Active Lincolnshire I talked about our changing approach, our commitment to being system leaders; advocating for the positive power of sport and physical activity and our role as enablers and influencers. Changes in the system, in policies, in partnerships, in our collective approach to the decisions that are made about the places we live in will all impact on people’s ability to be active every day.

Let’s Move Lincolnshire is the countywide vehicle for our shared approach to inactivity, Active Lincolnshire will continue to facilitate the development of the refreshed strategy, providing a framework for everyone for collaboration, leadership and change around this agenda.

Active Arena, the host venue is living the vision of advocating for the positive power of sport – providing sessions with professionals supporting men with mental health issues combined with time on the indoor football pitch, a sensory movement room for people with learning disabilities and pre and post-natal classes for parents.

Active Lincolnshire are committed to playing our part in tackling the challenge of inactivity with a focus on inequalities and we will continue to work with you to find opportunities and areas for greatest impact and meaningful, long term transformational change.

You can listen to the event and view the presentation here.