Creating Active Communities 2017

Andrew Honeyman

Head of Sport, Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport

'Andrew Honeyman has been Head of Sport at the Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport since May 2017. Before that he was Head of Health, Workforce and Diversity in the sports team from March 2015 and worked on the production and implementation of the government's sports strategy 'Sporting Future: A New Strategy for an Active Nation'. He has worked in DCMS since 2009, managing the cross-government legacy programme from the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Before joining DCMS, Andrew has worked in various policy roles in the Home Office and Association of Police Authorities.

In his spare time, Andrew enjoys running and watching all sport.'

Morning Plenary Session 1: A Whole Council Approach to Increasing Activity

Main Plenary Address

9:15 - 9:35

Mike Diaper
Exec Director Children, Young People and Tackling Inactivity
Sport England

Mike joined Sport England in November 2006 and heads the Community Sport Directorate. His directorate is focused on: Getting more children active by investing in school sport through the Primary School Sport Premium. Encouraging and keeping people exercising by investing in local sport. Supporting underprivileged young people to get active through programmes like Get on Track, delivered by the Dame Kelly Holmes Legacy Trust and Greenhouse's sports programme Working with colleges and universities to create more opportunities for 16 - 25-year-olds to play sport. Leading our youth programmes, including satellite clubs and Sportivate. Tackling inactivity by getting people into sport and exercise. Making sure investment in sport continues by working to influence local authorities and partners' policies. Mike joined Sport England from central government where he worked across the Departments for Education and Skills and for Culture, Media and Sport, leading the PE, School Sport and Club Links strategy. During this time he also helped forge international school links between schools in Manchester and Omsk in Siberia where he still volunteers. He was awarded an OBE in the 2007 Queen's Birthday Honours for service to school sport.

Georgie Delaney
Managing Director
The Great Outdoor Gym Company

Georgie Delaney is the Co-Founder and Managing Director of The Great Outdoor Gym Company, (TGO) the UK pioneer of outdoor gyms. Georgie is responsible for advancing TGO's mission, which is to drive up physical activity, increase wellbeing and promote climate action - to solve health, wellbeing and sustainability challenges of communities worldwide. As the market leader, TGO has over 800 free to use outdoor gym installations, from London's Olympic Park to Sydney's Randwick coastal walk. Georgie is a social entrepreneur placing a higher value on social impact than company profit and she is a firm believer that ethical business can change the World. Her background is in design. In 2004, she qualified with a 1st Class Honours Degree in Industrial Design with Italian from University College London and Milan Politecnico, where her specialisms included city communications, product design, web design and park design. As an entrepreneur, Georgie applied these skills to designing the greenest, safest and strongest outdoor gyms in the World, which are made in Britain to rigorous safety and quality specifications. Before founding TGO in 2007, Georgie worked in Sport England's communications team, where she was involved in the national fitness campaign Everyday Sport and she supported projects including the Olympic legacy bid and online communication tools. Over the past 10 years, Georgie and the TGO Board have delivered many outdoor fitness innovations, including; Hundreds of partnerships with councils, schools, universities, health partners, employers and housing associations The intervention and roll out of TGO Green Gym technology, where users generate electricity as they work out Designing and installing for the United Nations at COP22 in Marrakech, the global climate change conference The design and national roll-out of adiZone outdoor fitness spaces, part of Adidas's sponsorship of the London 2012 Olympics Moving TGO product design and manufacturing from the Far East to the UK, to offer the greenest, safest and strongest outdoor gyms The development and implementation of outdoor gym safety standards

Mr Adrian Turner
Director
Total Swimming

Andrew Boyd MRCGP
RCGP Clinical Priority Lead, Physical Activity & Lifestyle
Public Health England

Dr Andrew Boyd – RCGP Clinical Champion for Physical Activity and Lifestyle Andrew is a GP in south London, with experience in medical education and leadership. He has a particular interest in the vital role physical activity plays in the context of health and wellbeing. He teaches doctors as part of the PHE Clinical Champions programme and has recently been appointed as joint national lead for the RCGP ‘Physical Activity & Lifestyle’ clinical priority. The team aims to educate and empower GPs nationwide to motivate all of their patients to get more active, through effective partnerships within their community and is developing an online Toolkit, and the Active Practice initiative, to be launched later this year.

Colin Buttery
Director of Open Spaces
City of London Corporation

Colin Buttery is the new Director of Open Spaces at The City of London has taken up the post in March 2017. His remit involves managing the protection and conservation of The City of London's green spaces in London and south-east England with over 4,500 hectares of land, including National Nature Reserves, Sites of Special Scientific Interest and a range of Listed Landscapes. He is also responsible for a number of heritage assets in the Square Mile including Tower Bridge and the Monument. Previously Colin was the Director of Parks and Deputy Chief Executive of The Royal Parks for 12 years and has been involved in conservation land management for over 30 years. He has worked for the National Trust and Woodland Trust in a range of land management roles and the London boroughs of Bromley and the City of Westminster where he had responsibility for parks, cemeteries, tree management, leisure centres and a range of community facilities. Colin is an ambassador for environmental charity Keep Britain Tidy and a member of the Forestry Commission's London Region Forest and Woodlands Advisory Committee and the Oak Processionary Moth Advisory Group.

Helen Griffiths
Chief Executive
Fields in Trust London office (National Playing Fields Association)

Helen Griffiths is Chief Executive of Fields in Trust, a national charity working to improve the protection, provision and quality of outdoor recreational spaces for all communities in the UK. Helen joined the charity in 2008 and delivered the Queen Elizabeth II Fields challenge – a nationwide programme to create a grassroots legacy from the Diamond Jubilee and London 2012 Olympics. She took over as ...

Mr Richard Tisdall
Managing Director
Tisdall Associates Limited

As Director of Tisdall Associates with Health Parks, Richard draws from experience and qualifications in Landscape Design, Public Health and the Environment. He brings a unique perspective as to the value given to Parks and Green Spaces when used alongside Public Health initiatives and Social Prescribing. With an understanding of the importance of evidence-based solutions, and the need to address avoidable medical and mental conditions, Richard has been at the forefront of innovative cross-cutting developments to optimise the use of Parks, Green Spaces and the natural environment within the context of Primary Prevention, providing practical solutions to optimising the use of parks for health and wellbeing.

Esther Watts
Senior Officer Dementia Friendly Communities - London
Alzheimer’s Society

Rupert Furness
Deputy Director Active and Accessible Travel Division
Department for Transport

Rupert Furness is the head of the Active and Accessible Travel team in the UK Department for Transport, where he is responsible for advising Ministers on policies to promote walking and cycling, as well as on how best to ensure that transport is genuinely accessible to all users. His previous posts in the Department for Transport have included heading the London Transport team, heading the Environment Strategy team, and managing the implementation of the UK's Renewable Transport Fuel Obligation Before joining the DfT in 2003, he worked for a number of other Government Departments including the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, and the Cabinet Office.

James DeMountfort
Chief Commercial Officer
U Scout For

James De Mountfort has held previous roles including Director of Performance at RedBull F1 through its golden period winning 4 constructors and four driver championships, consultant to Porsche LMP1 winning Le Mans and WEC Championship and Audi DTM, NFL, EPL and Championship Football and Finnish NHL, prior to that he worked with the Ghurkas in Brunei. James consults in his area of specialism; creating elite performing c ...

Yvonne Harrison
Managing Director
Project `92

Yvonne was appointed as Managing Director of Project 92 in March 2018, after leading Greater Manchester Charity, GreaterSport, as their Chief Executive for four years. Having spent over fifteen years within the sport and physical activity landscape, Yvonne has a wealth of experience across the sector incorporating strategic development, relationship management, finance, business planning and communications. Yvonne has been a key driver to galvanize the Greater Manchester network to produce Greater Manchester Moving, the blueprint for physical activity and sport across the City Region, as Greater Manchester trailblazes with radical reform of the health and social care system through devolution and begins to implement Sport England’s local delivery pilot. Yvonne led GreaterSport to multiple awards, before leaving to embark on a new challenge, working with the ‘Class of 92’ across their sport and education portfolio, which includes the brand new University venture UA92 in Trafford. Yvonne joined the Board of Why Sports Media Group in 2017 following a positive working relationship with the Founders and recognising the contribution she could make through her experience and network. Yvonne is enjoying helping the social enterprise realise its objectives and ensuring customers of Why Sports experience great content, networking and cutting edge thinking through the series of conferences and panel debates delivered.

Mark Steward
Managing Director
Max Associates

Managing Director of MAX Associates, Mark has over 30 years' experience of public sector management and service delivery. His experience is wide-ranging and includes over 16 years consultancy experience working for a variety of London, District, Borough and Unitary Authorities. Mark is at the forefront of investigating and demonstrating the social, economic and community benefits of sport, leisure and cultural provision. Mark has an exceptional background in this field having previously project managed the largest sport, leisure and culture procurement process across the UK for The London Borough of Hounslow. Scope of services included sport and leisure facilities, libraries, open spaces, arts, heritage and children's play. This process has led to significant revenue savings for the council whilst levering in prudential borrowing investment to redevelop the sports, leisure and library portfolios. This also ensured significant increases in participation across all groups within the community. Mark also assisted Southampton City Council in the procurement and mobilisation of both a leisure management operator and a golf course operator. Due to the success of the project, Mark was asked to advise and manage the mobilisation phase of the projects and provide interim project support for a period of 8 months. He has recently completed the Bath and North East Somerset procurement process for sports facilities and supported through the transfer and contract start-up. He is currently assisting North Devon Council, Reading Borough Council and Exeter City Council with the procurement of a leisure management partner. Mark previously advised The City of Edinburgh Council on the strategic review and options for future delivery of sport and leisure provision across the capital. Mark provides continued professional development (CPD) for the sport and leisure industry in sport and leisure procurement and alternative models of service delivery. He has extensive experience of working with Members and senior officers in previous local government roles and has been responsible for policy and development, client monitoring and contract performance.

Adam Whitehead
Senior Team Member
Dame Kelly Holmes Trust

As the Head of the Learning Design, I'm responsible for leading the strategy and development of the athlete area at the Trust. This includes both the training and development programme, which I'm proud to say has supported over 800 world-class athletes since 2008. I also manage the other members of the Athlete Team, who are all former world-class athletes themselves. I retired from an international swimming career in 2006 and found it incredibly difficult to find what to do next with my life. I was fortunate to get introduced to the Trust in 2007 and received world-class support and development from them, I know the impact the Trust made on me and want every world-class athlete to have the same opportunity. The most rewarding part of my job is supporting athletes through difficult periods within their own lives and seeing them flourish in new roles or careers. My background is training and development and I have written programmes that we now deliver at the Trust as well as for other organisations previously. I have worked my way up from being an athlete mentor, trainer, assessor and manager to the role I am currently in. I'm proud to be an example of an athlete who is More Than a Medal. I enjoy fishing, socialising and walking my dog. I have recently learnt how to mix electronic music, which keeps me learning and developing a new interest. In my swimming career, I'm very proud that I was European and Commonwealth Champion and swam at the Olympics in the year 2000. But I'm most proud of the relationships I have built and the people I have supported with their own dreams and aspirations.

Andrew Honeyman
Head of Sport
Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport

Ben Wilkins
Head of Community Development
Oomph! Wellness

Ben Wilkins is an Osteopath and post-grad in Musculoskeletal Science at Oxford University. He is Head of Community Development at Oomph! Wellness and the founder and Clinical Director of Fluid Motion, a community aquatic rehabilitation service based in Oxford. His work and research focus on community health programmes involving older adults and musculoskeletal health.

Mr Dean Hill
Head of Active Cities
The Great Outdoor Gym Company

Jane Ashworth
CEO
Street Games UK Ltd

Working in close cooperation with the Board of Trustees, Jane guides StreetGames to harvest the benefits of sport to disadvantaged communities. Prior to co-founding StreetGames, Jane worked for Sport England for ten years including 4 years spent in the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister bringing together sport with community regeneration policy. She also worked for the Community Strategy Units of Salford and Newcastle City Councils and managed the Youth and Community Service in Kirby. Jane was awarded the OBE for services to community sport in HM The Queens's Birthday Honours List in June 2011.

Tony Leach
Chief Executive
Parks for London

Tony Leach, BSc (Hons), Dip LA, MBA, CMLI, FCIHor Tony Leach is Chief Executive for the Charity Parks for London. He trained as a horticulturist and landscape architect and worked in four London Boroughs over a period of eighteen years. His interest in people, project management and business development led him to lead a variety of urban regeneration projects and teams. In 1999 he set up an independent business consultancy specialising in management and business development. Since 2004 he has led Parks for London, an independent charity that safeguards London’s parks and green spaces. He works with the people that manage, maintain and enjoy parks; keeping them thriving, accessible, safe and beautiful places. He has been a Governor of Capel Manor College since 2008 and a member of the RHS Education Committee since 2013. See https://www.linkedin.com/in/tonyleach1/ for more information.

Speaker Profiles

Andrew Honeyman

Head of Sport, Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport