Building a sporting legacy: Sir Keith Mills with youngsters outside the Olympic Stadium in East London W
hen the London 2012 bid team, led by Lord Sebastian Coe and Sir Keith Mills, went to Singapore in 2005
to bid for the right to host the 2012 Olympic Games in London, they took 35 young people from East London with them. “Why are they here?” said Lord Coe, as he spoke passionately to the International Olympic Committee delegates in the room. “It’s because we’re serious about inspiring young people. Choose London today and you send a clear message to the youth of the world: the Olympic Games is for you.” Fast-forward eight years and I’m
meeting Sir Keith Mills in London to talk about how that promise is being kept. With him is Adam Parr, former Williams F1 CEO and now chief executive of Sported, a charity set up to ensure a lasting legacy for the UK’s youth. Specifically, Sported uses sport to change young people’s lives in disadvantaged areas of the UK, supporting grassroots clubs and organisations that use sport to create social change in their communities. Both Mills and Parr are absolutely
convinced of the power of sport to change the lives of young people, and they’ve been backed up by recent research from the Sported Foundation. This research has found that, by using
November/December 2013 © Cybertrek 2013
sport as an intervention to tackle social problems, £4,000 can be saved per young person per year. With 2.5 million young people living in areas of deprivation in the UK, this could add up to billions of pounds. “Sport helps young people in several
“The people who run these organisations are
inspirational. They’re not just referees or coaches”
ways,” says Parr. “Firstly, the young people we’re dealing with don’t necessarily have a great structure around them, and sport can provide a framework for their lives. Secondly, it provides a physical place where they can go and be safe and have people around them who want to be there. Thirdly, the people who run these organisations are inspirational. They’re not just referees or coaches; they play a huge part in these young people’s lives.”
GETTING STARTED
“It all started when we were developing the bid,” explains Mills, who became CEO of the London 2012 bid committee in September 2003 having been approached for his strong business credentials – he had 20 years’ marketing experience and is the creator of Air Miles and Nectar. “We needed to get closer to the communities in East London, because
that’s where the Olympic Park was being built. Together with the local authority, we hired coaches, booked halls and playing fields and started to run sporting activities for the local kids. The borough and the local police reported a huge impact, because it gave the kids something to do in the evenings. It got them off the streets and engaged in something positive.” But there was still much to be done
if the London 2012 bid team’s promise of ‘inspiring a generation’ was to be delivered. After realising there was nothing of significance in the sport for development sector taking place in the UK, Mills decided to establish Sported as a personal initiative, using £10m of his own money. He recruited Jo Stocks to lead it, and asked her to spend six months looking at the UK sports sector and working out where the gaps were. Stocks found there was a whole
sector that was using sport not just for participation, but as a means to help young people. “There were
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