After you read the linked article you may want to read the Commons debate of the Foresight Review of Obesity Report and here is the report itself.

"One of the easiest and most enjoyable forms of taking exercise is swimming and yet all over the country public swimming pools are still closing down. A few are being replaced, but usually with a smaller pool, and many of the old swimming baths with two pools have ended up with just one.

Yet, according to the Government's own strategy report on sport, swimming has the third highest retention rate in terms of post-teenage activity – and thus an important recreational activity to combat obesity. So you would think that swimming in schools would be encouraged.

Yet in my own area of London, Stockwell Park School, which already has a 25 metre swimming pool, is going to be totally rebuilt with money from the Building Schools for the Future fund – minus its pool. To the surprise of the community Lambeth Council says the government guidelines don't specify a swimming pool as being necessary and there isn't enough money. Schools Minister Jim Knight in a written answer to me said that it is up to the local authority to decide whether to replace the pool."

(Via The Daily Telegraph Obesity policy can either sink or swim: .)

Go straight to the comments on her article and have your say.

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| press and publicity | 30 October 2007; 2:06:03 PM |# | | |