Child’s play is a public health issue, so why is England so far behind?

 

Fast-forward 15 years and over 430 playgrounds in England have closed since 2012; 32 per cent of children under nine do not live within a 10-minute walk of a playground; and reports show existing playgrounds are in increasing states of disrepair. 

But play does not just mean a square-metre allocation of designated playground. It is about understanding the full gamut of informal and formal opportunities for play within a neighbourhood. Just having the space isn’t enough. Children need the time and permission to use it. A “playable landscape” is what experts strive for – a whole web of child-friendly routes and play opportunities from the doorstep and as you move around your neighbourhood.  

“One of the key principles for play sufficiency is spatial justice for children,” says Russell. “It’s about the politics of space, and the bottom line is that currently cars are seen as more important than children. The presence of cars on residential streets – parked and moving – has had such a fundamental effect on communities and children’s lives. And electric vehicles will do nothing to solve those issues.” 

 

The health benefits to outdoor play are manifold: mental health, social connections, belonging, self-efficacy as well as physical health and strength, adaptability, resilience and emotional regulation. Play consultants and researchers Ben Tawil and Mike Barclay of Ludicology even call it a population health issue which takes in “the broader social determinants of health, recognising that our health is shaped by the communities we live in, the services we access and the decisions made by local and national governments”.  

Ludicology and Russell’s recent report Playing and Being Well summarises this evidence, demonstrating: “Play isn’t a triviality. Play is an essential protective factor in children’s wellbeing and that of wider society.” 

When asked about the digital shift and concern over children’s increasing dependence on electronic devices, they are clear: “This isn’t the cause of diminished outdoor play – it’s a symptom.” 

The experts leading the Raising the National Play Commission also conclude that the increase in screentime is partially driven by the loss of safe access to places and spaces to play.

Russell adds: “One of the changes in children’s play patterns is that there’s much less that kids can do for free and much more that can be paid for, such as soft-play centres, laser centres and escape rooms, those ‘pay for play’ places which are beyond the pocket of a lot of families – families that don’t have gardens, are already living in cramped accommodation, don’t have a neighbourhood street that’s easy to access. All these things affect poor children far more than any others.”

 

 

It will have taken Scotland 20 years since play sufficiency legislation was first discussed in the noughties to the first assessments being complete in 2027. England’s development industry cannot and must not wait for play sufficiency legislation to come into play before innovating to make new and existing developments more child-friendly.  

At the moment, play requirements outside London are still based on the 1956 “six acre standard” which calls for just 0.25 sq m of equipped play space per 1,000 people. Fields in Trust, a charity working to protect parks and green spaces, has codified these as local areas for play, local equipped areas for play and neighbourhood equipped areas for play – or LAPs, LEAPs and NEAPs. In higher-density areas like London, the guidelines are a bit more detailed, but they still focus on square metres, age-appropriate equipment and simplified distance-measures, rather than considering how children will actually move through and experience the space. Play on the doorstep is not a target. 

 

The paradox is that those who need play the most – children – hold the least power. They don’t vote or drive the economy, yet everyone suffers if they are ignored. The places that do incorporate play strongly – such as On The Way Play SK in Stockport, Marmalade Lane in Cambridge and the Gascoigne Estate in Barking – show that all ages benefit from a child-friendly approach. 

 
But we need more than feel-good stories. To make meaningful change, we need better post-occupancy evaluations (hearing children’s voices) and play sufficiency assessments. In Wales, there’s been progress, but even after four rounds of assessment, the positive outcomes aren’t fully articulated. 

 

For all the nostalgia about children’s freedom to roam in generations previous, we can act now in constructive ways to galvanise a new freedom in today’s urban settings. 

“We have to find out where play is happening because in some places it is,” says architect Dinah Bornat. “The narrative that it doesn’t happen anymore is unhelpful.” Her book All to Play For offers ways to analyse spaces using heat maps and post-occupancy insights. She calls for a broader view of play that extends beyond just the development boundary. 

“Developers should look beyond the red line and think of children’s movement in their local area,” she says. “Where are the schools? How do children get to them? Where can they play on the way home? It’s time for a more holistic approach to high-density housing, as part of a city fabric which supports children and young people’s everyday life.” 

Even a “light-touch” play sufficiency assessment by Tower Hamlets Council, east London, has helped give the local authority teeth to insist on this broader view. The council opted to run a play-space audit of the borough, mapping the quantity, quality and value of existing play provision. Its play programme manager, Kevin Siaw, describes how this has helped Tower Hamlets lead its own play agenda so that when proposed developments come to it, it understands conversations around play quotas better, and how each development might be able to better support or connect with existing play spaces nearby.  

As a purely spatial audit, this is only one step in a full play-sufficiency assessment, but even this is proving beneficial in empowering the local authority to demand the “most-sufficient” play strategies. 

“Most developments’ idea of play space is very limited,” says Siaw “They put catalogue play equipment on some safety surfacing. There’s a lot of education that needs to happen around play.”   

Unusually, Tower Hamlets positioned Siaw within the public health team. “It was a good fit for play to sit,” he says. “It’s been kicked around a bit over the years – in sport or education– but it needs its own place because people don’t know enough about what play means. I helped to build a plan on how to use play in different departments, and the health benefits it brings.”  

 

 

Despite no legislation for play in England, other local authorities, such as Leeds and Sandwell, have also taken on dedicated “play champion” roles. Leeds is the first local authority in England to determinedly implement a full play sufficiency assessment. The council’s play strategy officer, Jenny Rutherford, talks of how anecdotal conversations about play didn’t hold much evidential weight, but play sufficiency has “catalysed partnerships” and put the voices of children and families “front and centre” of strategic discussions. 

“Play is everybody’s business,” she says. “It’s the whole system coming together to think ‘how do the actions I take and decisions I make impact upon play?’ I am not a highways engineer or a planner, I don’t know how to influence that kind of system in order to innovate it to improve children’s opportunities to play. As more people start to look through the lens of play, it becomes a really powerful thing.”  

Bornat’s book shows that in high-density urban schemes, achieving the play square-metre quota is a challenge and a “courtyard” scheme doesn’t necessarily mean children will “play out” or that they will have equal access or usage. Visual connections, overlooking and routes through are all critical, as is management. Bornat looks at ways developers have addressed the long-term management of a housing estate from the outset, such as Urban Splash’s “10-point manifesto” at Port Loop in Birmingham, with point 2: “Play out ’til tea”.   

 

Evidence shows that nuisance and anti-social behaviour concerns are critical to a space’s success and the perceived use of it. One in three parents are said to stop kids playing out due to nuisance to others. To fend off nuisance, “no ball games” signs adorn housing estates as well as any slightly ambiguous space. This is a huge contributor to teenagers in particular feeling they don’t have permission to play. Campaigns are underway to remove these signs, and a recent “more ball games” campaign by London Sport goes one better, fixing basketball hoops beneath “no ball games” signs.  

 

 

While policy may be dragging its feet, grassroot movements like these are picking up pace to have real impact. Playing Out, an organisation set up by parents and residents in Bristol, campaigning for temporary street closures to allow children to play outside their homes, has led to 1,650 street communities “playing out” in 100-plus different local authority areas across the UK since 2009, with the numbers continually increasing.  

Adventure playgrounds – not to be confused with playgrounds that are a bit more adventurous than the norm – are a distinct place for free, unstructured, outdoor play. The first was established in 1948. They foster independent play supervised by a dedicated playworker, with tools and materials for children to build their own structures within them. 

There are currently 126 adventure playgrounds in the UK but more than 25 have closed in the past few years. Investment in both adventure playgrounds and playworkers has plummeted with local government budgets, and rarely do developments choose to incorporate them. 

Clarion is still the first and only housing association to build one within a housing estate (2010 at Roman Road, Tower Hamlets). Siaw, who was Clarion’s adventure playground manager at the time, talks of the importance of the process to its long-term success. “Rather than what it looks like,” he says, “whatever you’re building has to be for the public it serves, so they have ownership and input, having things done with them not to them.”

 

 

In recent years there has been a much-needed shift in emphasis to engaging with young people during the design process. But this engagement doesn’t always carry through to development outcomes, perhaps due to a lack of joined-up thinking across development departments.

“There’s a recognition of play from a housing management perspective,” says Bornat, “and examples of where this can be quite positive and nuanced. But even then it doesn’t connect up with their own development teams. The two are talking very different languages.” 

In March this year, the government announced a reduction in statutory consultees on planning applications to streamline the process. Sports England was among those removed, which will undoubtedly have a further impact on the scrutiny of schemes from an active, outdoor play perspective. But Play England seems positive that the Labour government will implement a national play strategy, underpinned by play sufficiency legislation under the Department for Culture, Media and Sport – although some campaigners suggest it would have more weight under the Department for Housing, Communities and Local Government.  

 

Housing development in the UK is largely led by what the market demands, with planners and policy being a line of defence in that process. “In a market-driven environment, we can’t rely on policy alone,” says Play England chief executive Eugene Minogue. “We need to be raising expectations across the board, requiring developers to demonstrate not just space for play, but a meaningful strategy for enabling play, underpinned by a societal acceptance of play.” 

TOWN’s Anstead adds: “There is a lack of expectation on developers to engage with the needs of children and young people in a nuanced and qualitative way. They are encouraged to adopt a tick-box approach that reduces the needs of children into the provision of play areas that are cheap, simple to incorporate into standard housing estate layouts and quick and easy to deliver – despite this approach falling short of genuinely supporting children’s play, development and independence.”  

A year on from the parliamentary inquiry (which was halted due to the general election), Anstead says the conversation is growing in the industry but has yet to turn into consistent action. “The path remains the norm because it aligns with the standard incentives and regulatory frameworks that shape most new housing development,” he says. “Planning policy must treat children’s needs as a fundamental requirement, not a bolt-on."

“Play sufficiency legislation is a start, but what’s needed is a policy hierarchy where questions like ‘how can children move around this place independently and safely?’ are asked before the waste management strategy is signed off. Local authorities should be empowered – and expected – to require this of developers.”  

 

 

The Town and Country Planning Association has captured the evidence from the 2024 inquiry in a recent report named after Keir Starmer’s ambition to raise “the healthiest generation in history”. The Raising the Nation Play Commission’s interim report similarly concluded: “Above all, a culture which, at best, is ambivalent towards children’s needs and, at worst, is actively hostile towards them, has embedded itself in communities and the policy that shapes them.” 

The development industry needs to strive for more than the ambivalent or sufficient – it needs to innovate and push boundaries, and shout about it. 

 

Harriet Saddington is a writer and architect with a background degree in architectural history who works with architecture practices and developers with a focus on social impact

 

Find out more: 

All to Play For: Yes ball games! At Festival of Place, 2 July: Dinah Bornat gives a talk about her new book All to Play For, which brings together research about housing that supports childhood with panel Simon Battisti, Creative Director, Start with Children Summit; Jonny Anstead, Founding Director, TOWN; and Marie Williams, CEO, Dream Networks. Visit Festival of Place to register for the event.