Paul Lindley OBE is an award-winning British entrepreneur, social campaigner and best-selling author. In 2006 he founded Ella’s Kitchen, the UK’s largest baby food brand. In 2018 he was appointed Chair of London’s Child Obesity Taskforce by Sadiq Khan, Mayor of London, and was appointed Chancellor of the University of Reading in 2022. In 2019 he founded just IMAGINE if… a biennial innovation competition supporting entrepreneurial ideas addressing global challenges. He is Chair of Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights UK, sits on the board of environmental beer brand Toast Ale and is a Trustee of Sesame Workshop, the creators of Sesame Street. His first book, Little Wins: The Huge Power of Thinking Like a Toddler was published in 2017.
Paul’s recent book, Raising the Nation, drew together co-authors from across academia, charities, business, and politics to share ideas that could transform life chances for children. The two-year project of researching and writing the book highlighted the huge importance of play and underlined how supporting and encouraging children to play has become a neglected policy area, to the detriment of children’s health, wellbeing, education, learning, and social skills.
“Play is a crucial and innate part of childhood. Play is how children explore who they are, how they relate to others, and how they make sense of the world. It is one of the most powerful tools we have to boost children’s physical activity, wellbeing, and confidence. Yet as this report shows, in England we’ve made it incredibly hard for children to play.
“We have visited countries where children’s play is at the heart of government strategy – embedded across education, health, local government and beyond - because it is seen as the central fabric of life. All of this is within our grasp in this country, but England needs a National Play Strategy to make it happen.
“Creating truly playful communities is not just about better street design, traffic management, and reduced crime, but also about a reversal of the growing culture of intolerance towards children playing.
“This will also encourage more parents to have confidence they can let their children play out more freely, in the knowledge that their children will be both having a great time and are also safe.
“We need to give our children back the time, space, opportunity, freedom - and the right - to play again. ’Everything to Play For’ sets out a bold and necessary vision and framework to restore play to the heart of childhood in England. We urge this mission-led Government to act upon it.”
“Too many of our children are spending their most precious years sedentary, doom scrolling on their phones and often alone, while their health and wellbeing deteriorates. It is no coincidence that the least happy generation, the generation with the highest rates of obesity and rising ill health, is the generation that plays less and less.
“As we have heard from a swathe of experts and professionals working with children over the last year, play is being squeezed out of childhoods, with drastic implications for children, our economy and public services. With so much at stake children really have everything to play for: their health, wellbeing, happiness, learning, and development depends on our ability to reignite the role of play.
“This report provides a blueprint for how we can get children playing again and also tackle the scourge of addictive doom-scrolling, so we can prevent future generations from becoming glued to screens.”
Many children and young people in are living with enormous challenges around poverty, mental health, and obesity. The digital world, increase in traffic, poor planning, changing nature of our communities and public spaces, and the dramatic reduction in the availability of safe areas to play, have changed children’s experiences of childhood.
Although research consistently shows how play improves learning and social and physical development, children are now spending 50% less time on unstructured outdoor play than they did in the 1970s.
There has been a loss of free play and active outdoor play initiated and directed by children themselves. Children are far less likely to play for hours each day, burning calories, learning social and creative skills, discovering the world around them and sometimes just letting off steam.
We need to give children their childhood back. That is why we have launched the year-long Play Commission to develop a national play plan that shapes future government policy.
It is time to prioritise safe, playful spaces, teach teachers to play, ensure school days have plentiful playtime, and put forward a raft of other ideas to encourage thriving childhoods - and a thriving nation.
The Raising the Nation Play Commission has brought together experts from the world of play, academia, children’s rights, education, and communities as commissioners and advisors, seeking expertise and evidence and providing a platform for thought leadership events, parliamentary engagement, and visits to identify the leading practice in the field.
A national panel of experts and leaders informed the work of the Commission, combining personal and professional insight and understanding of children’s play and the impact on the lives of young people and communities. Our panel included academics, psychologists, child development experts, local and central government experts, economists, and business leaders.
The Commissioners met throughout the year to provide advice, as well as taking part in a series of evidence sessions.
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