The Promotion of Physical Health Among Young People

Part of 2. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 3:05 pm on 19 September 2018.

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Photo of Vaughan Gething Vaughan Gething Labour 3:05, 19 September 2018

I recognise the broad points you make and I don't think we'll find ourselves with any disagreement on the principles. I look forward to the committee's report, and you'll hear more from the Government over the course of this autumn. You know that we're committed, not just by legislation, but we've made public commitments about our new healthy weight strategy, available for consultation this autumn as well. The health budget of course has a role to play in the way we deploy resources in promoting physical activity and we are, after all, the largest employer in the country with over 90,000 directly employed staff within the service. So, we should be an exemplar ourselves about the opportunities that we provide and the messages we provide for our staff in their roles as employees, as well as their interaction with the population.

This is partly going back, if you like, to the important point about the broader cultural changes we need to see take place, and to renormalise areas of physical activity. And that does mean that we have to work across the Government with different portfolios, but actually to work with people in communities as well, and actually understand how we make physical activity easier for them to undertake, rather than saying, 'You should do this; it's a good thing for you to do'. We actually need to make it easier for them to do that as well. So, you'll hear more from the Government over the course of the autumn about what we propose to do, and I look forward to scrutiny and suggestions, indeed, about how we might choose to do that and, hopefully, achieve that in the most positive manner.