Select committee: Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee
Recommendation 20
Third Report - Concussion in sport
Published 22 Jul 2021
Paragraph 82
Addressed to Department for Culture, Media and Sport
Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee Concussion in sport All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
We are concerned that there is history of the Government looking into issues of sporting safety and failing to follow through with practical interventions that would Concussion in sport 33 make a difference to the safety and health of those participating. The reports of the 2002 Working Group and by Baroness Grey-Thompson in 2017 both suggested ways to address the issue of concussion in sport and yet the Government has not progressed these. We urge the Government to grasp the nettle this time, move past the concerns about how regulation may change sports, and take real and effective action.
From: Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee, Third Report - Concussion in sport (HC 46), paragraph 82, 22 July 2021
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 10 December 2021 (deadline 3 December 2021).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government states that the Committee's recommendations "largely align with the Government's own ambitions", agreeing with some in full and in part, and setting out its own action plan.
- On a UK-wide concussion protocol, the government "agrees with this recommendation", saying the four home nations have "agreed in principle" to develop shared protocols based on the Scotland model, with completion expected by the end of 2022.
- On a single research fund, it agrees with the intention but does not "believe it is necessary" because medical research funds already exist; it will instead convene a "sports concussion research forum".
- On a national injury reporting framework run by the Health and Safety Executive, it "agrees in part", saying other organisations are "better placed" to collate the information, and that it "will look into the feasibility of a national register of concussion incidents".
- It sets timed actions: the research forum to be convened "by the end of January 2022", Oxford study findings "by the end of March 2022", and shared protocols completed with communication started "by summer 2022".