As part of measures to control the COVID-19 pandemic, sports facilities were closed multiple times by the government. During the pandemic, Sport England distributed £271 million to the grassroots sport and physical activity in financial support and the Department provided £700 million for organisations affected by the loss of spectator ticket income and for public leisure centres.48 We asked what had been the impact of this funding, given that participation rates had not increased during this period. Sport England told us that the funding was emergency funding to enable the sector to survive the pandemic rather than to support increase in activity levels, and that it considered the funding to have been “absolutely necessary”49. The Department told us that over 1,600 organisations had benefited from the sport survival package, and that no club that received funding went into administration during the pandemic.50