Free-range spirit

Catherine Prisk is anxious to find a green backdrop for her photo shoot. Play England promotes outdoor play, but its offices at the National Children’s Bureau (NCB) in central London are brick-heavy, and a patch of grass opposite is tainted, ironically, by an ominous “no ball games” sign.

Charlie, her small terrier, accompanies her on her canal-side walk to work on Fridays, and today is a Friday. He shivers and looks dispirited by the brisk autumnal day. But his owner shrugs and smiles. “It’s good to be outside,” she insists.

A year has passed since Prisk was appointed director of Play England, after her predecessor Adrian Voce stood down. During that time, the sector has been struggling with cuts to services and increasing concerns about children’s lack of connection to the natural world.

Behind the scenes, Prisk has been working to achieve independent status for the organisation, in a bid to raise the profile of play across the country. Currently hosted by the NCB, Play England was recently inaugurated as a company limited by guarantee. She expects it to gain its own charity number within two years.

Independent voice

“It’s a pride thing,” says Prisk. “The other three nations have independent organisations campaigning for children’s freedom to play. In England we want to have an independent voice for children’s play that can talk on the platforms of planning, housing, education and childcare.”

Prisk’s pride in Play England’s achievements is evident as she explains how the organisation recovered from losing millions of pounds of funding after the change of government.

Under Labour and Every Child Matters, Play England was the strategic partner for the national play strategy. But the advent of the coalition meant a change in tack and a repositioning of the organisation’s strategy to focus on the big society. The organisation secured Cabinet Office social action funding last year. “Play England put together a programme with 17 partners providing £3.5m of match funding to generate more than 20,000 volunteers in an 18-month period,” says Prisk. “We’re three quarters of the way there already and only eight months in.”

Prisk joined Play England four years ago to lead the Playshaper programme, which brings local agencies together to create child-friendly communities and enable more children to play in public spaces.

She says that the joint working that lies at the heart of Playshaper is what she does best, adding that her affinity for teamwork began at school, as a member of a Javanese gamelan percussion orchestra.

“Playing gamelan always taught me about teamwork, because the point of the gamelan is that no one instrument is important,” she says.

Her career has consistently involved children and communities. After seven years in the teaching profession, she took up a post at the now dissolved South West Regional Development Agency, focusing on skills and development.

Meeting her husband brought Prisk to the capital and the London Development Agency, before becoming policy director at Lifelong Learning UK.

But, she says: “I’d moved way too far away from children”. So Prisk became deputy head of two children’s centres in Hackney, before becoming assistant director at Play England.

One of Prisk’s key priorities is to encourage grassroots play projects, exemplified by the drive to get more children to play on their streets. The movement began in Bristol when two mothers realised that since they could apply to close roads for street parties, they could do the same to encourage street play.

“We’re now trying to secure funds to help local authorities put in place the legal changes needed, so that when communities want to take control of their neighbourhood there isn’t any red tape in the way,” says Prisk.

The movement has led to road closures across the country, including in Prisk’s own borough of Hackney, where the council introduced London’s first temporary play street order in September.

But Prisk’s vision of how play should permeate every aspect of a child’s life is much broader. “In future, I want to increase the supply chain of play,” she says. “I want to make sure every parent, when they drop their children off at an after-school club, or look for a suitable school, is asking them about play opportunities.”

Underestimated value

Prisk believes the educational benefits of play are often underestimated. Play, she argues, develops confidence in children, among many other skills.

“A child who can climb a tree will have the confidence to do that scary thing called writing,” she says.

Prisk recalls an example from her time as a reception-class teacher. “I had to start the day by taking them outside and letting them run around, because they weren’t ready to learn without getting rid of the fidgets,” she says. “We’ve got to get children outside, not only because they need to learn how to play, but because they need to learn how to read.”

She insists that play must be a part of every child’s life from the early years through to secondary education, pointing to statistics that show older children’s health is suffering because break times have been cut at schools.

“Fourteen-year-olds have got half an hour at lunch – they’ve got to eat – and it’s frowned upon to run around. They get fat,” she says.

Play England is campaigning with the National Trust to encourage children to spend more time playing outdoors. The partnership arose following the trust’s publication of its Natural Childhood report in March, in which it claimed children were suffering from “nature deficit disorder”. Play England responded to the report by arguing that children must be allowed to have a “free-range childhood”.

“That led to the National Trust calling to ask if we’d like to get involved in their campaign,” says Prisk. She laughs, although it is a serious point, as she explains there is “more legislation about battery hens than children spending time outside.”

Prisk is also a keen environmentalist and believes play is essential to ensuring that the next generation develops green credentials. “If kids never get beyond their front door, why do they care about trees?” she asks. “You need to get kids who like running around in mud so that when they get to 16, they get passionate about saving the world.”

Alongside the National Trust, Play England is working in a coalition with the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, the NHS, Play Wales and Play Board Northern Ireland to develop a feature-length documentary about getting children outside. Project Wild Thing will be released in September next year.

By then, Prisk says the situation will be critical. “There are now many more places that are clearly designated as a place to play,” she suggests. “But we’re in the last days when we can really make a difference. Young parents today grew up without the opportunity to play outside, so will they let their kids have a free-range childhood?”

To make the change, Prisk says a three-nations approach is needed. “Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland all invest directly in play provision and have officials with responsibly for play,” says Prisk. “England does not.”

Play England also plans to expand its membership, which was recently opened to individuals. Prisk hopes this will bolster its work. “We want to build that campaigning arm where people who care about the freedom to play stand alongside us, so that I can categorically say that I’m backed by individuals from across England,” she explains.

Prisk also sees opportunities to influence the media and entertainment industry. She recently took part in a discussion at Viacom, the media giant behind children’s television channels such as Nickelodeon. “I told a room of advertisers that one of the big reasons why kids don’t holler about going outside is because advertising is all about computer games and playing inside,” she says. “The whole room was really supportive because they’re all mums and dads too.”


CATHERINE PRISK: CV

• Prisk holds a BA in Indonesian studies and anthropology from London’s School of Oriental and African Studies and an MA in social research methods from the University of Leeds
• She taught reception and year 2 classes at primary schools in London and Skipton for seven years, after gaining a teaching qualification in Aberdeen
• Prisk travelled widely as a child, completing her schooling in Cheshire, and lived with her family for periods in Iraq, Egypt and Iran
• She spent three years working at the South West Regional Development Agency, before moving to the London Development Agency and Lifelong Learning UK
• She lives in Hackney with her husband, who works for Hackney Council’s youth services