Do we need playgrounds?

The news was announced this week that hundreds of community playground schemes in England are being axed or scaled back because of government cuts. Education Secretary Michael Gove has frozen grants to 132 councils for building and running up to 1,300 schemes. Only schemes where construction has already started are to be allowed to proceed.

The £235m Playbuilder scheme was started more than two years ago.  Launched under Labour to develop 3,500 playgrounds designed by and for the communities they were to serve, each local council was given cash to build 22 play areas. 

Not unsurprisingly, the reaction to this latest round of cuts has been mixed.   On the one hand the building of playgrounds might seem like a luxury in these straightened times compared to the preservation of front line services such as the NHS. On the other, those communities who have spent considerable time and effort putting together these schemes are understandably disappointed to see all their hard work go to waste.

And there is also a bigger issue about the value of play to our children.  The playgrounds being designed and built under the initiative are  a far cry from the cold metal swingsets with concrete bases which were the fashion in the 1970s when I was growing up. These are  far more adventurous affairs, designed to tempt our computer -fixated offspring into the fresh air to take healthy exercise, use their imaginations and take risks in a safe environment. 

And as anyone in charge of small children knows, playgrounds are great (free) places to entertain and distract children for hours at a time and also for adults and children alike to make friends. 

So, not much to object to there unless you think that the schemes planned were too many, too elaborate or too expensive. And that is the crux of the matter. Whilst most people would probably agree that children need places to play, opinions differ as to how much playgrounds should cost and who should pay for them. 

The economic crisis is throwing up all kinds of questions about the role of government in our lives, about the return on our taxes and spending priorities. The arguments over playgrounds are just round 1.