Healthy Children
Commitment to a healthy environment for our youngest Londoners
The Mayor is passionate about supporting the health and wellbeing of children and their families, which is why expanding the School Superzones pilot became a key commitment in the Health Inequalities Strategy.
We know that providing children with environments that help them to play, eat, socialise and develop well is essential both for long-term health and to enable children to achieve their full potential. While London’s schools and boroughs have been doing incredible work in this space, the Mayor wanted to support their efforts to tackle the wider challenges that exist beyond the school gates, such as: fast-food takeaways, traffic fumes, betting shops, and London’s highly polluted air.
In 2018 and 2019, the Mayor partnered with schools, pupils, parents, local authorities, communities and local businesses to pilot the School Superzones programme. To date we have awarded 51 grants to 28 boroughs, creating 86 School Superzones which are addressing some of the biggest challenges to child health.
Each School Superzone identified their area of greatest need. Funding from the Mayor enables them make use of local assets and local authorities’ place-shaping powers to make their communities healthier, greener and safer. Here’s what they’re getting up to:
- Using the ‘schools streets’ approach to improving air quality and road safety
- Working with local fast-food takeaways and convenience stores to increase the range and sales of healthier options
- Making improvements to lighting and signage to make streets and communities safer
- Making it easier for parents and children to get physically active by providing cycling infrastructure and cycle training
- Designating tobacco free zones around schools so that families can breathe cleaner air