St Helens benefits from £26m community investment into Rugby League

Saturday, August 5 will mark the end of the most successful and significant programme of investment into grassroots facilities in the history of Rugby League.

Since it was launched as a key part of England’s successful bid to host Rugby League World Cup 2021, with funding from Department for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport, Sport England and The National Lottery, the CreatedBy Grants Programme has driven investment of more than £26m into all areas of community Rugby League including St Helens.

The majority has been allocated to a total of more than 30 large scale grants, but there have also been dozens of small scale grants, covering all manner of items essential to the successful operation of Community Rugby League, whether boilers or rugby balls, lawnmowers or tackle pads – and of course wheelchairs, allowing the development of new teams and clubs to capitalise on the breakthrough success of England’s thrilling triumph in the Wheelchair RLWC tournament last autumn.

The CreatedBy programme was singled out for praise in the report published last week by UK Sport highlighting the long-lasting social impact of RLWC2021 – which was postponed by 12 months until 2022 because of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Tony Sutton, the chief executive of the Rugby Football League, said:"“With only a few weeks until the closing date for new applications for the CreatedBy Small Scale Grants, this is a good time to reflect on the transformative impact the programme has had on our sport.

“Rugby League’s greatest strength has always been the depth of its roots in the communities in which it is played. Partly because many of those communities are in less wealthy parts of the country, it has often been a struggle to fund the facilities which Community Rugby League deserves.

“Thanks to the significant financial commitment of Government, Sport England and The National Lottery since the RFL’s successful bid to host RLWC2021, and an immense amount of work by the many people involved in delivering the grants programme, dozens of clubs up and down the country, and especially across the North of England, are now significantly better-placed to serve their communities.

“We have been delighted to welcome a number of Government ministers to some of those facilities, including Oliver Dowden visiting Victoria Park in Warrington in 2021 – and conducting the Challenge Cup draw! – during his tenure as Culture Secretary, and Nigel Huddleston and Stuart Andrew welcomed as Sports ministers to Blackbrook and Leigh Miners Rangers respectively.”