Our Head of Business Operations, and increasingly regular blogger, Jon Keating has been taking the opportunity to follow up on a reflection he made at Elevate 2023 by visiting the NHS ConfedExpo in Manchester.
Here, he shares his thoughts and makes a rallying call for our industry to really prove itself in our ambition to be a trusted partner of the NHS.
Two years ago, I wrote a blog reflecting on my visit to Elevate 2023, when I spoke of ‘the elephant in the room’ after one of my fellow panellists then left London to travel to a health conference in Manchester.
For those who don’t have a memory like an elephant, this is what I said: “And here’s the elephant in the room – quite literally. Yes, ‘leisure’ was there; but where was ‘health’?
“In fact, one of my panel members declared she was leaving London and heading straight back to Manchester to participate in another panel session at a health conference. I couldn’t help thinking why these events are not connected?”
The health conference in question was the NHS ConfedExpo, billed as the UK’s leading health and care conference, dedicated to driving innovation and improving care for patients and the public.
Up until this year, the NHS expo and Elevate had shared the same dates, often stated as one of the reasons for the disconnect, after all we can’t be in two places at once.
Given the unprecedented opportunity to attend both Elevate and the expo, I did – and discovered two elephants!
The one at Elevate still looms as large as it did two years ago, but now it has a cousin firmly ensconced in the NHS ConfedExpo arena!
To my knowledge, there were few (if any) allied health practitioners and physios etc at Elevate.
By the same token, there was only a handful of us from ‘leisure’ at the NHS expo (me, Michelle Childs, who leads our health steering group; Hayley Lever, of CEO of GM Moving, who was a panellist; Jack Murphy, P4C Programme Lead and Ben Ward from Innerva.)
So, while our industry celebrated at Elevate, it was by no means a huge leisure contingent at the expo.
Simultaneously, it would appear, the NHS doesn’t recognise enough the value our industry can provide it with, both in terms of a lack of physical presence at Elevate, but also in the little recognition given to physical activity at the expo.
At the risk of repeating myself from my elephant in the room blog, the pivot/transformation (whatever you want to call it) that we all cherish so much simply cannot happen without health and leisure operators sharing the same space.
The whole ecosystem around Greater Manchester has a decade or so to evolve, so if we are to make an impact and a difference, these connections need to be developed and amplified.
I originally added ‘at the earliest opportunity’ to that statement. Sadly, the opportunity has been lost to another two years of plentiful discussion that doesn’t always equate to a similar amount of action.
So, I have this message for my esteemed colleagues in ‘leisure’:
“Take time out of your inward-looking diaries for next year’s NHS ConfedExpo and create a leisure presence there that will help us to shift the dial and show the NHS that we really are capable of being its valued partner.”
In fact, at our most recent health steering group, we agreed that we should have a strategic presence and somehow lobby the expo organisers and influence the need for a physical activity and movement theatre.
This includes our Strategic Business Partners Innerva, Technogym and Active IQ, who all want to be part of this with us too.
Before I document what we can expect to gain by attending next year’s NHS Confed Expo, I’d like to share an insight into the future of the NHS courtesy of Rt Hon Wes Streeting, Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, who was a keynote speaker.
Here’s a precis of his core themes:
The government is reimagining the NHS – not as a ‘top-down’ reorganisation, but with a shift in mindset and delivery.
From ‘sickness to prevention’ is a major theme in the forthcoming 10-year plan for the NHS.
Investment and reform with include £10 billion to digitise the NHS, with a 50% increase in the tech budget.
Fewer targets, more freedom by reducing bureaucracy to empower local systems.
Patient-centred care – the ‘patient is king’, he said. Outcomes and experiences matter most.
Empowering Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) and communities with more strategic commissioning, local flexibility, and community focus.
Tackling health inequalities by addressing social determinants and injustice.
Leadership and accountability – clarity, consequences, and collaboration are key.
As you will discover as you continue to read through this blog, there is much for ‘leisure’ and ‘health’ to collaborate on…
What Michelle and I discovered at the expo was a landscape of aims and aspirations that share common goals with those of our own transformation to active wellbeing.
The event is huge, including about 180 different seminars – we managed to attend several of the most relevant.
The key themes coming out were systemic transformation, neighbourhood health and prevention, partnerships and ecosystem, workforce and operating model, and finance and value. Here’s each one in a little more detail.
Systemic transformation – delegates were told of three major shifts the NHS aspires to: quality and innovation, workforce transformation, and financial reform. As Mr Streeting explained, the move from treatment to prevention, via a reimagined NHS, will be patient-powered and community-driven. There is also emphasis on devolved systems, localism, and place-based partnerships.
Neighbourhood health and prevention – neighbourhood care is central to this with localised, community-informed, and prevention-focused services. ICBs will drive outcome-based commissioning while population health and community needs will guide service design.
Partnerships and ecosystem – the NHS should work as a partner, not a dominator, with other organisations and sectors, such as the third sector, councils, housing, etc, co-creating solutions with communities and empowering them to manage their own health. Technology will help to streamline services and reduce inefficiencies.
Workforce and operating model – radical workforce reform is expected to create a flexible, tech-enabled, and community-embedded way of working. Expect new operating models with less bureaucracy, more autonomy, and a focus on outcomes.
Finance and value – there is a shift to longer-term revenue budgets aimed at prevention allied to a focus on value for money, quality, and the removal working silos.
The opportunities for us to partner with the NHS are plain to see, those key themes mirroring many of our own.
What we have to offer is not as the panacea, however, it’s part of the holistic approach to prevention and management of long-term conditions. So, who’s up for the journey?
One of the seminars I attended (Leadership in action – from sickness to prevention) revealed that 20% of the population accounts for 70% of healthcare costs.
There were other eye-catching facts and figures among some of the other seminars:
On a more positive note, there is potential for £32 billions of inward investment, while the £7 billion ICB budget for Greater Manchester represents a major opportunity for innovation.
The key shifts said to be necessary for positive change included radical reform in primary care and commissioning, while the others very much aligned with our own thinking:
Whilst physical activity didn’t feature prominently, I attended a session called ‘Maximising the role of physical activity to tackle long-term health conditions’, which featured Hayley Lever, CEO of GM Moving.
It was here that the underactive 12 million adults and 2 million children fact came to light, and the discussion covered a perceived empathy gap between exercise professionals and patients, and a disconnect between evidence and practice – both in need of cultural and mindset shifts across the system.
Echoing sentiments heard at Elevate previously, shift the emphasis from physical activity to simply moving more as business-as-usual, it was said.
Recognise movement as a fundamental right in care and embed movement into holistic, person-centred care.
Yet again, this highlights a number of opportunities for GM Active, and other similar public sector health, fitness and wellness operators, by:
So, what does this all mean for public sector leisure and organisations like GM Active?
With many successful and sought-after physical activity referral programmes – not least Prehab4Cancer – already well established, attending the NHS ConfedExpo 2026 is a massive opportunity to amplify our stakeholder status with the NHS by illustrating what we are capable of:
I’m not saying we shouldn’t be at Elevate – I’m saying we should be at BOTH!
