Kate Hoey wants boxing back in schools
Monday October 22, 2001
The Guardian
‘You are a disgrace to the sisterhood,” said one of the friendlier correspondents in a cluster of vitriolic letters I received after publicly giving my support to boxing. I reassured myself that former sports ministers like Colin Moynihan would have filed this letter in the bin with a neat left jab and the great Denis Howell would have taken the insults on the chin without a blink.
This year the Schools Amateur Boxing Association celebrates 55 years of work. During its heyday in the 1950s and early 1960s thousands of youngsters climbed through the ropes in schools up and down the country. The national schools championships were huge events sponsored by the old Star newspaper and, when held at the Royal Albert Hall, drew 23 London Mayors and Her Majesty’s inspector of schools to ringside. Last year’s finals had no big sponsors, no Chris Woodhead and were held in Barnsley.
Over the years Local Education Authorities, in the face of minority but well-organised protest, have caved in to pressure to withdraw support for school boxing. Many local councils banned it from their premises. The anti-boxing lobby became fully paid-up members of the politically correct brigade. Most had never been inside a boxing ring or talked to a boxer in their life.
But the tide is turning and the opponents are on the back foot. Under the umbrella of SABA schools are clamouring to introduce non-contact boxing as an extra-curricular activity. The Kid Gloves scheme was pioneered in Bristol, where local authority support and the dedicated work of Denis Stinchcombe, a boys’ club leader and coach, introduced more than 400 school children to its skills and discipline.
Minimal equipment is required – just space and boxing gloves. Skills such as co-ordination, footwork, balance, defensive sparring and knowledge of the rules are tested. There is no requirement to take part in competitions but the boys and girls (sisters take note) get fitter, improve agility and flexibility and, most of all, they learn discipline.
For some it will be a stepping stone to boxing competitively in a club but for others it will just have been well- organised fun. Raines Foundation School, a highly successful school in Tower Hamlets, co-operates in the scheme with the famous Peacock club. “It is now our most popular after-school club,” says the Head.
This is no surprise. It may sound old-fashioned but anyone who visits a boxing club with youngsters involved will be impressed by what they see. Boxing has character-building qualities unequalled by many other sports. Few start by teaching the responsibilities that go with participating. Listening to a coach explaining the importance of sportsmanship and respect for an opponent, one realises the ethics of the amateur game are worlds away from the Tyson image. These youngsters are not pulling shirts, spitting or trashing a dressing room. Aggression is controlled and channelled constructively. It is a sport where they learn self-control, courage and dignity, qualities so lacking in many teenagers.
Another innovation is the boxing academy at East Durham and Houghall College in Peterlee where some of our most talented young boxers are in residence, with top coaching combined with studying for an educational qualification. Discipline is such that, if you skip class, you miss boxing. Here sport is being used as a motivator for young people, many of whom have been alienated from formal education. Just last week the academy won an appeal against an earlier decision by the Oxford and Cambridge board that boxing could not be offered as an option in the A-Level PE syllabus. This is a breakthrough and a tribute to the coaches and volunteers who have not given up in spite of hostility and prejudice.
No one can ever guarantee total safety in any sport but amateur boxing is 28th in the list of sports injuries – far below football, water sports, athletics and even angling. In many parts of inner cities the boxing club is a haven from the muggings, drug abuse and violent crime too often part of everyday life. The school truant will regularly flee to the caring discipline of the boxing gym. How much easier for them to flee to the after-school boxing club than to the street?
It is time to get boxing back into our schools.