Governance and Policies

Board aims and objectives

• To set the values, strategic direction and policy of Active Sussex.
• To respond to local, regional and national influences, including the representation of Active Sussex, sport and physical activity on all relevant local, regional and national policy and strategy consultations.
• To advocate for sport and physical activity, and for Active Sussex.
• To ensure Active Sussex is fit for purpose.
• To advise on the annual business plan and associated budget, and receive performance management information.
• To scrutinise Active Sussex’s governance, risk management, financial management, strategy implementation and the performance of it’s professional staff team.
• To account to Sport England and other relevant stakeholders for the for the performance of the organisation, including the allocation, use and management of its grant funding, in line with Sport England funding award conditions.
• To oversee the Active Sussex business development and recruitment processes.

The Active Sussex Board is committed to encouraging partnership working between agencies, so that delivery of activities are of high quality and accessible to all people across the county.

Code for Sports Governance

In 2016, Sport England and UK Sport launched ‘A Code for Sports Governance’, which sets out the levels of transparency, diversity and inclusion, accountability and integrity that are required from those organisations who seek – and are in receipt of – UK Government and National Lottery funding from the two organisations.

To date, the Code has been applied to more than 4,000 partners across its three Tiers of funding and has provided a standard framework of governance for a wide and diverse range of national, regional and local bodies, community groups and charities providing sport and physical activity opportunities.

Many of the principles set out in the Code are widely accepted as being elements of good practice in corporate governance, and can be found in most models of governance both within and outwith the sporting sector, e.g. the UK Corporate Governance Code, the governance frameworks of all five domestic Sports Councils, and the Sport and Recreation Alliance’s Voluntary

In July 2020, against the backdrop of Black Lives Matter and more than three years of implementing, assessing and supporting the governance of organisations in line with its provisions, UK Sport and Sport England announced a review of the Code.

This was aimed at identifying areas where the Code would benefit from further development, with a substantive focus on those elements that support diversity and inclusion. The review also provided the opportunity to compare the
requirements in the Code against best practice in governance, recognising that thinking may have moved on and further improvements may be found in sport and other sectors.

A detailed overview of the 2021 Code for Sports Governance can be downloaded from the Sport England website here.