‘A generation of kids have no swimming skills’

The father of a teenage boy who drowned in a reservoir has said he has a “real worry” that a “whole generation” of children lack the swimming skills to keep them safe.

Sam Haycock, 16, lost his life in Ulley Reservoir in South Yorkshire in May 2021.

His father Simon, from Rotherham, said it was “vital” children were taught to swim at secondary school, in addition to current lessons for primary pupils.

Mr Haycock, who has campaigned for better water safety since losing his son, said: “Nobody can deny that swimming is a vital life skill that we should be teaching all kids.”

Mr Haycock said: “It’s all well and good leaving school with this qualification, with that qualification – but they haven’t got a qualification to keep them alive in certain situations.

“These dangers are there, nobody can deny them.”

‘Dangerous situation’

He said Sam was never a strong swimmer and he wished he had been given lessons as part of PE at secondary school.

“If he could have swam, who knows, it’s better to have these skills in place isn’t it?”

He said the closure of several swimming pools in the Rotherham area had made the problem worse, while many schools had lost their swimming facilities over the years.

The 54-year-old learned to swim at what is now Wingfield Academy in Rotherham, which used to have its own small pool.

Swimming and water safety lessons are currently only a compulsory part of the curriculum in primary school – either in key stages 1 or 2, but free schools and academies are not required to follow the national curriculum.

There is currently no requirement for swimming to be taught or included as a sport in PE lessons at secondary schools.

“I don’t think six half-hour sessions is anywhere near sufficient,” Mr Haycock said.

“They really are putting all our youth groups in a dangerous situation.”

Chris Porter is one of the managers at Tadcaster Community Swimming Pool in North Yorkshire.

He warned there was a Covid cohort of children coming through who could not swim to the expected standard by secondary school age, who missed out on lessons during the pandemic because of the restrictions.

“There is a knock-on now and definitely a higher rate of children that haven’t achieved the key stage 2 standard of 25 metres,” he said.

In 2021, the charity Swim England warned that more than one million children could leave primary school in the subsequent five years unable to swim the minimum standards required under the national curriculum.

Mr Porter warned that “cost is also a barrier”, with it often depending on how far children had to travel to their local swimming pool.