Last year BADMINTON England made a successful bid to Sport England for money to invest in new and improved facilities for our sport. Whilst the £2.9m awarded is a welcome boost to our development plans, it was less than we had hoped for so, in order to maximise its impact, we will be targeting the money at projects which will support the development of our network of Performance Centres and strengthen their relationship with the County Badminton Associations. Our Capital Investment Programme was launched earlier this year and the deadline for the first round of applications is the end of April. There will be two further rounds with deadlines in Nov 2011 and November 2012.

The Programme is expected to enhance the on-court experience by funding the upgrade of flooring, lighting and wall colour, and to support improvements off-court such as changing rooms, fitness training facilities and meeting rooms. Also, whilst it is not large enough to fully fund construction of new sports halls, the Programme may be able to contribute to new-build projects in partnership with other agencies, particularly on school sites.

In return for this investment BADMINTON England will require facility owners to guarantee long term low cost access for Performance Centre activities. Thus, by the end of Olympic year we will have secure access to a network of quality facilities to support this vital platform.

If you would like to know more about the Capital Investment Programme please contact Jonathan Lee - Facilities Investment Manager on 01908 268400 or jonathanlee@badmintonengland.co.uk