About Project
Torch Associate Mandu Reid led the design and implementation of Sport Unites, the Mayor of London’s multi-million pound community sport investment programme developed as part of London 2012 legacy. The programme invested in skills, infrastructure, participation projects, and place-based initiatives. It brought together local authorities, delivery partners, community organisations, and funders to use sport as a lever for social outcomes. The system was complex and fractured, with multiple funding partners, delivery bodies, and policy priorities operating on different timescales and in service of different (sometimes clashing) strategic priorities. This created challenges around maximising impact and tracing accountability.
About Project (Cont.)
Key judgements included: determining the extent to which control should be centralised or devolved; how to balance consistency with local flexibility; and how to design funding and governance arrangements that incentivised collaboration rather than competition. The programme deliberately moved away from activity-led funding, towards shared outcomes framework and place based programming, despite the additional complexity this introduced. Sport Unites established a coherent operating model that aligned funding, partners, and delivery around common outcomes, while allowing for local adaptation. The approach enabled more strategic use of investment, clearer accountability, and learning that informed subsequent sport-for-social-impact initiatives beyond the original programme.
