To ask the Minister of Health (i) to outline what steps he is taking, and advice he is giving, to reduce sedentary behaviour in desk and office-based workplaces, in particular those in the public sector; and (ii) for his assessment of those industries most affected by sedentary behaviour.

(i) My Department, in conjunction with the Public Health Agency, works cross-departmentally with the Department for Communities in relation to their Active Living: Sport and Physical Activity Strategy and with the Department of Infrastructure’s Active Travel strategy. Alongside my Department’s A Fitter Future For All strategic framework, these strategic partners work together to promote the Chief Medical Officer’s Physical Activity Guidelines, which aims to improve physical activity across all parts of the population and to increase the numbers of people choosing to travel to schools and workplaces through active travel means.

Programmes in place to address sedentary behaviours include the workplace health programme - ‘Work Well Live Well’ - which works with 250 businesses in Northern Ireland, with sedentary workers being a key target group. The workplace active travel programme ‘Leading the Way’ in Belfast and the North West supports people to use active travel modes of transport and to use this as a means to attain the CMO Physical Activity Guidelines. As part of this, the annual Active Travel Challenge invites workplaces across Northern Ireland to sign up to compete with other employers and to log active travel journeys during the period of the challenge.

Finally, the Regional Health and Social Care Workforce Wellbeing group launched a Regional Staff Health and Wellbeing website to help promote the Chief Medical Officers’ Physical Activity Guidelines and hosts resources and recommendations to support staff and their families to incorporate physical activity into their daily activities.

(ii) There is evidence to show that office workers are at risk of excess sedentary behaviour. A recent study using data from 360,047 adults from UK showed participants who reported more than 6 hours/day compared with less than 2 hours/day sedentary time had higher risks of 12 of 46 non-communicable diseases. These included ischemic heart disease, diabetes, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma, chronic kidney disease, chronic liver disease, thyroid disorder, depression, migraine, gout, rheumatoid arthritis & diverticular disease. Another study addressing health and sitting in 850,000 adults showed that, without changes to the levels of sedentary behaviour, 60 minutes of moderate-to-vigorous activity per day would be required to compensate for the added mortality risk.