Sport England tells its sports: funding will depend on fighting climate crisis

• Status quo is no longer an option,' says Chris Boardman
• It's just a massive topic. It's the biggest topic we will face'

Sport England, which invests more than 300m of public money every year, intends to ask sports to do far more to fight the climate crisis as a condition of receiving funding, the Guardian can reveal.

The radical move was signalled by the funding body's chair, Chris Boardman, who said that while his organisation planned to work closely with sports to help them decarbonise and better protect the environment the status quo is no longer an option".