NEWS

Netball at Sports Day 2025 SPARTA is pleased to announce that the SPARTA Netball Club has relaunched. On Friday 23rd January, they held a netball taster session at the 2 Marsham Street Sports Hall, bringing together 17 colleagues from four different departments. After a quick warm up, they ran a few simple drills before moving into a friendly game, which turned out to be very evenly matched. The group included a mix of complete beginners and regular players, but everyone got

The SPARTA Astronomy Society are pleased to announce that after pre flight checks lasting several months their society was successfully launched with its first meeting at the end of last year. Ideas were gathered and plans for many exciting future missions were discussed and are now being put into motion. If you are interested in space, space flight, astronomy and stargazing but don’t know where to start, come and join the club! Open to everyone we kick off on Friday 13th

Superstars Cricket Club are already preparing for an exciting year of cricket in 2026. The Superstars CC on tour in 2025 Nets Nets have been booked in the excellent facilities provided at the Oval cricket ground. These are taking place in February and March, and more nets are planned for April. Contact osdsuperstars_cc@hotmail.co.uk if you are interested in joining them for nets. All abilities from beginner level to Ben Stokes (but with less injuries) level welcome. Tour A

After a full-on festive season of carols and Christmas music through the ages, the Civil Service Choir have started preparing a new repertoire for Spring! On Sunday, the 26th of April , the choir will be performing Haydn’s The Creation at Sinfonia Smith Square. Published in 1800, The Creation is one of the most exalted achievements in choral and orchestral music and the first choral work to be published with both German and English texts. In this performance it will be in Eng

The SPARTA Personal Safety Course is now under way. Over 20 staff from across DfT and MHCLG along with a few colleagues from the Home Office came together for the first two sessions of the SPARTA Personal Safety Course which is run by Stay Safe Global. The course is 8 one hour sessions spread over 8 weeks and covers everything from how to avoid getting your phone stolen (which is much easier than you would think) to what to do if someone tried to abduct you. By teaching you s

The SPARTA History Society continues to host a set of excellent talks. Here are a few that you can attend over the next few weeks. For full details of all the talks coming up this year get in touch with Robert Baker at robert.baker@dft.gov.uk Wednesday 11 th February   Twentieth Century Seaside Architecture - Kathryn Ferry Online Talk from GMH Room 5.7 1pm and available as a Microsoft Teams meeting  Join: https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/37296345379772?p=xvBx5YNaQR7eITB6l6  

SPARTA are pleased to announce that the SPARTA Personal Safety Course will start again on 27th January 2026. Stay Safe this winter with SPARTA’s Personal Safety class Stay safe this winter with the help of SPARTA. SPARTA are proud to announce that following the running of the very popular Personal Safety class in early 2025 we are repeating the course in early 2026. The course will run on Tuesdays for a period of 8 weeks starting on 27 January 2026 . It is provided by Stay Sa

The Civil Service Choir – looking ahead to 2026!   The Civil Service Choir had a busy end to 2025. They performed Orff’s Carmina Burana with its famous O Fortuna  opening at Holy Trinity, dazzled guests at the Civil Service Awards ceremony, and held two Christmas concerts locally in Westminster.   Performing at the Civil Service awards As we look ahead to 2026, the choir will be joined by the Brandenburg Sinfonia orchestra as they perform Haydn’s The Creation on the evening o

The SPARTA History Society has a varied programme of talks with leading historians from major universities covering Ancient Rome, English Civil War, How World War Two is remembered and the Global Middle Ages. Wed 14 th January The Blood in Winter: A Nation Descends, 1642 - Jonathan Healey                Online Talk from GMH 5.7 1pm In 1642, England fell into Civil War. Before this epoch-making collapse, there was a political crisis in the winter of 1641 that saw King Charles

Here is a Christmas message from the SPARTA Leeds Running group Firstly, we wanted to say thank you to everyone who got involved with the club in 2025. It’s great to have established a small running community in the Leeds office and we’re looking forward to doing even more next year.    As some of you will already know, we’ve moved to having a monthly “official” run now, which takes place at 12:15 on the first Tuesday of every month. We’ll refresh the invites to these in the

SPARTA is pleased to announce that we have booked a date and ground for the 2026 SPARTA Sport and Wellbeing Day. Date - 24th July 2026 Location - We are returning to Imber Court Sports Ground, near Hampton Court. The location is only an extra 5 minute journey compared to the journey to the Kings House Sports Ground. We are really looking forward to welcoming you all to a day of fun and wellbeing in July. If you are interested in volunteering to help on the day then we would l

Last year over 35,000 people joined in CSSC's Active Wellbeing Challenges. The challenges start again in February 2026. Can you and/or your team combine to walk/run/swim enough miles to go round the world? The challenges are fun but also inclusive and completing them will give you an enormous amount of satisfaction. Why not sign up and use their challenges to help increase your health and wellbeing in 2026. Make it part of your everyday wellbeing package. Check out the CSSC w

SPARTA are pleased to announce the publication of the SPARTA Annual Report 2025. The front cover features a picture of the Swinging Mandarins band playing at the 2025 Sport and Wellbeing Day. The report gives a run down of the many activities that SPARTA has helped to put on throughout the year. You can download the report using the link below. We hope that you all like the report. If you wish to send us any comments then please do contact us at SPARTA@dft.gov.uk

The Drama club, the St James's and Westminster Players, are busy preparing for the autumn scene with auditions and productions in the...

The SPARTA Golf Society report from their Autumn meeting which was held at Ealing Golf Club. After torrential rain the day before, the sun shone brightly throughout the day of their Autumn meeting. Two guests from the Home Office Golf Society were invited along to enjoy the day but the rules did not allow them to take away any trophies, however one was awarded some golf balls for the best Stableford score on the day. Unusually for the SPARTA Golf Society, the venue was some w

This summer the Civil Service Choir celebrated their 200th performance with a programme of swing and jazz favourites with a choral twist, accompanied by a professional jazz orchestra. Following their 200th performance this summer, the Civil Service Choir is preparing for a busy autumn/winter season. They’ve got a busy schedule for the remainder of the year, performing Carmina Burana with its famous O’Fortuna opening on 22nd November 2025, their annual lunchtime carol service

During 2025 the SPARTA History Society has organised 40 events, 37 talks and 3 walks, the most it has ever achieved. During 2025 it has also helped the Department for Transport to celebrate Railway 200, the 200th anniversary of the Stockton and Darlington Railway. organising 16 Railway 200 talks, 1 walk and members have organised events in Leeds Office and in September in Great Minster House put on a display of railway items in reception, alongside archive images from Histor

The SPARTA Art club have been hosting Watercolour sessions, organised by John (MHCLG), Ahad (MHCLG) and Aishwaree (DfT). The sessions have involved familiarising with water consistency and learning watercolour techniques before painting their own creation to take home. The sessions have proved to be very popular and were quickly totally booked up, (almost as quickly as Oasis tickets). The club is hoping to continue to run similar sessions going forward and also to explore way

At SPARTA we are always trying to make a difference by improving what we can offer you but to do that we need your help. Volunteers Our clubs are run by volunteers. They help at the clubs because they enjoy the particular activity that their club does. Without their help their club would struggle to continue operating. Some of our volunteers have been doing their work at the clubs for a long time and they need your help to ensure that the clubs continue to operate and develop

GOLF, GOOD, COME, JOIN . Golf is good. Come and join in!! This year the SPARTA Golf Society has made changes to its event and competition...