Life-saving skills are being taught to the public thanks to a link-up between a council and charity.

Leicester City Council sports services staff are to provide instructors to help deliver CPR training, working with the Joe Humphries Memorial Trust.

It is working to ensure sports clubs can access free training in emergency life-support skills.

Joe's Mini HeartStart 4 Sports teaches people of all ages cardio-pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) techniques and how to use a defibrillator – which delivers an electric shock to the heart to try to restart it.

The city council has allocated £6,000 to help train more than 500 people.

Knighton Park Table Tennis Club was the latest to take up the offer of training.

Vicky Ball, sports regeneration manager at Leicester City Council said:

"This was a great chance for us to meet members of the table tennis club and tell them more about this life-saving training, in advance of the sessions we plan to run at the club.

"We were delighted by the response we got – members are clearly really keen to learn and we look forward to sharing these vital skills with them."

Deputy city mayor Councillor Rory Palmer, the council's lead for health and wellbeing, said:

"I'm really pleased we can support the Joe Humphries Memorial Trust by providing funds for specialist trainers."

David Morley, from the club, said:

"This is a chance for us all to learn a few simple skills that could make a huge difference."

Charles Poole, from the Joe Humphries Memorial Trust, said:

"This support from the council is a fantastic boost for us, and means we will be able to extend our offer of free training to more sports clubs in the city and county."

Read more at Leicester Mercury

JHMT advocate that all sports clubs should be prepared and ready for the worst case scenario when someones heart stops beating. 'Every vital second counts' should someone collapse through a cardiac arrest. This includes working towards ensuring all members of a club including players aged 13 and over, volunteers, club officials, parents as well as coaches, are trained in basic emergency life support skills/CPR and have access to and are confident with how to use a defibrillator if ever called upon to do so. Parents should expect this as a minimum standard of safety in sport. Now we know that fit and healthy young people can also be susceptible to subtle heart conditions (SADS) its not acceptable practise anymore to hope that a coach/club official, who may have the necessary CPR skills, is in the right place as this can happen to anyone, anywhere and anytime.