Following a debate today in the Scottish Parliament on the legacy plan for the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games, Glasgow MSP Bob Doris has hailed the Partick Thistle Football Club community engagement programme as a model for achieving community participation in sport.

Mr Doris, who yesterday hosted a reception at the Scottish Parliament to raise awareness of the work of the Partick Thistle community engagement programme said: "We have a real opportunity to improve health by engaging communities as we prepare for the Games. The real legacy of the Games will not just be buildings and infrastructure, but real improvements in the health and wellbeing of our citizens.

"The Partick Thistle programme is engaging with a number of third sector organisations to improve wellbeing amongst vulnerable and socially excluded groups. Mental health charity SAMH and Glasgow Old People’s Welfare Association (GOPWA) to name only two are putting in tremendous effort to ensure the success of the programme."

Commenting on the innovative approach, which club supporters hope will have the dual benefit of increasing supporter numbers as well as providing an invaluable service to the local community, Kieron Dempsey Community Director and Trust Representative said: "We realised that in order to do this with no funds we had to work in partnership with other parties picking up on their expertise and services. What we could give to them was our facilities and our own expertise in sport. Effectively we said "Here is a football stadium - how can we use it to benefit your client group?

"What we are trying to do is to remove some of the barriers that exclude a variety of groups from attending football matches. We started with some elderly guests from the Donald Dewar Centre and Erskine House - some of whom have been unable to attend a match for several years - now groups attend every game. Since then  we have a number of socially isolated groups taking up our offer. The groups are small, but it helps a growing number of people to have an improved quality of life."

The long term future of the club has been a matter for much heated discussion in recent years but organisers now think that the community programme could form at least part of the solution. Partick Thistle Marketing Manager Stuart MacPhee summed it up: "We wanted to improve our community engagement, the whole match day experience and strengthen the brand of Partick Thistle Football Club."

Club Chairman, Allan Cowan, was present at the parliament to explain the benefits to the club: "Football clubs need to work harder to get people interested in coming along to watch live sport. Once there, we also need to ensure that they have an enjoyable day and want to come back again.

"While the headline grabber has been 'Kids go Free', it is only part of an overall plan by Partick Thistle to improve the experience of coming to watch live football and at the same time actively engage with our young fans and the wider community as well.

"Gone are the days when all fans could expect was a greasy pie and lukewarm Bovril as the 'match day experience'. We must ensure that football is affordable but even with our limited budgets there are many things which with a little imagination and plenty of enthusiasm clubs can do to encourage watching and, of course, participating in the game we all love."

Bob Doris MSP has lodged a parliamentary motion in support of the community programme and hopes to instigate a debate at parliament and encourage cross party support: "We all have to work together to ensure the success of this scheme and that 2014 legacy plan objectives are met. There is a massive potential for other football clubs the length and breadth of Scotland to emulate the efforts of Partick Thistle’s programme in line with the core principles of the Glasgow 2014 legacy plan."

Following the 2014 legacy debate in Parliament Shona Robison MSP, Minister for Health and Sport, agreed to visit Partick Thistle to learn more about the programme.