Update from Newark and Sherwood District Council on Southwell Leisure Centre

“Well over a year ago, Newark and Sherwood District Council proposed building a new swimming pool attached to Southwell Leisure Centre. The estimated cost was £5.5m and the Council considered that the construction of a new pool was better value for money than repairing the old pool. The construction of a new swimming pool was considered to be the first step towards construction of a new leisure centre for the local community.

“Frustratingly, the Trustees of Southwell Leisure Centre initially wanted the Council to repair the old pool as well as provide a new one and when the Council made it clear that this was not an option, the Trustees decided to persevere with repairing the pool and in doing so rejected the offer of a new pool. Ever since the pool has been closed, the Council has made it clear that spending over half a million pounds repairing an old pool in an old building is not the best use of tax-payers money, it would be like using sticking tape. 

“Trustees previously claimed that the pool could be repaired at a fraction of the Council’s estimated cost, but it now turns out that isn’t the case. By now, we would have been well down the road towards construction of a new swimming pool. Instead, Southwell Leisure Centre Trust has taken 12 months to source quotations for a repair that it can’t afford to undertake. It’s quite a ridiculous situation that is of the Trust’s own making.

“The reality is that Southwell Leisure Centre Trust owns a facility that it can’t afford to maintain and operate and wants the Council to bail it out from its own responsibilities as the owner and landlord of the centre. The Council does not want to remain in a relationship with Southwell Leisure Centre Trust and has offered the Trust sufficient money it said it needed to repair the pool in return for surrender of its lease. So, the fact that the pool remains closed with no new pool to replace it is down to the Trust and if the Trust want the pool repaired, the Council has offered the money to do that. We will meet with the Trustees, yet again, to help progress this for the people of Southwell who quite frankly deserve better… in fact they deserve the new pool we initially offered.”