Hurrah for Minnie Driver - as she speaks up for Brynaman Lido

Hurrah for Minnie Driver, the star of "Hunky Dory", as she speaks up for Brynaman Lido.

See latest news in the Western Mail (Wales Online)

http://www.walesonline.co.uk

http://www.walesonline.co.uk/footballnation/football-news/2010/08/20/hollywood-star-calls-for-wales-only-lido-to-be-opened-91466-27101965/

In the above article the Council are still claiming that repairs would cost £100,000 pounds which is five times the figure they were giving when the news was first broken towards the end of July. It would seem that the cost of the repairs is in direct proportion to the Council's embarassment over this whole situation: the greater the adverse publicity, the higher the cost of re-opening the Lido.

Will Broomhill Pool get MUGA - ered?

I have recently submitted a letter to both the local newspapers, but, because it is rather long, it is likely to be edited. Below is the full text of the letter:

Dear Sir, On July 1st this year a national newspaper openly named one of the bidders for Broomhill Pool as Fusion Lifestyle. As a consequence of this declaration I tabled Questions at the "full council" meeting of Ipswich Borough Council, held later in July, to ask what timetable the Council had set for the consideration of bids for the pool site. It is now nearly a year since the council first advertised for Expressions of Interest and the original deadline for interested bidders was meant to be in February 2010; since that time the council has moved the goalposts quite considerably so that when the article headed "Rival bidders want to buy historic lido" was published, Councillor Andrew Cann is quoted there as saying "the bids were in by June". Certainly no-one can accuse the council of rushing to find a solution for the Broomhill Lido; "mothballing" this Grade II Listed building was originally meant to be an option for one year only, but eight full years have now passed and in the autumn of this year the steadfast campaign to save the pool will move into its ninth year. No-one would guess that the pool was Suffolk's top icon as voted for on Choose Suffolk's new website and that its recent history has been dogged not just by endless delays, but also an attempt to effectively sabotage all restoration by voting through measures to fill the pool in with sand and granular infill in the run up to Christmas 2008. The people of Ipswich need to be aware that it is extremely unlikely that there truly are "rival bids" for the pool site, The bid submitted by Fusion Lifestyle will be for the full restoration of the site, because Fusion already manage 52 sports, leisure and community centres, including 41 swimming pools, two of which are Grade II Listed. For example at Brockwell Park Lido in Herne Hill, the changing rooms have been imaginatively converted into fitness and dance studios, spa facilities, meeting rooms for youth groups etc. and these all-the-year round activities successfuly subsidise the lido itself. The so-called 'rival' bid for the site is unlikely to include the restoration of the pool, because Ipswich Borough Council very cleverly avoided this requirement when they advertised the pool site last autumn; bids were simply invited for recreational/leisure purposes and there is therefore a danger that Broomhill Pool could be "mugged" ie turned into a Multi-Use Games Area (MUGA). I hope that I am wrong, but nothing in the council's scandalous mothballing neglect of this particular asset gives me much optimism that they are treating the Fusion bid with the respect it deserves. This is our last chance to get an Olympic-sized swimming pool for the foreseeable future; IBC have already tried and failed to get a 50 metre indoor pool and in the current recession any hopes of this happening have to be shelved; but a 50 metre open air pool is very much within our grasp at a price that is 66% less than the one quoted in 2002. Back then, IBC said they needed £3 million to save Broomhill, now they need just £1million, because Fusion will take on responsibility for all other fundraising. One million pounds may still sound a lot, but there are pockets of money that IBC can call on eg at the last Executive meeting on 3rd August, the papers show that the balance of the unallocated budget for the Community Improvements Programme for the year 2010/11 was £266,210 and the balance of the unallocated budget for the Area Forums amounted to a further sum of nearly £130,000. This is a total of nearly £400,000 for a start, so it can hardly be beyond the council's reach to organise a little more. After all, if the restoration of Broomhill would not be a community improvement then what would? I hope the Council take this chance to say "yes" to Fusion and restore to the town the pool for which we have campaigned for so long, Yours sincerely

New window Print all

Swimclub thread on Brynaman Pool attracts over 1000 views

The Swimclub thread on the Brynaman Pool has now attracted over 1000 views:

http://www.swimclub.co.uk/forum/showthread.php?t=14169

The latest post is about the council's Community Regeneration Team, which apparently has invested nine million pounds in Carmarthenshire's communities to "empower them", strengthen their identities, protect leisure and cultural facilities etc.

If the Community Regeneration Team has access to this kind of funding then it should definitiely be supporting the people of Brynaman in their fight to save their lido, because this pool is most certainly a part of the community's 'identity'.

This is the nonsense of modern funding: how can Carmarthenshire County Council claim that they can't afford to spend an extra £12,000 repairing the pool whilst the Regeneration team boasts of a nine million pound investment?

Brynaman Pool needs more than vague reassurances

The Deputy Leader of Carmarthenshire County Council has been pledging that the Council will do all they can to re-open Brynaman Pool next year. Unfortunately, these kind of vague reassurances have no value whatsoever without a detailed survey, a proper budget and an exact timetable for the repair work.

Estimates for repairing the pool are currently varying between £20,000 and £100,000 depending on what newspaper you read! For example in the South Wales Evening Post on August 4th 2010 the Council were claiming the upper figure was needed and also claiming (erroneously) that the film company had offered £20,000.

I have taken the trouble to double check with Chris Hill, the Location Manager for "Hunky Dory", and at no time did the film company offer the Council £20,000; and yet the council made this statement in the South Wales Evening Post last week: "When the (film) producers heard the pool would have cost £100,000 to repair and not the initial £20,000 they had offered, they backed off."

Furthermore the Council remain "at a loss" to explain why they didn't alert the Brynaman Swimming Pool Association sooner about the need for repairs. This phrase occurs in the article written in the South Wales Guardian. I believe I can help them out here: the reason why the Council cannot adequately explain the delay is because they planned it that way! They knew they were not going to open the pool and they also knew they couldn't afford to give BSPA too much notice, because otherwise there would have been time for a concerted protest: therefore presenting the people of Brynaman with a fait accompli was their chosen method of closure.

I doubt if they had prepared themselves for the publicity that has followed this unpleasant piece of council deviousness.


http://www.southwalesguardian.co.uk/news/8311034.Council_boss_offers_Brynaman_pool_campaigners_some_hope/

Bereft in Brynaman - Article for the Outdoor Swimming Society

"BEREFT IN BRYNAMAN"

An article about the closure of the Brynaman Pool this summer (2010).

I wrote this article on 29th/30th July 2010 and sent it in to the Outdoor Swimming Society.
It is now available on the news section of the OSS

http://www.outdoorswimmingsociety.com/index.php?p=news#234

Photo is courtesey of the Brynaman Swimming Pool Association

Did Carmarthenshire County Council turn down the producer of "Billy Elliot"?

When the news about the Brynaman Pool closure broke last week, one of the additional items of news was that a film company had been planning to use the lido as one of its locations this summer.

As far as I can gather the film is called Hunky Dory and the producer of this is Jon Finn, the producer of the film "Billy Elliot"!

Did Carmarthenshire County Council really turn this opportunity down and if so did they realize what it was they were saying "no" to?

If I have got any of my facts wrong here, I would like to know; but I have been researching all afternoon and Hunky Dory is certainly being shot this summer in Wales, with one of the stars being Minnie Driver.

Have just contacted one of the production team of Hunky Dory and it's true. The Council have said 'no' to the lido being used as a film location.

It would therefore appear that in their eagerness to close Brynaman Pool, Carmarthenshire County Council have bypassed the opportunity to showcase local Welsh talent - actors, musicians, singers etc - and to put Brynaman on the map in a highly positive way. This would have been a boost for tourism in the area as people love to visit places that have been used as film locations. Not so hunky-dory. My guess is that the council made up their minds to close the pool months ago and then were not flexible enough to change their plans when the film opportunity came along

Brynaman Pool - no funds for repairs claims Carmarthenshire County Council

Traditionally the Brynaman Pool in Wales opens in time for the summer holidays; this is the last lido in Wales and Carmarthenshire County Council claim to be proud of it.

However, actions always speak louder than words and just as the pool was due to open, the council informed devastated residents that £20,000 worth of repairs was needed which the council could not afford. Their normal maintenance budget is about £2,000 - £3,000 and the harsh winter weather, they claim, had damaged the pool more than they'd realized.

I find it hard to believe their pleas of poverty: this is the council which is willing to spend far in excess of £100,000 per annum just to distribute their self-congratulatory "Community News". six times a year. Their expenditure on consultants is also likely to be excessive because in reply to a Freedom of Information request they claimed the information would take too long to collate!
They were also mentioned by Watchdog for wasteful practices in regard to their use of chauffering services: the hire of a lease car, fuel etc came to more than £12,000 and this did not include the cost of wages for the drivers.

The picture becomes even less believable when you consider that the local Brynaman Swimming Pool group offered a £5,000 contribution towards the £20,000, but the county council (with a budget in excess of £500 million) still claim they cannot contribute the remaining £15,000.

At the moment Carmarthenshire County Council are saying that the pool is not closed: it simply won't open this year! They are promising that it will be open again in 2011, but I think the pool is greatly at risk of never opening again. Leisure Consultants Torkildsen Barclay advised the Council back in 2000/2001 to step back from funding the pool: outdoor pools are seen by such bodies as "poor value for money" because they are "weather dependent" and only open six weeks a year."

The fact that local children look forward greatly to these particular six weeks cuts no ice with those being chauffered around at considerable expense to council taxpayers.

I hope that those trying to save the pool will not too readily believe the council's assurances for 2011.