Agenda and minutes

No declarations of interest were made.

RESOLVED

that the minutes of the meeting of the Panel held on 15^th March, 2016, be received and approved.

The Chairman introduced the item and explained that the report had been submitted to the Panel to update Members on key projects within the Council’s Corporate Plan (2016-2019).  These included the Leisure Review outcomes and the feasibility for a replacement for the Festival Hall Leisure Centre (which would be informed by the final outcome of the Leisure Review and its accompanying consultation process).

The intention was for Members to consider the report and provide them with an opportunity to comment and discuss with officers the Leisure Review findings, the Leisure Review consultation process, the Targeted Wellbeing Activities Programme and the Sport England Pilot on Commissioning.  Any feedback/responses would be taken back by the Service Director and the Portfolio Holder to feed into the overall consultation process.  Once the evaluation was completed, a report would be submitted to Cabinet for final consideration and approval.

At this point the Chairman introduced the Council’s Interim Service Director for Planning and Economic Development, Carol Cooper-Smith, the Leisure Performance Officer, Joy Elmer and the current Portfolio Holder for Health and Wellbeing, Councillor Jim Aspinall.

The Portfolio Holder for Health and Wellbeing addressed the Panel and explained that the Leisure Review had been driven by the Council’s desire to continue to improve the health and wellbeing of Ashfield residents.  It had been recognised that the health of people in Ashfield was generally worse than the England average, with a related reduction in life expectancies for both men and women.  A number of diseases were also currently on the increase and affecting people at an earlier age including cancer, diabetes, obesity, hypertension and depression.

The review has focussed mainly on the leisure centres and had received assistance from Sport England and the Chief Leisure Officers’ Association (CLOA) who lent support to local Councils in relation to developing and building better relationships with commissioners and ensuring sport becomes a strategic partner that contributes to local commissioning priorities.

Specialist leisure consultants, FMG Consulting Limited, were commissioned to assist with the review of the Council’s leisure facilities.  In summary the outcomes from the review had revealed that three of the leisure centres were performing well and/or adequately (Lammas/Hucknall/Festival Hall) with the remaining three falling short of their performance targets (Huthwaite/Edgewood/Selston).

For each leisure centre, high level analysis of income, expenditure and performance had been benchmarked against key performance indicators taking into account local competition, operational philosophy, age, quality and design of facilities, any programming restrictions such as joint use agreements, geographical differences and demographics.  Following this exercise, it had been acknowledged that the four worst performing centres (Huthwaite/Edgewood/Selston/Festival Hall) were most probably struggling due to the age, quality and condition of their buildings as compared to the more modern facilities.

The Portfolio Holder proceeded to take Members through the findings for each of the leisure centres and outlined the costs per visit (by dividing the management fee by the number of attendances) as follows:-

·         Edgewood LC - £1.72

·         Festival Hall LC - £2.03

·         Hucknall LC - 0.27p

·         Huthwaite LC -  ...  view the full minutes text for item 3.