NEWS FROM MEDWAY LABOUR

Medway Labour Calling in the Decision to Demolish Splashes

Today the cabinet of Medway Council will decide to demolish the existing Splashes site, at a cost of over £400,000. The site had originally been earmarked for a £5million redevelopment. Medway Labour and Co-Operative group will be calling this discussion in for further scrutiny as it represents a change of the original plan, with many questions to be answered.

This change will extend the period of time that the community will not have local access to swimming and other exercise facilities, and with no timescales for the new building – or even a confirmation of what will be in the new building – this is too important an issue not to be scrutinised in the appropriate manner.

We are acutely aware that there is no time to waste in ensuing that a vital piece of Medway’s leisure infrastructure is back open to the public, so we will be ensuring that the process causes no unnecessary delay in proceedings.

Medway Labour Regeneration Spokesperson Simon Curry said:

“I remember the Splashes pool with great fondness. Taking my children there on Sunday mornings and teaching them to swim, followed by pancakes and syrup for breakfast!  The question we need to ask is: How will the Council replace such a valuable asset? There is a generation of children which needs facilities like and we have to ask ‘What are the Council’s plans?’.

It is a great shame that the building has been allowed to deteriorate so badly under this administration, and it raises the concerning issue of the other leisure buildings in Medway. That is why we will be urgently calling the cabinet decision in so we can get those answers.”

Medway Labour Group Leader Vince Maple said:

“This project has been very poorly delivered to date. Council agreed on a cross party basis investment into the much-loved Splashes site of £5 million at a time of large financial pressures on local government.  We then had the shock that hard working staff were made redundant, with no mention of this in the council report.  Now we find the cabinet seeking to agree the site will need to be demolished with no clarity on the overall cost of the project or indeed timescale.

Labour & Co-operative colleagues will be calling this decision in so we can have the much more detailed discussions before proceeding. We hope to see this call-in discussed at the next Overview & Scrutiny committee which is just two days after the likely cabinet decision.”