Falkirk Council: Swimming pools in Falkirk 'could close' warning

The blunt warning was given to members of Falkirk Council’s scrutiny committee today (Thursday), when they heard that there is currently “overprovision” of swimming pools across the district and a review is currently looking at how the costs can be brought down.

The remarks came as the committee was looking at reports that show how the council’s performance compares to other Scottish local authorities.

While there was some good news – including excellent results in education – there were also some worrying figures highlighted.

That includes the cost per attendance of sport and leisure facilities, including swimming pools, which for 2020/21 was £81.44 – double the Scottish average value of £40.36.

Chief executive Kenneth Lawrie told the meeting that a factor in the difference may be that fact that Falkirk’s leisure facilities were not used as Critical Community Response Hubs, Covid-19 vaccination or testing centres as they were in some other local authority areas who may have counted these as ‘visits’.

The figures show the massive impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the cost per visit, which had been £3.89 in 2019/20. But the director of children’s services, Robert Naylor, said that the costs had been a worry since long before the pandemic.

He said: “Fundamentally, we have arguably ‘over-provision of facilities and swimming pools in the Falkirk area. Many other councils only have swimming pools that are public swimming pools – they don’t have swimming pools in every town, as we do.”

Earlier this year, Falkirk Council took the decision to disband Falkirk Community Trust, an arms-length organisation with charitable status that was responsible for sport, culture and leisure locally.

Mr Naylor said that now the Trust was back under council control “we will be looking at the totality of that provision, where it exists and what our opening hours are because it is an area where there is significant improvement needed in terms of the cost per visit”.

Councillor Lorna Binnie – who stepped in to chair the meeting when convener Councillor Bryan McCabe could not attend – asked if there was a timescale for the report.

Mr Naylor said there were “no concrete proposals are yet” but he explained they are currently looking at which sessions are best attended, how much income they bring in and how they compare to other council areas.

Independent councillor Robert Spears asked: “Are you telling us that swimming pools could close?”

Mr Naylor replied bluntly: “Swimming pools could close, yes.”

The meeting also heard that the cost of library services in Falkirk was also much higher than elsewhere in Scotland in the wake of the pandemic. The cost per visit in 2020/21 was £24.79, compared to the Scottish average of £2.88.

Director of transformation, Karen Algie, told the meeting that there is a five-year plan for libraries that includes using them as hubs for other council services.

The cost per visit to museums and galleries rose to £118.80 in Falkirk for 2020/21, compared to a Scottish average of £10.14. The year before in Falkirk, each visit had cost £7.64.

Chief executive Kenneth Lawrie told the meeting that the benchmarking figures are “not a simple comparative tool” as there are great variations between councils in many factors.

However, he said they were a good opportunity for the council to look closely at how well services are performing and get valuable data on how to make improvements.

But he also warned that the Accounts Commission has made it clear that council’s will have to decide what their priorities are as council funding is not enough to tackle everything.

“We will see areas of performance decline in the context of the wider financial position and challenges we face.”