Beacon: Busy centre sends more powerful message than petition - sports bosses

In addition to this, the trust has taken on the management and operation of more council facilities and currently manages fourteen across Fife.

“The trust has had to take the necessary steps to adjust its service provision accordingly so that we can fulfil our duty to provide affordable, accessible and, importantly, sustainable opportunities for the communities of Fife in accordance with the legal services agreement that we have with the local authority.

“In addition, internal budget savings have been ongoing over a number of years and the trust has highlighted its concerns to Fife Council with regards to the threat of the reduced management fee on customers.

“The trust is also faced with growing local competition from private suppliers who, unlike the trust, do not have the charitable commitments to deliver a comparable range of services for people of all ages and abilities or provide concession schemes to support the inequality agenda.

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“To claim that the trust has mismanaged its responsibilities, or, has failed to fulfil its service obligations is untrue. Fife Council commissioned an external consultant to appraise Trusts delivering services in Fife. From this appraisal, an analysis of the council management fee shown as percentage of income for Trusts in Scotland, shows that Fife Sports and Leisure Trust was jointly the best performing trust in Scotland.

“The trust is fully committed to delivering on its objectives to improve the health and wellbeing of local communities – it has consistently grown attendance levels, engaged more swimmers on to its Learn to Swim programme, increased participation from target user groups such as older adults and young people and supported more people living with long-term health conditions to improve symptoms with increased physical activity.

“The last thing the trust wants to do is decrease its operating hours or close facilities.

“It is equally alarming and demoralising for our staff, who work hard to deliver quality facilities and programmes and engage with users, as it is for our customers, for claims to be made that the trust’s primary agenda is to cut services when this is not the case.

“We would encourage local people who care about the centre, that as a charitable trust that reinvests back into facilities and programmes, we rely on customers choosing the trust rather than a private gym – and that a well-attended local facility sends a more powerful message than a petition and would help us influence decision makers of the importance of the Beacon Leisure Centre.”