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Crumbling baths are thrown £22m lifeline
Critics attack plan to spend £9m saving learners’ pool
A NEW £22.7 million plan to refurbish Kentish Town Baths has been unveiled by the coalition administration at the Town Hall.
The Liberal Democrat and Conservative alliance has torn up Labour’s proposals for the pool and now plans to pump more money into the project to save the learners’ pool.
The beginners’ pool was to be sacrificed under Labour, which drew up a cheaper makeover scheme worth closer to £14 million. It would have involved selling some of the land at the Prince of Wales Road site for private housing.
Council chiefs said on Monday they were heading towards a larger rescue package for the Victorian pool, which is prone to breakdowns and in desperate need of investment.
Liberal Democrat leisure chief Councillor Flick Rea said: “I am delighted it looks like we are going ahead with this. I made the promise that we would do this and now we are honouring it. It was a big thing for me.”
The plans have to be ratified by the Town Hall’s cabinet of senior councillors and will then be discussed with swimmers in a series of consultation meetings and open days.
Labour, now in opposition, immediately reacted to the announcement by claiming the extra spending was misguided.
Councillor Theo Blackwell said: “Is spending £9 million on a training pool ‘better and cheaper’? Could the borrowing and finance from the reserves be better spent? If the purpose is to train kids to swim, for £9 million Camden could hire Ian Thorpe or Duncan Goodhew to teach an entire generation to compete for the Olympics.”
Another senior party source said the Lib Dems were “flip-flopping” one way and then the other over the learners’ pool and had only committed to the full refurbishment after being embarrassed by Labour pressure.
When in power, Labour had proposed spending £14 million on the baths but only after considering closing the pool altogether and building an alternative at nearby Talacre Centre in Dalby Road.
Cllr Rea said Labour had not really had the “heart or will” to improve the baths. She added: “The previous administration just wanted to move it all to Talacre until they realised that the public did not support that idea.”
She added: “It is a story of neglect. People need to see the inside of the building to see the scale of the problem. It is a sorry building that needs a lot of work done to it.
“We have come up with a scheme that includes keeping the learner pool and if all goes well we can get to work on it as quickly as possible. It is important to me but I have kept quiet until I knew the money was available.”
The refurbishment of the baths was described as a “big ticket” priority for the new administration by Liberal Democrat finance chief Councillor Janet Grauberg on Monday. She said it was possible to splash out on the pool and still freeze next year’s council tax by finding savings elsewhere. |
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