York Hall Saved

Dear all - very good news!

As you may have seen on London Tonight news this evening, the Council agreed earlier this evening to award the new leisure contract for running leisure facilities throughout Tower Hamlets to Greenwich Leisure Ltd. This is a 15-year contract and is an arrangement which secures a ring-fenced £4.72m funding package for YH. The investment which will be made over the next 2 years is enough to undertake all the required maintenance and refurbishment work and to keep the facility open for at least the next 15 years.

The only minor downside is that it will be necessary at some point in 2005-6 temporarily to close the facilities at York Hall in order to allow the maintenance works to go ahead. We have, however, been assured that this will be kept to a minimum and progress of the works are to be monitored closely by the Council. Nor will the temporary closure happen until the new Mile End facilities are up and running. Finally, we have also asked that the User Group be formally constituted and given a more prominent role in the new management of the facility.

So, watch this space! In the current environment and with various pressures on Council budgets, this is probably the best possible result we could have got for York Hall. It is also a tribute to the lobbying and all the hard work which members of the community, the Users Group and the consultative committee have put in over the last year.

Thank you!

Cllr. John Griffiths (Bethnal Green North Ward)
134 Old Ford Road
London E2 9PW
T. 020 8980 2814
M. 07887 643980
E. johngriffiths@tinyonline.co.uk

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