Communities across Cornwall are being urged to support their local leisure centres and help protect them from permanent closure.

Greenwich Leisure Limited (GLL) runs 14 Better leisure facilities across Cornwall on behalf of Cornwall Council. It is a charitable social enterprise and not-for-profit organisation that employs over 900 people across Cornwall.

Following a month-long closure during Lockdown 2.0, all GLL leisure centres and swimming pools reopened on Wednesday. Now they need your support to ensure they remain financially viable.

Cornwall Councillor Mike Eathorne-Gibbons, Cabinet member with oversight of the leisure agreement between the Council and GLL, said: “We live in a beautiful county that is predominantly surrounded by water. We desperately need these centres to ensure that children can learn how to swim and that families have access to facilities to help them stay healthy and active. We must protect these essential community facilities.”

Adam Paynter, deputy leader of Cornwall Council, said: “The Council has provided significant funding to support leisure centres this year. Without extra support from the government there is a risk that some centres may have to close if they continue operating at a loss. We are urging local communities to support their local centres to help prevent this from happening.” 

All GLL leisure centres were operating in a Covid-secure manner prior to lockdown 2.0. Those measures remain in place to keep staff and customers safe.

James Curry, GLL’s Head of Service in Cornwall, said: “We’re working really hard to keep everyone safe and keeping fit and healthy has never been more important. We’re really pleased with the very positive feedback we’ve been getting and urge people to use their local leisure centres as much as possible. We have opened all our leisure facilities, including swimming pools, this week but long periods of closure have obviously had a severe impact on our finances. This really is a case of use what’s available or risk not having it there in the future.” 

Cornwall Council has provided a financial relief package for the county’s leisure centre providers.

The vast majority of the funding, which was announced in September, was in the form of loans to the providers totalling up to £4.4m. It also included additional grants, loan holidays and contract payments totalling approximately £1.7m which was funded from Council reserves. 

GLL is offering half price membership throughout December, with no joining fee. For details, visit https://www.better.org.uk/memberships/gym-membership-deals-and-offers.

GLL has implemented a safer, better, stronger approach under coronavirus regulations to keep its centres as safe and comfortable as possible.  

This means centres are operating at reduced capacity and all activities must be booked in advance through the Better UK app.

Details on how to do this are available on https://www.better.org.uk/coronavirus/booking or by visiting a centre and asking staff to help.