Coronavirus costs to leisure centres could set Daventry District Council back between £300-600k

The pandemic forced all leisure facilities across the country to lock their doors in March, with the decision leading to the closure of Daventry and Moulton (Chris Moody) Leisure Centres and Daventry Sports Park.

A report outlining the financial costs of that decision has now been made public, and will be discussed at an upcoming strategy group meeting of councillors to be held virtually on Thursday (July 9).

The report states: “Urgent action was taken to support the council’s operator, Sports & Leisure Management (SLM, which trades as Everyone Active) in retaining staff and keeping facilities in a state to permit reopening once this was otherwise possible.”

Since the closures, the district council has been supporting SLM to the tune of £36,000 per month, meaning costs for the three months since then have amounted to £108,000. This is inclusive of £17,000 a month towards pay for furloughed staff, £5,000 a month for staffing to keep the facilities in a fit state for when they reopen, and £14,000 in management fees which were due to be paid to the council being forgone.

It is anticipated given recent government announcements that the facilities could reopen by the end of July or start of August, but SLM anticipates that it will lead to ‘significant’ monthly deficits on reopening.

It estimates that the financial deficit for the rest of the financial year (until April 2021) could be a £300,000 loss, with £1.31 million in operating costs offset only by projected income of about £740,000, and with the furlough and management fee savings.

The report states: “This financial forecast has been developed using research from Sport England and sports governing bodies such as Swim England. This has been further refined using SLM’s industry knowledge.

“Although the best data currently available has been used to develop the financial forecast whether the public chose to return to leisure facilities is clearly a matter of personal preference and perception of risk. This unknown variable has significant potential to alter the forecast budget, either positively or negatively.

“Once the facilities have reopened the effect of public confidence and willingness to return to leisure facilities would be monitored and the figures revised accordingly.”

At the meeting, officers will recommend to councillors that chief executive Ian Vincent – in consultation with leader Councillor Richard Auger – be authorised to make the budget adjustments required.

A cap of £600,000 has been suggested, of which £108,000 will already have been used by the end of June, and that headroom of £194,000 would be allowed over the current projections.

“This should allow sufficient flexibility to make it possible to manage the situation between scheduled council meetings”, the report concludes.