Agenda item

Appendix 2 to the report is in the private section of the agenda at Item 17.

Further to Minute 28 (11 July 2017), the Cabinet Member for Community Leadership and Engagement presented a report on proposals to significantly enhance the football and associated facilities at Parsloes Park.

The Cabinet Member explained that Parsloes Park was a regionally significant park for its football pitch provision.  The pitches and associated facilities had become run down and required significant investment in order to deliver the aims of the Council’s Parks and Open Spaces Strategy, the Borough Manifesto and the Corporate Plan.  Discussions had taken place with The Football Foundation, Sport England and the Essex County Football Association regarding a major improvement project via the ‘Parklife’ programme, a national scheme that provided capital investment for sites such as Parsloes Park and the Cabinet Member advised that a c.£6m project had been developed which would deliver accessible, state-of-the-art facilities including:

·  New changing facilities incorporating eight team changing rooms (suitable for use by children and adult teams) and changing rooms for officials;

·  55 station gym, dance studio and gym change;

·  Bar, café and social space;

·  Public toilets and disabled toilets (to ‘changing places’ standard);

·  Three artificial grass pitches with floodlighting that could be used for 11-a-side football matches and compartmentalised to accommodate multiple mini, junior and five-a-side games being played simultaneously; and

·  Subject to funding, one of the pitches to be stadia standard (National Ground Grading Category F criteria), which allowed for football to be played up to Step 5 level.

The Cabinet Member outlined the capital funding required for the project to proceed, which included a £3.6m contribution from The Football Foundation and a total of £1.35m of Council funding.  Of that sum, £0.6m was proposed to be met from Strategic Community Infrastructure Levy (Strategic CIL) funding and £0.35m from Section 106 funding.  It was also acknowledged that all revenue costs associated with the operation of the new facilities would be met by the London Football Trust, a pan-London charitable trust set up to manage the new facilities via a long-term lease from the Council with full repairing and insuring responsibilities at a peppercorn rent. 

Cabinet Members spoke in support of the project and were pleased to learn that a minimum of 40% of the available usage time at the new facilities would be made available to local groups.  The Leader also referred to the intention to invite the local community to choose between two designs for a statue of Bobby Moore and suggested that Parsloes Park would be an appropriate location as he had honed his skills on the pitches back in the 1950’s.

The Cabinet resolved to:

(i)  Approve the creation of a football hub of regional significance to replace and greatly enhance the life-expired sports facilities in Parsloes Park, as set out in the report and the site plan at Appendix 1 to the report;

(ii)  Note that the delivery of the c£6 million scheme to the proposed specification shall be dependent on a significant level of external capital funding that had yet to be confirmed, although decisions were pending;

(iii)  Note that there shall be no additional revenue cost to the Council from the operation of the new facilities; 

(iv)  Authorise the Director of Law and Governance, or an authorised delegate on her behalf, to enter into a 30-year lease, on a full repairing and insuring basis at a peppercorn rent, for the new Parsloes Park football hub facilities with the London Football Trust, subject to satisfactory negotiation of the lease requirements set out in the proposed funding agreement with the Football Foundation;

(v)  Approve the procurement of a design and build contract for new sports facilities at Parsloes Park (to be funded as part of the Parklife programme) utilising the existing 3G AGP Framework and the Modular Supplier Framework for ChangingRooms used by The Football Foundation and its funding partners, in accordance with the strategy set out in the report;

(vi)  Delegate authority to the Commissioning Director of Culture and Recreation, in consultation with Cabinet Members for Community Leadership and Engagement and Finance, Performance and Core Services, the Chief Operating Officer and the Director of Law and Governance, to conduct the procurement and enter into the contract and all other necessary or ancillary agreements with the successful bidder(s) in accordance with the strategy set out in the report; and

(vii)  Note the intention of the London Football Trust to undertake a single stage tender process to procure the services of a leisure operator to manage the new sports facilities at Parsloes Park via a Service Concession Contract.