Vital leisure centres are being left high and dry

I took a notion recently to go on a water slide. I’d been staying with my parents for a few days so perhaps regression was at play, though I’m saying that to temper your judgment of a 37-year-old woman seeking dopamine in a rubber dinghy.
Anyway, it didn’t come to anything. The main swimming pool that I frequented as a child closed a few years ago and two others had cordoned off their flumes. “They’re mouldy,” one of the receptionists told me when I asked why. “We need to replace them but there’s no budget.”
It’s a familiar story. Since Covid, community pools and leisure centres have been struggling to stay afloat amid funding cuts and escalating running costs. Last week it emerged that Laidlaw Memorial Pool in Jedburgh, where the Olympian Lucy Hope learnt to swim, is facing closure because it can’t afford to pay its energy bills, which amount to more than £54,000 a year.
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Aberdeen beach leisure centre, Alloa Leisure Bowl and West Lothian Leisure’s pools in Livingston, Broxburn and Armadale have closed. North Lanarkshire council had 12 of its Active NL buildings earmarked for closure last year before reneging on its decision, and a similar scenario played out for eight of Edinburgh Leisure’s venues in January. Headline: they’re safe. Small print: for now.
It’s curious how leisure centres are viewed by the authorities as expendable given how vital they are to our wellbeing. In these egalitarian spaces we find a sense of community and a place to play, be active and learn.
My family didn’t have much money when I was growing up but I didn’t notice because I had access to Lanarkshire’s leisure centres. For a couple of quid, I did gymnastics in Wishaw, ice-skated in Motherwell and learnt to swim in Hamilton. I made friends and birthdays were spent careering along the river rapids at the Time Capsule flumes park in Coatbridge. Life felt rich.
What happens when we lose access to such places? If you’re financially comfortable you can join a gym but if you’re not, you miss out. And children are affected the most: they may not learn how to swim and their mental health as well as their physical health can suffer. Living in a deprived neighbourhood is associated with poor fitness and negative health outcomes, and closing leisure centres will exacerbate this and widen health inequalities.
I’m no Olympic athlete but at my local leisure centre I was equipped with skills that have served me for life. More importantly, though, I was given a place to have fun in, a reason to be cheerful. That’s something we should never let slide.