'Councillors made the right decision for the local population' - Your Letters: March 14

LEISURE CENTRE FIGHT A SUCCESS

​The group, Campaign to Keep Dudley Borough Leisure A Public Service, would like to thank everyone who put pen to paper, or fingers to keyboards to sign the petition to keep leisure services in public hands. We can now happily report that at a full meeting of Dudley Metropolitan Borough Council, 38 councillors voted in favour of keeping our leisure centres in public hands and 33 voted against, a clear majority, we were absolutely delighted!

The centres, after this vote, will stop in council hands. We have to remember that Council Tax payers paid £18.4 millions for the new centre in Dudley - The Duncan Edwards - and £8.4 million for the refurbishment of Halesowen Leisure Centre.

I must mention that, quite disappointingly, £26,000 was also spent on consultants looking at outsourcing.

I am sure that the council will now promote our centres and watch them go from strength to strength under public control. These services, swimming pools and leisure centres provide enjoyable amenities, meeting places and help to keep the population healthy.

Dudley MBC have a really good staff in these centres who have also been against the privatisation, because it makes absolutely no sense! The grey clouds of privatisation have hung over them for over a year and now the sun shines. There should be stability and a desire to move forward.