Over the weeks of campaigns the scale of the cuts has seemed to get worse, with arms-length leisure service providers ‘Kirklees Active Leisure’ now guaranteeing to keep only Huddersfield and Spen Valley leisure centres open. This time last year it ran 13 centres across Kirklees!
On our first stall we found that many people were still shocked about the proposals, but a week later there was far more awareness of the cuts and a bigger mood to discuss what we could do about them.
We promoted the upcoming lobby of the council on 18 October, but also explained the need for the council to fight for the funding needed to keep services open. Many people agreed that an incoming Labour government could pledge to restore council funding, making these cuts by a Labour council totally unnecessary.
Dewsbury is among a number of towns to have been granted £20 million from the ‘levelling-up fund’, but this money hasn’t been granted for keeping public services running; instead it’s for ‘sprucing up’ town centres. As one person signing our petition commented: “What’s the point in putting planters in our town centre to make it look nice if we don’t have a leisure centre or anything else people want to come here for!”
Iain Dalton
