Confusion over footie pitch ‘sale’
‘Banks’claim has community baffled
Deep confusion surrounds the status of a stretch of land at Perth’s Murray Royal Hospital.
NHS Tayside this week denied it had disposed of the land despite a community group claiming they had been told it had been sold.
Community councillors, convinced they were on the cusp of finally getting the health board to agree to ‘fix’ a poor quality football pitch it created in the hospital’s grounds years ago, were said to be shocked when a boss seemingly suggested the land it is on now belongs to “banks”.
It was believed NHS Tayside’s head of property Mark Anderson had made the suggestion at a recent meeting he had with two members of Bridgend, Gannochy and Kinnoull Community Council who thought Mr Anderson had arranged the session to discuss how the pitch could be upgraded.
The pitch was supposed to be a likefor-like replacement for one that was lost years ago during the construction of the hospital’s newest buildings, but it is understood local players have rarely if ever used it because they consider its condition to be so poor.
The group scored a minor victory in its long-running battle to have the health board make the much-maligned pitch playable last year after taking their complaints about its construction to the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman.
It concluded council officials failed to specify in a planning agreement the pitch should have been built to the same standard as the pitch it was supposed to replace and recommended the local authority liaise with the community council and together persuade NHS Tayside to construct a proper pitch.
However the community council’s vice chair, Dave Beattie, told the PA this week his colleagues cut short their latest meeting with NHS officials, including Mr Anderson, after concluding there was nothing to discuss if the land had been sold and it was only after the two men had returned home they began to ask questions about the supposed sale.
Mr Beattie said: “Two of our councillors had a meeting with NHS Tayside to talk about further improvements to the [football pitch] and at that meeting Mr Anderson told us that NHS Tayside no longer owns the ground.
“He said he wasn’t certain to whom it was sold but indicated it might be a consortium of banks.
“They weren’t prepared to say any
The former football pitch on land at Murray Royal Hospital, Perth more but they did tell us they had sold it. Our guys were gobsmacked.”
Asked for what purpose anyone would want to buy the land Mr Beattie was stumped. “It sounds incredible,” he said. “I cannot understand how a piece of land like that, which is designated as community space, could have any commercial value.”
But when the PA asked NHS Tayside this week to confirm what it is claimed Mr Anderson said a spokesperson flat out denied it had sold the land.
They said: “We have looked into this, and the land has not been sold.”
Reacting to that statement Mr Beattie said he was still concerned something was amiss and the group would be seeking further clarity from the board on the current status of the land now under scrutiny before their next public meeting this coming Thursday.
“We’re writing to NHS Tayside’s chief executive asking for an explanation,” he said. “We’ll follow up from there.”