Centre stolen

The Six Villages sports complex has now been stolen from the general population of the Six Villages. It has gone with a limited amount of fuss from all in our local government. West Sussex County Council and Arun District Council seem powerless to prevent this theft from the local people of the six villages.

The education department at West Sussex made no response to our questions. We do know the parish council of Aldingbourne did at least make an effort and a few individual councillors from the parish and district councils tried to prevent the closure. Sadly, this has not stopped Ormiston academy from closing the centre and closing the clubs associated with it.

The academy has claimed individuals can hire the centre outside school hours up to 7pm, but with this comes things like insurance, management time etc. This is what Freedom Leisure supplied along with trained staff for first aid.

So it is a very sad day that despite the calls for all people to get fit, doctors calling for more public gyms, and schools wanting to integrate more with their communities, Ormiston Academy is going in the opposite direction. It took them just 6 weeks from announcing the closure to making it happen. Freedom Leisure had a part in it being such a quick closure. But in the end it is the Acadamy who have stolen our facility.

We can only hope this will now have an impact on the planning department at Arun DC, and stop the building of the 2,000 plus properties that planning permission is being sort.

George Stapley-jones

Barnetts Field, Westergate