Agenda item

To consider the following Tourism, Leisure and Culture related reports scheduled for Cabinet consideration on 14 April:

·       Our Museum: Poole Museum Redevelopment

·       Management & Development of Leisure Centres

The O&S Board is asked to scrutinise the reports and make recommendations to Cabinet as appropriate.

Cabinet member invited to attend for this item: Councillor Mohan Iyengar, Portfolio Holder for Tourism, Leisure and Culture

The Cabinet report for this item is included with the agenda for consideration by the Overview and Scrutiny Board.

Please note: A number of appendices for the Management and Development of Leisure Centres item contain exempt information under paragraph 3, Information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information, of schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972.  If the Board wishes to discuss information contained within the appendices the Board may need to resolve to Exclude the Press and Public from the meeting during this consideration.

Our Museum: Poole Museum Redevelopment

The Portfolio Holder for Tourism, Leisure and Culture presented a report, a copy of which had been circulated to each Member and a copy of which appears as Appendix 'C' to these Minutes in the Minute Book. The Portfolio Holder outlined the key issues within the report. The Portfolio Holder and the Poole Museum Manager responded to comments and requests for clarification, details included:

• Part of the cultural compact was to get a board/wider forum in place to ensure that there was a fluid and diverse mechanism to uplift the cultural scene across the conurbation.
• A series of public engagement sessions had recently concluded and the national lottery heritage fund had congratulated the council on the inclusiveness of these sessions.
• Traditionally, Scaplen’s Court had been an immersive schools experience for many years and the same advantage had not been taken with the museum to date, which would be addressed as part of these proposals to bring a ‘wow factor’ to the museum and there were plans for immersive digital interaction and opportunities for play activities as part of this project.
• The history centre would be moved out of the Town Cellars and relocated to the museum to allow this historic building to be shown off to members of the public.
• Officers were confident that moving the café from the main museum to the Scaplen’s Court building would not cause any harm and would in fact bring the space that it currently occupies into community use, whilst creating more ‘covers’ for the café in its new location.
• There was no intention to charge for entry into the museum, although it was acknowledged that there would need to be a review of the museum operation policies across the conurbation and possibly harmonise them in the future, although it was highlighted that the various museums have different offerings, so this would need to be addressed carefully.
• It was an ambition for hireable community spaces to remain as inexpensive as possible to ensure that local groups were not outpriced of being able to use the facility.
• One of the main opportunities that these proposals provided was to increase the dwell time of visitors and therefore increase revenue raised by, catering, donations and retail etc. As the proposals were not actually increasing the footprint of the existing buildings it was projected that the revenue created from increased visitor numbers would offset the additional costs of the operation.

Management & Development of Leisure Centres

The Portfolio Holder for Tourism, Leisure and Culture presented a report, a copy of which had been circulated to each Member and a copy of which appears as Appendix 'D' to these Minutes in the Minute Book. The Portfolio Holder outlined the key issues within the report. The Portfolio Holder and the Head of Leisure responded to comments and requests for clarification, details included:

• The project to review the management of leisure centres was due to commence imminently (within the next few months) and whilst it would have been preferable not to undertake these short-term extensions, circumstances had made this unavoidable.
• It was important that when undertaking engagement with members and members of the public as part of the review exercise that it was wholly inclusive and the Portfolio Holder welcomed any forthcoming advice and discussions as to how this might be undertaken. There was an opportunity for the council to think differently and comments would be taken on board in relation to the inclusion of niche groups to reflect the changes to sports and recreation over recent years.

In order to discuss the information contained within the confidential appendices, the Board passed the following motion

“RESOLVED that under Section 100 (A)(4) of the Local Government Act 1972, the public be excluded from the meeting for the following items of business on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Paragraph 3 in Part I of Schedule 12A of the Act and that the public interest in withholding the information outweighs such interest in disclosing the information”

• Contracts differed between SLM and BH Live, but both companies had been in receipt of financial support from the council over the past year due to covid.
• The Council needed adequate time to undertake the review of sports and leisure services and therefore the short contract extension as proposed was considered appropriate to ensure that credible and stable management in place.
• The Café at Rossmore leisure centre would be reopened as soon as safe and viable to do so.
• Incentives for members of the public to return to leisure facilities would need to be carefully considered due to cost implications.

Following the discussion on this item, the meeting returned to public session.