Schools bosses 'misled' council over sports fees

Published on Thursday 10 December 2009 08:37

A SENIOR councillor has accused education bosses of "misleading" him and his colleagues by "hiding" a hike in charges for hiring school facilities and gym halls.

Ricky Henderson has put in an official complaint to education director Gillian Tee, claiming that information was deliberately withheld from councillors over the charges to clubs and community groups for hiring school facilities after hours.

A report presented to members of the education committee recommended that councillors agreed to implement a set fee for lets throughout all of Edinburgh's 23 high schools in order to eradicate the "unfair" and "confusing" difference in rates charged from school to school.

In it, the council argued some clubs and community groups were actually being charged more for hiring school facilities – particularly at weekends – than they would be if they used Edinburgh Leisure facilities.

However, the report did not include school-by-school charges for facilities such as football pitches or badminton courts to back up these claims, nor did it compare each school's charging policies with Edinburgh Leisure.

According to Councillor Henderson, this omission was a deliberate ploy to mislead councillors into thinking that bringing prices in line with Edinburgh Leisure would offer community groups a better deal.

He has now managed to secure an earlier version of the same report, which does include these figures, and they show that the majority of schools charge less than Edinburgh Leisure's rates.

Cllr Henderson, who is Labour's education spokesman, said: "This is the type of detailed information elected members should have, yet it was excluded, and there was even a paragraph in the report that said that the information isn't available.

"There may well be an innocent explanation as to why we weren't given this information, but I have yet to hear it.

"As a result of this, the report that went to members was incomplete and misleading."

The figures from the earlier report show that of the various facilities offered throughout the 23 high schools, almost 90 per cent are cheaper than Edinburgh Leisure from Monday to Saturday. On Sundays, 68 per cent of facilities are cheaper in schools than Edinburgh Leisure.

Cllr Henderson added: "What it's going to mean is quite a significant rise in the vast majority of cases and the charges are going to be passed on to users and community and sports groups.

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A council spokesman said: "This is a significant project with some way to go and the report presented interim findings only.

"At an early drafting stage we took the decision not to include the price summary because figures need further checking.

"We'll present accurate figures at a future committee."