30 January 2017
In June 2015, the Cabinet at NBBC were discussing the procurement of a Climbing Tower. Green Party and Nuneaton Mountaineering Club member Michele Kondakor spoke against the idea, citing numerous reasons – training, health and safety implications, transport etc. The Cabinet decided to go ahead regardless.
In December 2015, the provision of the Climbing Tower was back at the Cabinet, needing more money for driving courses etc and requiring re-arrangement of staff from the Play Rangers Team. Of course, by this stage the Climbing Tower had already been purchased and there was not really any choice but to go ahead with the necessary changes, if the £40,000 Tower was to be put into use.
Once again Michele Kondakor spoke.
Now, in February 2016, following a question at Full Council it has been established that the Play Ranger scheme has been totally disbanded because of the Climbing Tower. Cllr Ian LLoyd, the Cabinet member’s assertion that there are now more jobs and no-one has been sacked is a distortion of the reality. Some of those who ran the Play Rangers did not want to be involved in the Climbing Tower and so chose to take voluntary redundancy. They may not have been ‘sacked’ but their jobs were removed and the alternative was not something they felt able to do.
There has been coverage in the local papers. The various articles can be seen here.
Update – 23rd April 2016.
There will be a charge to use the tower. It appears from the article in Nuneaton News that there are Insurance and Safety issues too. All these things were pointed out by Michele Kondakor back in June 2015. Perhaps the Council should actually start listening.
Update - November 2016
At the last Full Council meeting ( September 14th 2016), Michele once again asked a question regarding where the Climbing Tower had been used and how many people had used it. The question was not answered (as can be seen in the minutes, which can be found here) but a subsequent Freedom of Information request has revealed that over the last year, since it was purchased, the Tower has only had 418 people registered to use it. It has not visited all areas of the Borough as some areas have not had a suitable venue identified (All issues that should have been looked at before it was even purchased.) As a member of the public said ' Fail to plan, planto fail'. We believe that the Council should find another organisation to run the Climbing Tower on it's behalf. Even if it gave the Tower away to an organisation like the scouts, the residents of Nuneaton and Bedworth would be better off.
Update -30th January 2017
Michele seems to have touched a raw nerve with the Council with her questions as, at the Full Council meeting on December 7th 2016, one of the Labour Councillors (Cllr Neil Phillips) asked a question regarding the Climbing Wall. ( You can see the question and answer on the minutes here - page 12). We think there had been a concerted effort to get the Climbing Wall out and about because in the period between 5th November and 3rd December 2016 it was used by 147 children. These figures pale into significance compared to the number of children that were reached, previously, by the Play Rangers ( 4017 children during the period April-June 2015 and 6191 children during the period July-September 2015, according to the Sports Development Team quarterly reports for those periods)
A current search on the Council's website reveals that the information on the climbing tower has not been updated since 22nd April 2016 and there is no information available as to where or when people can use the Climbing Tower in the coming months. All totally unsatisfactory.
Sign up for updates
Find out more
