Water Polo to be wound-up at Clissold (until someone else takes the time?)
What the republished note below doesn’t cover is the lack of support from LBH and London Swimming. The ASA has been top-dog in swimming for so long by making sure that no uppity upstarts get too ‘above their station’ with innovative projects and initiatives that are not directly attributable to the ASA, even if they are initiatives that they eventually advocate.
People are not allowed to see the contract for the management of Hackney’s leisure assets and nobody has any idea how charges are set and controlled. As a Hackney Councilor once said to an offficer looking at a funding request from the community that would have restored a Hackney building at no cost to LBH, “You can’t recommend this for funding, if people can get funding and deliver projects in evenings after their day at work what’s the point of you and me.”
“It is a disappointing day today, after all the hard work we put into the Clissold Swimming Club Water Polo section we are having to close this down due to pool-hire costs. They (GLL) now charge us £125 per hour which has killed the session and means from April we have to let the pool-time go.
I am sure there could have been a work-around this if others had been involved. Unfortunately the people running it now just accepted the situation and did not realise the fight that went on just to get it going.
It is good to think that we are 2 years away from the Olympics and GLL only see ripping-off clubs as a viable way forward to generate money. How many olympians will come from the public swim sessions …
RIP – Clissold Water Polo“ Gary Simons water polo coach
