On January 4th a consultation meeting at Ashington Leisure Centre in Northumberland was held by the Lib/Dem leadership of the County Council to "discuss" the question of its closure.  The council has to find £33m worth of cuts this year and amongst the many services being targeted is the town’s very popular and highly used leisure centre.

Around 3-400 people turned up on the night to hear council leader Simon Reed trying to make the case for its closure only to face a barrage of questions and counter arguments from a very angry audience.  Amongst the crowd was a significant group of youth who are regular users of the centre who chanted slogans and barracked the Liberals as they left the building.  Around 10-12 young people, mainly from the High School across the park from the centre, were very angry and gave the Lib/Dems an ear bashing they wont forget in a hurry.  Following on from this two of the young people, Adam and Thomas, both aged 15, set up a Facebook page called Save Ashington Leisure Centre which, as we go to press,has almost 3,000 friends and a petition has also been launched which has hundreds of signatures already.  The Liberals, having felt the wrath of the public and the grim determination of the youth, have backed off and given the centre a stay of execution till April 2011.  This has not taken the steam out of the campaign but has galvanized the young people into even more activity.

After linking up with the local Trades Council in the county they called another public meeting which met last Monday 18th January.   Around 150 attended and heard Adam, along with other labour movement leaders and LRC supporters, speak from the platform where he put the case for the centre and called on the County Council to withdraw the threat of closure completely and demand that much needed investment in the centre be brought forward.  Many at the meeting spoke in defense of the centre and condemned the cuts and afterwards several people came forward to join the campaign committee.  The youth themselves have established their own committee to draw more and more young people into activity and so far 10 or so names have already come forward to get involved.  The leading youth understand the need to link up with different sections of the community, in particular with the TUs who they see as taking the brunt of the cuts through job losses.  The work they have done is now paying off with the temporary back down by the council and the fact that they now have the support of local cricketing hero Steve Harmison and Ashington football legend Jack Charlton.  "The only way to get the council to back down is if the whole community gets behind the campaign!" said Adam Nichol.  "This is our centre, our mams and dads have used this centre when they were kids, and we want our kids to be able to use it in the future!" 

Future protests being organised are a lobby of the council executive in Morpeth on Friday, 29th Jan at 12 noon and the a lobby of the full council on Wed 10th of February where the council will be setting its annual budget.