Encouraging people to stay healthy
More on the Budget Efficiency Savings Cuts following on from what Charlton Average spotted, which in turn followed on from The Last Boy Scot's post, and this is the issue of the Charlton Fitness Centre being set to close in the near future. Now if you take the time to look at this PDF you will see Greenwich's Health Profile for 2007, as you can see it shows that Greenwich has a significantly below average level of adults involved in physical activity.
So how to encourage them to take up exercise? Well closing local fitness centers would naturally be top of the list in Greenwich, according to the budget this closure will not see any loss of service as people can just go to the recently finished Eltham Centre. Which makes sense so long as you don't look at a map of Greenwich. You want people to use services, make them local, where do you buy you newspaper from, a shop close to home or on your way to work, or one a couple of miles out of the way. If its the one out of the way you'll probably just give up reading the Newspaper, unless its shoved though your door, like Greenwich Time. So if a local fitness centre is closed down then less people will use fitness centres in Greenwich, making the health problem worse.
On top of this there is the woeful story of Swimming in Greenwich, As part of the Governments hopes for Gold at the 2012 games local sports clubs are seeing changes. In Greenwich this does not mean wholesale improvement to sports provision but instead changing the Swimming clubs executive management so that now the Council has people who are there to concentrate on individual sporting excellence, rather than just your average swimmer. What this means directly is that Swimming clubs in Greenwich which used to have a couple of hundred members are going to be scaled back to deal with just a minority of top swimmers.
So how to encourage them to take up exercise? Well closing local fitness centers would naturally be top of the list in Greenwich, according to the budget this closure will not see any loss of service as people can just go to the recently finished Eltham Centre. Which makes sense so long as you don't look at a map of Greenwich. You want people to use services, make them local, where do you buy you newspaper from, a shop close to home or on your way to work, or one a couple of miles out of the way. If its the one out of the way you'll probably just give up reading the Newspaper, unless its shoved though your door, like Greenwich Time. So if a local fitness centre is closed down then less people will use fitness centres in Greenwich, making the health problem worse.
On top of this there is the woeful story of Swimming in Greenwich, As part of the Governments hopes for Gold at the 2012 games local sports clubs are seeing changes. In Greenwich this does not mean wholesale improvement to sports provision but instead changing the Swimming clubs executive management so that now the Council has people who are there to concentrate on individual sporting excellence, rather than just your average swimmer. What this means directly is that Swimming clubs in Greenwich which used to have a couple of hundred members are going to be scaled back to deal with just a minority of top swimmers.
Labels: cuts, David Gold, healthcare, Olympics
posted by greenwich.watch at 6:31 pm
5 Comments:
i use the gym at charlton all the time and it's always busy. how can they get rid of one of teh borough's better facilities?
I thought the lesiure facilities in Greenwich were run by GLL? So why are the council closing it?
GLL simply tender for the facilities as far as I understand.
Perhaps the closure of the leisure facilities are what prompted Cllr Brooks to encourage people to walk and cycle in the local paper....shame he doesn't lead by example really.
GLL will only be taking over recieving the income and the descision making of the New Improved Swimming Club/ The parents will still be expected to do all the work and thank GLL for supplying excellent coaching for the half doxen swimmers with potential to compete at a high level. The rest of the swimmers should be pleased to pay treble the fee they currently pay to support these wonder kids!
Counceller Fahey actually said at a consultation meeting that the plan would go ahead without club approval - So much for consultation!
£50 - £75 per quarter with Greenwich Swimming Club or £60 a week with GLL - take your pick! Perhaps the swimmers could hang out in Woolwich Town Center with a Barcardi Breezer instead.
oops, even GLL can not charge £60 a week - Sorry I should have read through before posting. The expected fee is expected to be in the region of
£60 a month
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