Purpose

To agree the future management model.

Decision

RESOLVED

KEY DECISION

 That the Executive:

a)       Approved the phased transition of all currently externally operated leisure centres to an in-house delivery model during 2027-2028, in accordance with current contract end dates and based on a managed transition over subsequent years to the community plus service offer.

b)       Delegated authority to the Director for Communities and Leisure in consultation with the Executive Member for Health, Housing and Leisure to take actions necessary to bring the currently outsourced leisure facilities in house in alignment with contract end dates.

Reasons for Recommendations:

To support the Council and its partners to prioritise activities which will increase physical activity levels, which in turn will help to improve health outcomes, reduce health inequalities, improve community connectedness and cohesion and promote a sense of pride in place. 

To enable the Council to offer an Active Wellbeing and Leisure service which will:

•     best meet the ambitions set out in the Corporate Plan, which puts 

    prevention at the heart of what the Council does;

•     create a consistent, quality leisure facilities and active communities

    service across the North Northamptonshire area;

•     provide equality of access and experience to all residents;

•     meet the objectives of the Active Communities Strategy;

•     Balance affordability, service quality, prevention, level of council

    control and flexibility for the future;

•     Enable the Council to proactively develop programmes that target and mitigate the triggers for high cost spend areas within the Council, such as programmes that build resilience and confidence in children and young people known to social care or SEND services, or that increase strength and independence for the frail and elderly.

•     Allow the Council to put in place a sound basis for continued growth both commercially but also in its active for health and wellbeing preventative offer to demonstrably reduce rising costs to the Council and its statutory partners. 

Alternative Options Considered: Sections 5 of this report sets out the options and associated choices and impact to enable transition within existing budget envelope. These include:

•           An outsourced model: Table 4 at paragraph 5.47 provides a comparative summary of the outsourced and in-house options, indicating that for outsourced model the Council would have less control and flexibility, higher risks around quality of delivery and higher costs in the short term.

•           Single contractor at cheapest possible option: discounted as this would typically deliver a more limited service than even the core offer. In practice, this is likely to focus on facility operation, membership management, pay-and-play activities and swimming lesson provision. However, such an approach would remove the Active Communities Service and significantly reduce the current offer around health improvement, inclusion and prevention programmes. This would have a direct impact on the Council's ability to deliver its clear commitment to prevention as set out in the Corporate Plan. In addition, it would reduce the Council's capacity to secure external funding for both its leisure estate and community outreach activities, as well as limiting its ability to develop and deliver capital projects that are providing visible improvements and wider social benefits across North Northamptonshire's communities.

•           A hybrid model approach: discounted, partly due to the complexity of financial modelling required and higher risks around delivery and performance management; but primarily due to the fact that it would risk the continuation of inconsistent service and access and therefore a postcode lottery for residents. The visioning survey made it really clear that a universal and consistent offer is what our residents want to see.

•           Core service level offer: discounted as there is minimal additional costs for the Community Plus option as the types of programmes included either receive funding and/or income that offsets a large proportion of the costs and this was the favoured level of service from the visioning survey. It enables continuation of the Active Communities service and an incremental expansion of the Active for Health programme, such as those currently delivered at Lodge Park Sports Centre, into the leisure facilities proposed to be brought in house.

•           Contract extension so that all facilities are brought in-house on 1 April 2028, rather than a phased transfer of facilities in-house: discounted due to the additional revenue cost of £457,141, creating short?term budgetary pressure during a period of wider financial constraint and service transition and abortive costs to the Council. There is also the risk of extending contracts on terms that do not represent best value for money and the limited immediate ability to implement service improvements or policy changes, as delivery remains under existing contractual arrangements. Early in?house and phased transfer of facilities, as the existing contracts end, will ensure there is more capacity for the Leisure service as well as council corporate services such as HR, IT, Finance and Business Systems to support and implement the transition over the period of a year. It will also provide stronger alignment with the Leisure Strategy and Active Communities Strategy and ability to start expanding the best practice from the in-house services across the wider leisure estate.

•           Wider concessions have been considered but have not been included because the Council has to balance social impact with financial sustainability for the service.  Plus any scheme needs to be clear for customers and straightforward for staff on reception duties to administer given the evidence that would need to be provided by customers and for consistent and easy to use digital booking systems.