Labour keeps free swimming over summer holidays despite Tory-Lib cuts

Great news that children will still be able to swim for free in Southwark despite Government cuts. In even better news this will be at no extra cost to the council and council tax payers after the new Labour administration managed to get Fusion (our local leisure provider) to cover the costs.

Southwark Council introduced free swimming in April 2009 with funding from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. Since its introduction there have been 2000 free visits each month at our local pools. Sadly, it looked like this would all come to an end when this funding was one of the things cut in June by the new Tory-Lib Dem Government.

The timing could hardly have been worse with school holiday just about to start. So it's a real testiment to the lobbying of the new Labour Council that we managed to secure this agreement with Fusion.

From September the council will introduce a 60p swims for under-16s and over-60s. It's disappointing that this isn't quite the same cheap day out families and older residents but hopefully still affordable for many.

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