Petition to save city's adventure playgrounds lodged

Kevin Sherriff, manager of the Highfields adventure playground, said the sites were "so valuable"

Campaigners trying to maintain council support for adventure playgrounds in Leicester have lodged a petition with more than 9,000 signatures to the authority.

Leicester City Council announced plans to stop funding nine adventure playgrounds across the city in March.

The petition calls on funding to be reinstated for the next financial year and for longer leases to be issued.

The council, which pays £1m a year towards the running of the playgrounds, said they needed to be become "self-sustaining" sites.

The authority previously said some grants would be available in the first part of the 2024-25 financial year, but expected the groups to fund themselves after that point.

The playgrounds are run by charities and Kevin Sherriff, manager of the Highfields site, said they needed time to secure grant funding in order to stay open.

Campaigners holding placards met outside the town hall before the meeting on Tuesday

Speaking before the children, young people and education scrutiny commission meeting on Tuesday, Mr Sherriff said facing the potential loss of the playgrounds had been "traumatic".

"The playgrounds are so valuable," he said.

"They act as a safety net for a lot of children and families.

"[The council] are talking about issuing five-year leases in April but that's effectively too late for our projects."

A recent report revealed some of the playgrounds have succeeded in finding new sources of income, but others were struggling.

Two playgrounds – Highfields and Woodgate – issued redundancy notices to staff in June.

'Not straightforward'

Shockat Adam, independent MP for Leicester South, also attended the protest.

He said: "These services that children have access to are irreplaceable.

"Everybody understands funding is an issue and I'm sympathetic to that.

"The playgrounds are looking for clarity, a bit of time, and an opportunity to be able to help themselves to continue running."

Deputy city mayor, Sarah Russell, told the meeting the council was continuing to offer help to all playgrounds as they look to secure their future.

She said: "We absolutely want our playgrounds in the city to continue to be able to provide open access play for children and to thrive.

"The opportunities that we're able to give them in terms of long-term access to the site is not straightforward.

"We've made sure they're able to access a five-year license free of charge, which gives them security on the sites for now.

"We can't offer to immediately transfer the land to them – it's really complex legally but also means other organisations could take them over."