Waunarlwydd residents' playing fields access row escalates

Waunarlwydd Playing Fields Action Group has collected a 500-name petition calling for access to the site

A council could face legal action after it awarded a lease for playing fields to a football club and then allowed it to fence off the site from residents.

Lawyers for Waunarlwydd residents have sent a pre-action protocol letter to Swansea Council seeking a judicial review of the lease decision.

Locals have said they want access to be restored but the authority said it had followed correct procedures.

Waunarlwydd Galaxy football club said it had followed legal processes.

It also said it had secured the necessary permission to erect the fence to counter vandalism and dog fouling.

The issue came to light at a full council meeting after Waunarlwydd Playing Fields Action Group presented a 500-name petition about the fence to the authority.

Suzanne Jeffreys, from the group, said the recreation area had marked its 75th anniversary last year.

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"Yet residents of Waunarlwydd are now excluded from using a much-loved, designated recreation area simply because they do not belong to any organised sporting activity," she said.

"We're not trying to stop the football. We just want access," she told the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

The recreation area marked its 75th anniversary last year, according to Suzanne Jeffreys from Waunarlwydd Playing Fields Action Group

A report looked into the concerns and said the process for granting a lease to the football club was followed in line with formal land transaction rules and relevant legislation.

Councillor Robert Francis-Davies, cabinet member for investment, regeneration and tourism, said: "Therefore the grant of the lease was perfectly lawful, as was the erection of the fence as the leaseholder sought the necessary permissions under the terms of the lease to make the changes to the leased land."

The council report said the football club had expressed an interest in leasing the playing fields, which it had been managing since September 2016.

The authority then published the required public notice about a potential land disposal, and no objections were received, before a 25-year lease was agreed in April 2021.

Mr Francis-Davies proposed that no action was taken about the petition and this was agreed at the meeting, although three councillors felt that further investigation was warranted.

Keith Price, director at Waunarlwydd Galaxy, said: "The petition is something that the petitioners and the council need to sort out.

"Everything we have done has been legal. The fence was the only way we felt we could protect the asset."