Citadel Leisure Centre refurb had no final business case

Audit Scotland has told the council that the business case must be completed as a priority, as part of their annual audit report presented to councillors last week.

The Conservative administration had made the scrapping of the leisure centre project, the cost of which had spiralled beyond its £40m budget, a key manifesto aim.

Following the 2022 election, the new Tory administration opted to spend £10m to refurbish the Citadel.

(Image: Kevin Dyson) Labour councillor Brian McGinley, who was depute leader of the council when it was working towards a new multi-million-pound centre in the heart of the town, raised his concerns about the situation.

At the meeting of SAC’s audit and governance panel, he argued that the reason for the now abandoned town centre development was that the refurbishment of the Citadel would be uneconomical.

He said: “The issue here is that this was carried out without a business case being made and there’s two issues there for me.

“One is that the £10m that was made available for this refurbishment was part of a political budget exercise and approved through that process.

“It was as a result of the £40m from the previous case not going forward.

“The second point is that a business case, if and when that has been made, are officers aware of our report that was made prior to the £40m capital project for a new sport and leisure centre that said the Citadel was unfit for purpose and that it was uneconomical to repair?

“Because that was part of the basis on which we made the decision.

Cllr Brian McGinley (Image: Alister Firth) “So, if you’re going to put a business case together to justify the £10m, then I would suggest that you would need to take the recommendation from that report.

“I’ve never seen it presented anywhere, but I know it exists. It does seem to me that one of the reasons why the case was made for a new centre was that this was unjustifiable to refurb.”

Cllr McGinley also contrasted the improvements in ‘vision and leadership’ from officers, but contrasted it with the political side.

“I do think, in terms of leadership, we are still on the political side, shy of doing our best to make that happen.

“I don’t want the undermining of what the officers are doing to be overshadowed by, politically, some of the difficulties that we’re having and some of the decisions that are made in allocation of resources.”

Chief executive Mike Newall admitted the failure to make that final business case.

He said: “First of all, it’s quite clear that officers should have completed the business case, so apologies that that wasn’t done.

“That was an oversight and Audit Scotland picked that up. In terms of the paper that you’re referring to, in terms of the congestion of the Citadel, and the reason that the previous administration was looking at a new leisure centre.

“I’ll need to dig that out, because I wasn’t involved in the process at all.”

Conservative councillor Kenny Bell hit back at Cllr McGinley’s claim over political leadership.

He said: “I would refute that, actually. I think there is very clear political leadership from this administration, obviously that was different to the previous administration.

“But I would say just because it’s different political leadership and different strategic objectives, I don’t really see it as a lack of it. It’s just a different viewpoint.

“I think the current administration provides sufficient leadership to officers, to work out the strategic directions of the council.”