Thank you to everyone who continues to support the petition to Save The Kingfisher

The battle is not over yet

While The Kingfisher still stands, we may yet change the Council's plans for its demolition

Please help keep up the pressure by donating to the fundraiser to obtain a legal opinion on whether the council's decision to approve the planning application can be challenged by legal means

At Full Council on Tuesday, at which a rather large number of Liberal Democrat councillors had gone AWOL by the time a motion to support this petition was voted upon, one of their members stated that the Council had agreed £40 million for a new leisure centre at the Corporate and Resources Committee that met on 30 September 2021

It is true that this committee agreed to add £40 million to the "capital progamme for this development" but the council has not raised the money to meet this commitment and has not shown it can afford to spend £40 million on a new leisure centre, to service the debt needed to fund it, or deal with the consequences of disposing of public sector assets and of necessary contracts with developers in order to pursue a project that might well turn in to the white elephant in the room

I also believe that there is no evidence that "the Council has committed to the redevelopment of a new leisure centre on the Kingfisher site" as is stated in the same paragraph of the report. They have made lots of promises and published lots of glossy brochures with lots of lovely pictures of swimming pools and happy people, but this is not the same as a formal Council commitment to redevelop a new leisure centre, which is notably missing

Meanwhile, the same report to Corporate and Resources Committee listed a string of significant overspend and financial problems that the council is facing delivering its existing activities, with the majority of over-spends not Covid-related

And unconfirmed rumours are swirling that the Council's Head of Growth and member of the Executive Team at the council has resigned, leaving nobody to manage a massive town centre development programme that has been kept hidden from us all

Kingston Council does not have the financial, governance or managerial resources to manage growth projects on this scale

The Kingfisher must not be demolished

The risks to residents from the council's plans are many and huge and they have not been properly assessed

The Kingfisher must not be demolished

And risks arising from the planned demolition of The Kingfisher have been completely overlooked

Please keep signing and sharing this petition and donate if you can to support a legal opinion on the council's decision to approve its own planning application to demolish The Kingfisher