Taxpayers' £1m bill for leisure site

Taxpayers have had to plough almost £1 million extra cash into Cannock's leisure centre since 2005 because the council failed to provide it with enough cash, a secret report has revealed today.

The document, unearthed by the Express & Star using the Freedom of Information Act, was commissioned to examine huge overspends at the Stafford Road centre.

The Value for Money Report states the council failed to give the centre enough money in its basic budget over a number of years leading to overspends.

It concludes there are no savings available at the leisure centre without cutting services offered to customers. It blames an increase in electricity bills, extra health and safety rules for the overspending.

In total since 2005 taxpayers have had to pump in £992,940 extra money with the leisure centre overspending by more that £200,000 a year.

Labour leader Doug Thomas said: "The leisure centre was being allowed to spend over its budget with no control whatsoever.

"We wanted to know how this had happened and who had authorised that overspend. It did not look at any detail of where the overspend had come from."