Edinburgh community centre closures could become 'necessary' as only six are in 'good condition'

More than a quarter of Edinburgh’s community centres are in poor or bad condition, with more than £13m of investment needed to avoid further closures.

Officers in a council report state that without investment in repairs, the closure of community centres across the city would eventually become “necessary”,

The report, due to be discussed at the finance and resources committee meeting on Thursday, lays out the cost of work required to get the city’s centres up to a ‘good standard’.

Of the 39 in the Capital, only six are categorised as such, with a £13.6m bill to improve their condition.

Councillors were told last year there was no money available to repair the centres until at least 2023.

The report states: “The lack of capital investment will increase the risk profile for community centres, until such time the risk becomes unsustainable and closure of some community centres will be neceassary to mitigate health and safety risk”.

The centres most at risk include Southbridge Resource Centre and Inch House Community Centre which need £1.5m and £900,000 of work each before they can be considered in ‘good’ condition.

Gracemount Community Centre, already shut due to health and safety concerns, requires more than £1.6m of work before it can reopen.

Conservative councillor Andrew Johnston who sits on the finance committee said the report followed years of warnings about the state of the centres.

He said: “It is really really concerning that the community centres are in such a bad way. I have been on the finance committee since 2017 and there have been continuous warnings about the condition of the city’s property estate.

“It was one of the reasons why we did not understand why they had gone ahead with the trams, including a dividend from Lothian buses, when there are bread and butter issues that they should be dealing with.

“If I went into my ward and asked people whether they wanted community centres in good condition or a new tram, 100 per cent they would say community centres.”

Green councillor Gavin Corbett added: “Two years ago the council decided, quite rightly, to make good on decades of neglect for schools and other public buildings. Since then £48m has been invested in repairs and improvements with real benefits already being seen. However, at the time, community centres were not part of the picture, which is why there is a build-up of almost £14m worth of works needing done.

“In the Green budget two weeks ago, I proposed £1m for the most immediate works to tackle any buildings at risk of closure. What now needs to happen is a longer term plan to put community centres on a secure footing, both to carry out works and to ensure that they are well-managed and looked-after to keep them in good condition.

“In a city where the population is growing at almost 5,000 a year, we need to protect and enhance community facilities.”

Finance vice-convener and Labour councillor Joan Griffiths labelled the condition of the community centres “unacceptable” and said the council were hamstrung by a lack of funding from the SNP government in Holyrood.

She said: “In my ward one of the community centre’s second floors cannot be used. It is not acceptable but we are hampered by the funding that we have and we made a decision that our schools would be safe and secure.

“We have done that and community centres need to be looked at next but it is because we don’t, as a council, have sufficient funding to do everything that we need to do.”

A council spokesperson said: “We are currently in the third of a five year asset management works programme for buildings in our estate. The principal focus has been on the school estate with particular emphasis on our primary schools.

“This has meant investment in community centres has been limited however in the past two years we have spent £1.3m on safety critical wind-and-watertight works.

“We estimate that £13m of investment is required over a number of years to bring the community centres up to a good condition but there is no budget available to achieve this within the capital investment programme until April 2022 at the earliest.”