The 'Prohibitive' cost of Tennis

12.00.00am UTC (GMT +0000) Mon 16th Jun 2003

With Wimbledon fortnight approaching residents have complained to Vincent Cable, MP, about the council's 'prohibitive' charges to use courts, which sit idle much of the time.

The adult charge per hour is £5.50 in the evening and weekends and only discounted to £5 off peak. Children up to 16 pay £2.60 but only before 6pm. After that and at weekends they pay the full adult fare.

Vincent Cable said: "The state of British tennis is pretty dismal. Apart from Henman no one who was brought up in the UK has made it into the top ranks of women and mens tennis in recent years. In the US and Europe many youngsters at least start on public courts but British facilities are generally poor quality or very expensive. "

"And for children in our state schools, which don't have tennis courts, they are totally dependent on council facilities".

"In this borough we have a major under used resource. The courts have no pressure on them from September to April and even in summer they are often under utilised".

"I recently raised the poor quality of Carlisle Park courts with the council and I am very pleased to see that new nets have been installed".

"I am now suggesting that the council show some imagination in their charging policy and offer a really attractive concessional rate to children or parents teaching or practising with children of - say - 50p an hour. The discount for off-peak tennis is also ridiculously ungenerous; no private company would price its services in such an amateurish way. It is not a question of subsidising tennis players but making more efficient use of the councils facilities and in particular encouraging youngsters".