MP Conor McGinn has welcomed the news of that Newton-le-Willows Leisure Centre has won a grant of £172,900.

The grant, from the national Swimming Pool Support Fund, comes after a successful bid by St Helens Council and lobbying by the St Helens North MP at Westminster and is being delivered by Sport England with the measures intended to ensure that children and adults up and down the country continue to have access to a public swimming pool.  

Kevin Mills on behalf of Sport England, wrote to Mr McGinn to say: “I take this opportunity to thank you for supporting your council’s applications for funding, as we move ahead with delivering this vital lifeline to keep our nation’s public swimming pools afloat.”

Mr McGinn was informed of the good news by Stuart Andrew MP, the Sports Minister, and said: “We’re lucky to have some great community sports facilities in the borough, and as someone who swims at Newton and Queen’s Park, I know that this will be welcomed by families and everyone who uses our leisure centres.

“This is only the first phase of funding which will help with some of the revenue costs, but I hope we can use it as a springboard to secure some further capital grants to improve and update the swimming pool at Newton to match the new facilities in the rest of the leisure centre.

Newton Councillors Seve Gomez-Aspron, Jeanie Bell and Keith Laird added: “Support for our Newton leisure centre is great news and going on from our £4.5m investment in this as a council, the continued support through Conor and the department is positive news.

“Energy costs and inflation have hit our services hard, and proactively securing funding like this can help alleviate some of that pressure.”