King Alfred campaigners call for a referendum on the future of an 85-year-old seafront leisure centre

One of the campaigners, Laura King, presented a petition signed by 664 people to Brighton and Hove City Council last week.

The petition, calling for a referendum on whether the art deco sports centre should stay on Hove seafront, was handed into a meeting of the full council on Thursday 28 March.

The council started a public consultation in January on a new “state of the art” leisure centre to serve the west of Brighton and Hove.

The proposals include a 25-metre swimming pool which has disappointed those who have previously highlighted the lack of a 50-metre competition length pool in the area.

The proposals also include a separate learner pool and splash pad, a sports hall and a health and fitness centre, with a gym and cycling studio.

The options are to build a new leisure centre at the existing King Alfred site, in Kingsway, Hove, or at the Old Shoreham Road end of Benfield Valley, in Hangleton.

More than 3,500 people had responded to the consultation when it closed in mid-February.

The petition called on the council to restore the existing building – as has happened with the art deco 1930s Saltdean Lido.

And the petition also called for the restoration to include the full indoor sports facilities, community facilities and a re-opening of the roof garden plus the underground bowling alley and 450-space underground car park.

Laura King said: “It wasn’t in the Labour Party manifesto to demolish the King Alfred.

“A new leisure centre … in Hangleton has also been sprung on residents, not appearing in any previous ‘consultation’, rendering the 2020 Your Sport, Your Vision, Your City, undertaken in lockdown, outdated.

“In fact, it would not be the King Alfred and it would not serve the same community.

“The removal of a public asset from its public beach home is at stake and the second option of building a smaller King Alfred on the current car park is clearly not a serious option.

“The cheapest, greenest and most obvious option remains missing – a complete retrofit of the existing King Alfred.”

Ms King told councillors that many people who supported the Keep the King Alfred on Hove Seafront Facebook group could not access the petition on the council website.

She asked for the petition to remain open to see if it could reach the 1,250 threshold required for a debate.

A straw poll of the group found that many of its members had not seen any leaflets about the public consultation.

At the same meeting, Gerry Walden told councillors that the King Alfred questionnaire was “slanted” in favour of a move to Hangleton.

He asked why the council was not looking again at a mixed commercial and leisure centre scheme on the existing site.

Mr Walden also said that the seafront site was well served by public transport, with many people walking or cycling to the pool, whereas the Hangleton site was served by few buses and would not be as accessible by bike.

Labour councillor Alan Robins said that no decision had been made yet and that the current site was not ruled out. But the results of the public consultation would be put before councillors in the summer.

Councillor Robins said: “The decision will be informed by the outcomes of the recent consultation and by the work we’ve been doing over the last nine months with experts in sport and leisure to examine value for money implications of the delivery options.

“The work has shown us that delivery on the existing site would be more complex, more expensive, more constrained and will carry a greater risk.

“The past three attempts to deliver the new facility on the site using mixed commercial and leisure development have all failed, highlighting the challenges of the site.”