golfnews24 editor Mark Flanagan reflects on the Beacon Park debacle
Anyone who has been a member of golf club will know that their course(s) represent so much more than a well-looked-after piece of land.
There is a huge emotional attachment to each and every hole. So many happy memories are made on golf courses plus there is the club factor. There is something very important to golfers about that sense of belonging and familiarity.
Increasingly golf clubs are taking the landfill route to provide a boost to coffers while also improving their course. These huge decisions are not taken lightly, not least because of the disruption.
Most can cope with short-term pain for long-term gain.
So imagine what it must have been like for the members of Beacon Park who have endured neverending pain for no gain.
In fact it’s more than that. It has been worse than no gain. It has been devastating loss.
Imagine losing your first hole. Every opening hole is special to its members. Beacon Park members have been without theirs for the best part of four years.
That’s on top of the disruption and also the time they have all had to take to find out what happened and why?
What is the big secret?
Why were the plans set out in the planning documents ignored?
Why did no one make Oaklands stick to the plan and why did the West Lancashire Borough Council wait so long to act when it was clear something was going badly wrong?
Whose job was it to put the landfill into the right places? Was it Oaklands’s or was it Serco’s? What deal did the two companies negotiate when Serco replaced DCT Leisure, the company who negotiated the original agreement with Oaklands?
Any council has the power to terminate leases when serious planning breaches are uncovered and what is more visible than a 15-metre high wall of landfill that local residents could smell as well as see?
These are levels of inepitude on an unimaginable scale. What’s more the council only acted after the pressure, created by campaigners desperate for information and action, became impossible to ignore.
The council’s inaction inevitably led to dozens of members leaving and – surprise, surprise – a drop in casual golfers. Who wants to play on a ‘terrible’ course? It doesn’t matter how cheap you make the golf… people won’t come. Most of us will be happy to pay a bit more for something that resembles a normal golfing experience.
However there is nothing ‘normal’ about Beacon Park. Even now there is a giant pile of rubble where some drainage work was supposed to be carried out (see picture above).
What an absolute disgrace.
And councillors have had the temerity to tell me the financial situation at Beacon Park is so bad West Lancashire Borough Council has been forced to consider other options?
Absolutely shameless.
One councillor also ‘confided in me’ that Serco had been fined £1,000,000 for their Breach of Condition Notice. They were fined £0.
In fact trying to find a councillor who knew the difference between lies and truths proved difficult. Is it any wonder Beacon Park is in the state it is when you consider who is running the show?
What councillors should be reflecting on is it is remarkable that Beacon Park still has any members left. But, like I said, those 18 holes represent more than just a golf course.
And those who have stuck it out deserve a proper explanation if nothing else.
A BEACON OF DESPAIR – The full story
• Part 1 of 4: An introduction
• Part 2 of 4: The Origins (1982-2012)
• Part 3 of 4: The landfill arrives years (2013-2018)
• Part 4 of 4: The death spiral (2018-2023)
Also…
• Oaklands Golf and Leisure – who are they?
• How landfill deals work
Do you have any information on what happened at Beacon Park? If so email [email protected]