1

Summary

1.1

This report sets out a proposal for a new policy to achieve greater efficiency and utilisation of existing school swimming pools and proposes a more strategic, safe and sustainable use of existing pool facilities for delivering Key Stage 2 (KS2) swimming in schools. The purpose of this report is to seek Executive Member's approval to consult with schools about developing a strategic approach to the provision of swimming pool facilities for the purpose of delivering KS2 swimming.

Children Children Act outcomes

1.2

The five outcomes specified in the Children Act are set out below, with a summary of how the proposals in this report contribute to their achievement:

· being healthy (enjoying good physical and mental health and living a healthy lifestyle): through proposals to encourage the efficient and effective delivery of swimming to KS2 pupils;

· staying safe (being protected from harm and neglect): by teaching swimming in safe and secure environments;

· enjoying and achieving (getting the most out of life and developing the skills for adulthood): by providing a high standard of swimming education for children in suitable buildings;

· making a positive contribution (being involved with the community and society and not engaging in anti-social or offending behaviour): by encouraging physical activity and a healthy lifestyle;

· economic well-being (not being prevented by economic disadvantage from achieving their full potential in life): by ensuring that proposals will not disadvantage children and will protect equality of opportunity.

2

Introduction and consultation with Primary Headteachers' Group

2.1

2.2

Based on discussions with primary headteachers' representatives, this report draws attention to the deteriorating state of school swimming pools, their low utilisation for KS2 and the need for significant investment if the pools are to be retained and meet modern health and safety requirements.

Headteachers have mixed views about the retention of school swimming pools and many of their views were captured in a survey in September 2004, the results of which are summarised in Appendix A. There is, however, a consensus amongst primary headteachers' representatives that a more strategic approach to the provision of KS2 swimming in Hampshire would have advantages in terms of improved health and safety management and investment opportunities. An earlier discussion with Primary Headteachers Conference would suggest that headteachers without pools (92%) would be concerned that investment in school swimming pools should not be at the expense of investment in core teaching facilities.

2.3

This review excludes pools in the special schools sector, which will remain supported by buy back through delegated budgets.

2.4

A more strategic approach to providing KS2 swimming is centred on creating a vastly improved utilisation of a smaller number of supported pools and a manageable rate of investment in them. Primary Headteachers Conference supported a view that schools with pools that do not feature as part of the strategic provision for KS2 swimming should be allowed to continue to run them using individual schools' resources if they wished to do so providing they meet with the corporate standards for health and safety management.

3

Background

3.1

Many school swimming pools in use today were built by the enthusiastic efforts of parent groups in the early 1970s. In most cases the construction of the original pool structures, mechanical and electrical plant was very much budget driven and in terms of specification the pools now fall a long way short of modern day standards. Whilst the pools have served the schools well, they are now 30 years old and have not kept pace with modern day standards in health and safety and the expectations of users. For example, the management of water quality in many of the pools still relies on a process of manual dosing of pool chemicals, whereas in a modern leisure centre complex automated chemical dosing is the norm. With low KS2 curriculum utilisation, coupled with large liabilities for repairs, maintenance and modernisation, many school pools today would not represent best value investment opportunities.

3.2

The National Curriculum Authority recommends12 hours of teaching time in swimming to be delivered during KS2.

3.3

The Health and Safety Commission updated their "Managing Health and Safety in Swimming Pools" guidance in 2002 drawing attention to:

· the practicalities of managing pool health and safety;

· supervisor and life guarding arrangements;

· new technologies, including pool water treatment systems.

As a result, schools find themselves in many instances having to manage outdated pool facilities against a background of rising health and safety guidance and standards.

3.4

Hampshire schools with swimming pools are delegated £3,000 each under the management partnership arrangements, and £228,000 is bought back under the Service Level Agreement with Property, Business and Regulatory Services. This amount includes special schools and is sufficient to cover day to day servicing and commissioning of the existing pools, but will not support the development of a major repairs and modernisation investment programme. There is concern that many of the pools have reached a point where they now require significant levels of capital investment for improvement and upgrading works and in some cases total renovation or refurbishment. In other words, the current stock of pools is year on year moving further away from the basic minimum requirements.

3.5

A proposed strategy to address these issues identifies those core pools that should be supported to deliver the County Council's KS2 commitments. Such an approach would meet headteacher representatives' concerns by targeting central resources at core curriculum provision. It needs to be recognised that such an approach would result in a number of school pools which may have established non-curriculum and community use of pools not being supported. Where pools are defined as non-core facilities schools could decide to continue to maintain and upgrade pools from their own resources. If schools decide they do not wish to continue to operate their own "non core" pool, they would be supported to allow for the decommissioning of existing facilities.

4

Local management of Health and Safety In Hampshire swimming pools - appointment of a responsible person

4.1

Accidents associated with the management and use of swimming pools, both nationally and in Hampshire continue to happen, as illustrated by the incidents outlined in Appendix B.

4.2

The retention of each school swimming pool must be backed up with competent local management that provides robust risk assessment arrangements for the use of the pool, including chemicals handling and management, water quality, hygiene training, life guarding, bather management, emergency procedures and security. The proposed policy for a strategic approach is therefore predicated on there being a responsible person at each pool who will ensure that health and safety is properly managed and observed at all times.

4.3

Effective local management, of health and safety in Hampshire swimming pools through the responsible person is a key area and should be driven by findings of risk assessment to include physical, chemical and biological hazards and those hazards relating to bathers. There is another set of risks during out of hours with the known possibility of trespassers getting into outside pool compounds. It is essential that pool operators develop a Pool Safety Operating Procedures Plan which includes normal operating procedures and emergency action plans. (For details see Appendix B).

4.4

Many of the outdoor (and some indoor) school pools do not have fully automatic chemical dosing plant and rely on manually operated chemical dosing systems. In such cases staff have to test waters or even add chemicals by hand to maintain disinfection and pH to acceptable operating levels. With these manually operated systems it is imperative that staff are highly trained to monitor the chemicals in the pool water immediately prior to use and every two hours thereafter through to closing the pool session. The new policy is proposing that retained pools be equipped with fully automated chemical dosing. The operation and maintenance of such systems need to be carried out by competent staff with appropriate training and experience.

5

Strategic Review

5.1

To arrive at the proposals put forward in this paper a review of school swimming pools in Hampshire has been conducted, looking at the following issues:

· existing swimming pool provision;

· an assessment of the current condition of the pool stock;

· theoretical benchmarking of the requirements for swimming at KS2;

· indoor versus outdoor pools;

· acceptable travel distances to a pool;

· educational need and utilisation of school swimming pools for KS2;

· value for money in delivering efficient and effective swimming provision

Existing swimming provision

5.2

The National Curriculum requires KS2 children between the ages of 7 and 11 to have access to a total of 12 hours of swimming over the four years of KS2. This affects 307 primary and junior schools across the county and a total of 56,000 pupils. The swimming curriculum is currently delivered through a total of 99 pools countywide, which is analysed in Table 1.

Table 1

Number of County Council indoor pools

16

Number of County Council outdoor pools

46

Total number of County Council pools

62

Number of leisure/private pools

37

Total number of pools currently used for KS2

99

5.3

Table 1 shows that Hampshire schools currently use 37 leisure and private pools to support the KS2 curriculum needs. These pools are typically of a high standard and are believed to have sound health and safety arrangements in place. Where these pools are used it is necessary for schools to ensure suitable child protection measures are taken. This is a concern to some headteachers, although a large proportion of swimming sessions are delivered in leisure facilities currently, with appropriate management arrangements in place. These pools represent a good level of leisure and private provision across large areas of the county. In the spirit of making the best use of local community facilities/resources it would be sensible to rationalise the County Council's pool stock with due regard to the pools which the district councils and private organisations currently make available for schools.

5.4

From discussion with Primary Headteacher representatives it is reasonable to assume that a suitable pool Should be located within a 5 miles radius of schools needing to deliver KS2 swimming. Based on this assumption it is possible to map out the current provision across the county and demonstrate that the vast majority of primary schools across the county would have a choice of a number of different pools at which they can meet their curriculum needs.

5.5

From an analysis of the utilisation of existing pools a number of observations can be drawn:

· only 24 of 307 schools responsible for delivery of KS2 swimming (i.e. junior and primary schools) have on site facilities (7.8%);

· over 92% KS2 swimming is currently delivered off site;

· in some cases schools use their on site pools for less than one hour per week over a 10 week season for KS2 swimming, i.e. less than 10 hours per year;

· there are circa 50,000 pool hours available in Hampshire per year which could potentially be used for delivery of KS2. Only 5,600 hours are required to deliver the curriculum. This represents a demand on available pool time of only 11%;

· in some cases pools are used for other community activities beyond KS2 requirements, which may well be affected if a more strategic approach to providing schools pools is adopted.

An assessment of the current condition of the pool stock

5.6

A condition assessment of all County Council swimming pools was conducted during August 2005. The findings of the condition assessments can be summarised as follows:

· a significant proportion of pools need relining;

· many pools have mechanical plant which is considered to be in poor condition and or have inadequate filtration equipment;

· manual control of pool water chemicals occurs at the majority of school pools;

· inadequate hygiene facilities-i.e. no showers, WC's and poor footbath provisions;

· problems with polluted water and vandalism and concerns regarding the security of outdoor pools when schools are not occupied.

5.7

The DfES does not require swimming pools to be defined separately within Asset Management Plans (AMPs). As part of the condition assessment a costing exercise was undertaken to highlight the liability cost for both the condition and suitability issues of the County Council owned pools. The broad conclusion of that costing exercise is that an investment of around £27m would be needed to bring all 62 school swimming pools up to a high standard of repair, modernisation, health, safety and welfare provision. Given the outstanding backlog of major investment that is required in core-buildings, it is unlikely such a level of investment for pools can be afforded. Therefore, a more selective investment strategy will be needed in order to maximise the utilisation of the best of the existing school pools as well as making the most use of community leisure pools.

Theoretical benchmarking of the requirements for swimming at KS2

5.8

It is possible to calculate a theoretical minimum provision of swimming pools which will meet the requirements of the KS2 curriculum. It can be demonstrated that the whole of the KS2 requirement could be delivered in eight swimming pools as a minimum provision across the county. Such a calculation ignores such factors as travel times, location, convenience and established usage patterns and clearly would not be practicable. However, if this model is compared against the current use of 99 pools (63 County Council owned and 37 leisure or private) there is a strong case to rationalise the Council's approach to meeting KS2 swimming.

Indoor pools versus outdoor pools

5.9

Indoor pools have a significant advantage over outdoor pools. An indoor pool has the potential to deliver 3.5 times more sessions; indoor pools can also offer a more comfortable environment, reliability and secure provision. Once the maintenance and upgrading costs are taken into account, along with the need for the local health and safety management including life guard provision and so on, an indoor pool offers a better value solution.

Acceptable travel distance to a pool

5.10

As indicated above 92% of schools do not have a pool and already have to make travel arrangements in order to access a pool for delivering KS2 swimming. There is however no single solution to address the issues of travel distances, location and convenience. However following consultation with primary headteacher representatives, a maximum travel distance of five miles has been considered as reasonable.

6

Proposed Swimming Pool Strategy

6.1

This proposal seeks to maximise the utilisation of existing County Council indoor pools by moving to a position where the KS2 curriculum is delivered in indoor provision wherever possible. There are currently 16 indoor County Council owned and 37 leisure or private indoor pools used by schools across the county. This proposal would retain the option to use all 37 leisure/private pools and between 10 and 20 existing school pools, based on a notional requirement for a pool to be within a 5 miles radius of any school needing to deliver KS2 swimming. Table 2 shows a possible comparison between current and future pool provision.

Table 2

Number of County Council indoor pools

Number of County Council outdoor pools

Total number of County Council pools

Number of leisure/private pools

37

37

Total number of pools currently used for KS2

99

47 to 57

7

Mapping Needs Against Provision

7.1

A study has been conducted to map the proposed level of provision against the need to deliver KS2 across the county. The results of this study show that 10,800 pool hours would be available in County Council owned pools supported under this strategy. This level of provision is almost twice the theoretical minimum requirement for KS2 to which can be added the provision available from the leisure sector. In many cases there are a number of County Council pools to choose from within a 5 mile radius of schools. Where several County Council school owned pools are an option within a cluster it is proposed to support the better pools in the area to maintain a utilisation benchmark of 40%.

8

Liability Costing Exercise

8.1

A budget costing exercise has been undertaken to establish the relative liabilities in the existing stock of County Council owned pools. This exercise is based on six pools. A "good", "fair" and "poor" pool was selected from the indoor pool stock and the outdoor pool stock. From the liabilities defined at these six sites a pro-rota adjustment has been applied across the rest of the swimming pool stock. Costs are based on the condition issues found from the surveys conducted in the autumn of 2005 and the projected investment required to upgrade pools to a good level of provision.

Existing liability in the pool stock

8.2

If all the existing swimming pools in the County Council's stock were to be supported and upgraded (46 outdoor and 16 indoor) it is estimated that there is a total asset management liability of approximately £27m over the next 5 years.

Liability in the pools supported under the proposed strategy

8.3

The proposal is that County Council support is given to the servicing, repair maintenance and the improvement of between 10 to 20 pools. This would mean that between 40 and 50 existing school pools would no longer receive support under this proposal. This strategy would leave an approximate asset management liability between £5m to £10m. Further more detailed feasibility work would be required to refine the liability costs, including the costs of decommissioning, following consultation with schools. Summaries of anticipated liability are shown in table 3.

Table 3 - Summary of AMP Liability

AMP Liability if all current County Council pools are supported

£27m

AMP liability for supported schools pools under a proposed strategic approach

£5m to £10m

Current swimming pool budget per annum

£0.23m

9

Funding strategy

9.1

In progressing this review the County Council is seeking to deliver a value for money solution for schools which recognises the capital and revenue cost implications of existing and proposed provision and the outcomes for children. This is in line with the County Council's value for money strategy to deliver high quality services at the lowest possible cost.

9.2

The existing swimming pools repairs and maintenance budget of £228,000 per annum and will not cope with the necessary investment required to bring pools up to a new standard of health and safety. Even with a reduced number of supported pools the current budget resources will not be able to sustain healthy and safe swimming pools. By careful selection of a limited number of existing school pools it is envisaged that an enhancement programme of around £1m per year for five years, when used in association with the existing swimming pools budget, would achieve a very significant improvement in the supported pools. This approach is likely, however, to generate additional costs for some schools because of the need to pay for travel to off-site pools.

9.3

Subject to approval by the Executive Member for Education, Buildings, Land and Procurement Panel and Executive Member for Policy and Resources, it is proposed that a joint funded approach between and Children's Services and Policy and Resources, requiring capital investment from each source at £385,000 p.a., could be adopted to fund a more strategic approach to the provision of KS2 swimming pools. This would be in addition to the current pool budget of £228,000 (assuming continued by-back from schools) generating a total potential budget of around £1m per year for the next five years.

9.4

It would be possible during consultation with schools to explore the opportunities to enhance this investment by KS2 schools sharing devolved capital, which if successful could speed as the investment programme.

9.5

The majority of indoor County Council owned pools are on secondary school sites. It is proposed that in order for those schools to retain County Council support for their pools they will need to offer pool time for KS2 swimming as a first call against their facilities. It would also be worth exploring during the consultation exercise whether a percentage of revenue returns from such pools should be set aside for reinvestment in the swimming pool stock.

10

Next steps

10.1

Those schools having pools that are not deemed to be core KS2 provision would have the choice of maintaining their pools at their own expense (providing they meet corporate health and safety requirements) or to decommission them. It is proposed that schools wishing to decommission their pools should be assisted for the first three years of the new strategy. This would help schools with the adoption of this strategy. The costs of decommissioning will be identified as part of any further detailed feasibility work.

10.2

Subject to Members' approval to adopt the strategy it is intended that Children's Services Department will lead detailed consultation with all schools in both the primary and secondary sectors, with support from Property Services. It is envisaged that consultation, principally a questionnaire, and area `roadshows' would need to cover:

· which of the pools available to each school under the proposed strategy they would prefer to use;

· views from schools currently without a swimming pool about the proposed investment of up to £5m over the next five years in school pools;

· would schools support the idea of sharing devolved capital to generate investment capital for the pools stock?;

· would schools with pools proposed to be supported consider a proportion of revenue returns being set aside for investment in the pool stock?:

· would schools that have pools on site, which are not proposed to be supported, indicate if they propose to continue to service and maintain the pools themselves or seek County Council support to decommission them?

· could schools wishing to retain unsupported pools confirm that they can meet the Health and Safety requirements set out in The Health and Safety Commission guidance "Managing Health and Safety in Swimming Pools"?

· for those sites with pools proposed to be supported under this strategy would they confirm agreement to KS2 swimming as a first call against pool time and confirm compliance with Health and Safety requirements given the proposed increased utilisation of the pools?

10.3

Consultation would also need to be undertaken with leisure pools to see what additional capacity they could offer.

10.4

During and in response to the consultation with schools it is proposed that more detailed feasibility work is undertaken by Property Services to give more certainty to the financial impact of the strategy.

11

County Council Policy Requirements

11.1

Legal implications - The proposals support the County Council's statutory duties under the Children Act and National Curriculum.

Financial implications - These are set out in the report.

Personnel implications - None directly arising from this report.

Crime prevention issues - None directly arising from this report..

12

Impact assessment

12.1

Race and equality impact assessment has been considered in the development of this report and no adverse impact has been identified

Recommendations

That:

1.

A consultation exercise with schools be undertaken on the proposals outlined in this report focusing on the proposal that the County Council is minded to pursue a strategic approach to the provision and maintenance of school swimming pools in Hampshire schools.

2.

A strategic approach to swimming pool provision in Hampshire schools is targeted at meeting KS2 curriculum requirements.

3.

Operators of leisure pools are consulted on the availability of and notice required to provide additional pool time for schools.

4.

Further detailed cost/feasibility work be carried out to test the viability of the proposed strategy based on the outcome of consultation with schools.

5.

A further report be prepared in the summer of 2007 following consultations with schools and further cost/feasibility work.

6.

A further health and safety advice note be prepared and issued to schools with swimming pools to support them in achieving the required standard of health and safety pool management, pending the outcome of the consultation process.