Peterborough’s culture and leisure services will be ‘bigger and better’ once coronavirus pandemic eases

Cllr Steve Allen, whose portfolio includes culture and recreation, is optimistic for the future despite the current uncertainty.

At the end of this month leisure centres, libraries, heritage and arts services currently run by Vivacity are being transferred to two city council-run bodies - City College Peterborough and Peterborough Limited - after the trust’s finances were decimated by Covid-19.

Vivacity 490 members of staff are now being transferred over to both organisations which will run the services for 12 months while the council decides what the long-term future should be.

“Everything is on the table” going forward, Cllr Allen said during an interview with the Peterborough Telegraph, which means services could remain in-house, be transferred to a leisure trust or co-operative, while a further options is collaboration with partners.

“There will be no kneejerk reactions,” Cllr Allen added. “We can put it in a safe place with our two operators and look at every opportunity to see how it is best to take the Vivacity estate forward.

“Our policy is to get what we can open, and the things which are not opening, when they do re-open, should be bigger and better.

“The idea is to make things better for the citizens of Peterborough if we can.”

One thing which is being promised is that services will not close, while customers will not notice any difference following the handover, other than disruption caused by the pandemic.

Looking to the future, when hopefully there is a return to normality, Cllr Allen is determined that there will be no accusations of Peterborough as a cultural cold spot, with a new culture policy expected to be produced in time for Christmas.

This will help bring a “betterment” in cultural services going forwards.

He also praised the work carried out by Vivacity in the past decade since the not-for-profit trust was handed over the services.

“I think they’ve done some wonderful things for the city,” he added.

“I do think their project to become more commercial that was in progress prior to Covid was on stream to make the organisation even more relevant to the Peterborough population’s needs, but it didn’t happen. They were a casualty of Covid.”

This is one of a four-part interview with Cllr Allen about the future of Peterborough’s culture and leisure scene.

Further articles will appear at www.peterboroughtoday.co.uk.