45-Year-Old City Of Cardiff Swimming Club Facing Possible Closure

One of Wales’ most successful aquatic organizations, City of Cardiff Swimming Club, is facing a financial crossroads, as increased facility fees are impacting its future viability. Cardiff, who boasts Olympic medalists David Davies and Margaret Kelly among its success stories, has been hit with increased facility rental fees, which have, in turn, resulted in increased fees to club members. The consequences thus far have been member drop-off, leaving the club in a budgetary predicament and overall operational uncertainty.

City of Cardiff Swimming Club uses 5 pools, with its main facility being the Cardiff International Pool (CIP), a 10-lane, 50m facility. The other pools are standard 6-lane, 25m pools, but all are owned by Cardiff City Council and operated by private companies. The CIP is operated by Legacy Leisure.

Cardiff Head Coach Graham Wardell tells SwimSwam that the club’s fees in 2018 to rent from Legacy Leisure, as well as run 5 meets a year, went from £116k to £205, a 76% increase. Per Wardell, “the new fees were brought on because Legacy Leisure had to renegotiate their contract with Cardiff Council, at which time the Council informed Legacy they were no longer putting a £1m subsidy to the building and its operation.”

Besides hosting meets, Cardiff’s only other source of income is member fees and Wardell says his club indeed raised fees twice in one year; once by eliminating by discounts to families with more than 1 member and also by no longer subsidizing any away trips or training camps. Wardell says the club “lost 57 members who were no longer able to afford to swim.”

Pool time for the club was also reduced for more facility-run programming, which just added salt to the wound in terms of having to increase Cardiff Club member fees for less time in the water for swimmers.

Per Wardell, “If the club does not raise fees, we will have enough money to run the club as it is for the next 18 months at which point we will no longer be able to afford to pay our bills.  If we were to close our doors, the most committed would be able to travel to one of a number of smaller clubs which are situated about 30-45 minutes from the centre of Cardiff.”

Naturally all parents are concerned about the situation and concern is also brewing within the community, as the club has been in existence for 45 years, providing young people of Cardiff with the opportunity to develop their swimming skills.

“We are very proud to have put a swimmer or coach on every GB Olympic team since the club’s inception in 1974, as well as providing a whole host of swimmers to represent Wales at the Commonwealth Games (we put 4 swimmer on the 2018 Gold Coast team),” Wardell tells SwimSwam. Harriet Jones, Xavier Castelli, Bethan Sloan and Chloe Tutton were the Cardiff athletes at the Commonwealth Games.

“The feeling is that swimming is becoming a sport which will only be accessible to those who can afford to pay. Unfortunately, due to the country’s financial situation over the last decade, there has been a huge cut back in the provision of sport in schools so we are one of the only avenues left for young people to pursue their sporting dreams in swimming.

“The parents are engaging their elected councillors and also Welsh Assembly ministers to find out what can be done to resolve the situation we find ourselves in. We are looking for the powers that be to come together to help us “future proof” the club and allow us to build on the fantastic legacy we have created.”