Over recent years, the City Council has given control of six sets of tennis courts - located in public parks across the city - to Courtside, formerly known as Premier Tennis. Over this time, the cost to access these courts for an hour has now risen to between £8 and £9, whereas previously they were freely accessible. At worst this represents an insurmountable financial barrier to some, and at best discourages a great many more from picking up a racquet and enjoying this sport.
Courts are now locked behind a keypad and - even when they are sat empty, which is often - residents and park goers are not allowed access without booking online and making payment. The Council promised that Courtside would be providing many free courts and activities across all six locations. At the time of writing, Courtside provides just three hours of free access in a given week - one hour at three locations - out of almost 600 hours of available court time.
Tennis is a pastime enjoyed by many families and recreational players, but participation is dropping, and putting courts behind lock and key is only exacerbating the problem. Given the Council's proclaimed support for wellbeing and physical activity, it must improve the situation across all six public parks. Ideally, this would be to once again return the courts to being freely accessible at all times. If this is not possible, at a minimum the Council should ensure that courts are free to access if they are not booked (naturally, participants to vacate the courts if a booking goes live) and pressure Courtside to drastically increase the number of free-to-access sessions across all locations.

This ePetition runs from 21/06/2025 to 01/08/2025.

43 people have signed this ePetition.