Rye Cricket Club is battling to retain the use of the whole of its pavilion clubhouse, part of which has been closed down by the Building Control department of Rother District Council.
The cricket ground, which, until last year, was also (and primarily) the home of the now-defunct football club, is owned by Rother and leased to the occupying club. Any buildings erected on the ground belong to the club that erects them and a ground rent – in addition to the rent for the overall lease – is paid to Rother. If the club ceases to pay the due rent, both for lease and ground rent, then Rother have the right to reclaim the land including any buildings on it.
In 2010 an earlier pavilion was destroyed by fire (arson) and, following a £160,000 payout by the insurance company, Rye Football Club (RFC), who were then the lessees of the ground and pavilion, commissioned a replacement. The idea was for RFC to have 32 weeks per year use of it and the cricket club to have the remaining 20 weeks for the cricket season.
It was at this point that the problems started. The new building, as buildings so often do even when efficiently managed, significantly overran its budget, which must have placed considerable financial strains on the football club. Inevitably, corners had to be cut and, doubtless to save money, a number of requirements relating to safety in public buildings were not met. On completion of the building in 2011, these were noted by the inspector from the building control department at Rother and an advisory notice was sent to the football club detailing the work to be carried out before a completion certificate could be issued and the pavilion officially opened. This was ignored and for the next few years, until its demise in 2014 the football club operated the social area of the pavilion without the required certificate, which, inexplicably, Rother building control failed to follow up.
In January of this year Rye Cricket Club successfully applied to take over the pavilion and the lease of the ground. It took RDC three months to produce the lease requiring the club to pay a sum for leasing the ground and a further ground rent for the pavilion. It was only when the club sensibly demanded a guarantee that all regulations relating to the building were in order that the lack of final building control approval came to light, the refusal to allow the clubroom and bar to be opened was put in place and now only the changing rooms may be used.
Rother has issued a statement in which they say that, “since taking possession of the clubhouse, it has become apparent that the building erected by the previous owners was completed without obtaining the necessary building control certificate. This means that the building does not comply with the necessary legislation to allow it to be used by the public, therefore a decision had to be taken to close the bar until such time as the building complies with all necessary building approvals. We have allowed the changing rooms to remain in use to ensure that the cricket club can fulfil its fixtures”
This is a crisis for the club. Almost every sports club needs financial resources outside revenue from its core activities and subscriptions and generally this means the club bar and associated social events. To have the bar and clubroom closed is a major set back. As club secretary, Martin Blincow confirmed, “the running costs of the club are considerable. Not only is there the lease of the square at £1,500 a year and ground rent of £500 a year for the pavilion, but also the cost of insurance, the maintenance of the pitch (that the club carries out), the cost of new balls for each match and so the costs go on. We need the returns from the bar area to enable us to cover all this.”
There is, however, a glimpse of light: at a meeting between the club the building inspector on Wednesday this week, Rother has agreed to produce a list of the work required which, as the owners of the building until it is formally passed over to the cricket club, they will arrange to have carried out and will pay for. The club hopes this will be done speedily so that the pavilion can once more become the centre of club activities.
Photos: John Minter