Mid Ulster leisure centres will close on designated days for training purposes

FOUR leisure centres in Mid Ulster will face partial closures in December to allow staff to undertake mandatory training.

Greenvale Leisure Centre will have reduced opening hours on Tuesday, December 15, while Dungannon Leisure Centre will be affected on Thursday, December 17, and Cookstown Leisure Centre on Friday, December 18.

All three facilities, along with Maghera Leisure Centre, will close from 8.30am to 3pm on Wednesday, December 16.

Normal opening hours will be maintained between 6.30am and 8.30am on that day, with services resuming from 3pm onwards.

The arrangements were approved by members of Mid Ulster District Council’s Development Committee at its meeting on October 15.

Assistant Director of Health, Leisure and Wellbeing, Kieran Gordon, told members the proposal would allow mandatory training to be delivered at a traditionally quieter time of the year.

He said feedback from previous years had been positive, with little or no major negative impact on services to the public.

Mr Gordon explained that the council employs approximately 360 permanent and casual staff across its leisure facilities, many of which operate seven days a week for up to 15 hours a day.

He said the shift patterns and operational demands made it challenging to ensure all employees received the necessary compliance training while maintaining minimum staffing levels during public opening hours.

The report stated that delivering training sessions collectively would improve efficiency and reduce the need to schedule multiple sessions of the same course throughout the year.

Councillor John McNamee (Sinn Féin, Cookstown DEA) proposed the recommendation, noting that there had been very little negative feedback about the arrangements in previous years.

He said: “There are large numbers of staff and a large number of courses to get through too, so it’s necessary to do this.”

The proposal was seconded by Councillor Wilbert Buchanan (DUP, Cookstown DEA).

The training programme will cover a wide range of mandatory subjects, including adult safeguarding, child protection, equality and diversity, fire awareness, first aid, manual handling and customer service.

Other areas include health and safety training on hazardous substances, dignity at work, corporate induction, defibrillator training and various information technology courses covering general data protection, cyber security and data protection.