LOYAL supporters of a Christchurch community hall have called on the council to “cast out Mr Scrooge” over plans to demolish the building.

Campaigners opposing the demolition of Druitt Hall attended a meeting of the full council at Christchurch on Tuesday presenting a petition and questioning leader Cllr Ray Nottage.

Concerns have risen over the removal of part of the council’s emerging Core Strategy, which said the “provision of a new community facility would be supported”.

But the council now states in the important document there is no aspiration for such a facility.

The omission has caused anger among supporters of the hall with many questioning why the sudden change of heart has occurred.

Elliot Marx, one of the Friends of Druitt Hall asked Cllr Nottage to explain when and why the amendment was made and which councillors and officers supported it.

And at the same meeting, Christchurch resident Peter Fenning presented a petition to councillors objecting to the change and questioning the procedure which led to it.

He said: “The combination of the council being hell bent on tearing down Druitt Hall next March, plus this change, sounds the death knell for a community hall presumably forever.

“We looked through the large tome of responses and found no sign of any response form requesting a change.

“At a meeting of the Christchurch Citizens Association in the threatened Druitt Hall our two ward councillors plus another council were asked about this volte face.

“We saw three bewildered faces – they knew nothing about it.

“We have asked questions and perused council documents to find out how this change occurred. All we can discover is that in mid-October a group of officers plus two councillors held a meeting at which this change was made.

“We consider this approach to be undemocratic and question the validity of this mode of decision making.”

Removed sentence ‘misleading’

Cllr Ray Nottage said the wording had been amended as it was “potentially misleading”.

He said: “In this case it was felt that the sentence referred to was potentially misleading as the phrase ‘will be supported’ could be interpreted as ‘financially supported by the council’.

“Council policy has been very clear for more than 10 years that it will not financially support the future management of community centres.

“It was felt that the sentence could reasonably be removed without changing the council’s overall intention to facilitate future management of community centres by group where there is a proven need and the group can demonstrate that they can administer a facility without recourse to public subsidy.”

Cllr Nottage said the council had not received any evidence to suggest a facility could be sustained in the area without public subsidy.

He said no business plan had been put forward, despite local businessman Alistair Somerville-Ford agreeing to fund a new centre to the tune of £1.5million.