Kids' football grinds to a halt due to overgrown pitches in Rainhill

For the past 50 years, St Helens Council has provided free maintenance on playing fields leased to parish councils across the borough so that residents can use the green spaces and sports teams have safe areas to play matches. 

However, as the council has backtracked on this commitment due to financial strains, a dispute has developed between it and Rainhill Parish Council.

As a result of the stand off, the grass on Rainhill fields has grown for weeks and made the pitches unplayable for hundreds of youngsters.

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Grass hasn't been cut for weeks on the Rainhill pitches off Warrington Road (Image: Birchall's Pumpkin Patch)

In what it says is a move to recover vital funds in the council's budget, councillors announced last October that the subsidy of free ground maintenance would be removed on all land that is leased out to parish councils.

They believe this would also create a fairer system, as clubs that hire pitches directly from the council already have to pay fees.

From April of this year, this meant that the Borough Council will no longer pay for the upkeep, mowing, litter-picking, and inspections of playing fields in Bold, Eccleston, Seneley Green, Windle, and Rainhill.

If parish councils want to continue receiving ground maintenance on playing fields, they were told that they will need to pay for these services, with the option to end the lease of the land if they are unable to meet costs.

The Rainhill pitches are home to dozen of junior teams and an adult team (Image: Rainhill Rockets)

In Rainhill, St Helens Council is said to have charged the local parish council an annual fee of £24,000 a year to continue the ground maintenance, including services on the fields off Warrington Road, which is home to dozens of youth teams at Rainhill Rockets and Rainhill United, as well as an adult team at Rainhill Town.

As junior teams are not charged to rent the pitches in Rainhill, the parish council says that it can only afford £8,000 a year for the maintenance costs.

With a shortfall of £16,000 and a standstill between the councils, all sports have ground to a halt on the Martin Close pitches, and frustrations have grown just like the Rainhill grass.

The Rainhill pitches cater for teams from under 7s up to open age (Image: Rainhill Rockets)

With meetings set to take place with Rainhill teams over the weekend, Rainhill Rockets chairman Nick McCoy hopes a resolution can soon be found so that all teams can get back to playing on the fields as quickly as possible.

Nick said: "There is basically a £16,000 gap in what the borough council wants and what the parish council has offered, so there needs to be a compromise from all sides.

"We managed to receive a grant from the Football Foundation previous to this, to help with the line marking and reseeding of the pitches, so things were looking good recently.

"But the grass hasn't been cut for weeks now and it's just getting ridiculous. It can't be left like this as there are hundreds of kids that can't play, not to mention the adults.

"I don't want to get into anything political but I'm hoping that we can get this sorted as quickly as possible."

Both St Helens Borough Council and Rainhill Parish Council expressed that they want to see the situation resolved to allow the community and grassroots clubs to get back to using the playing fields safely.

However, there are also tensions politically between the Labour-run St Helens Council and the Rainhill area, where there are independent councillors.

There have been a repeated wars of words between senior Labour councillors and the independents in recent years.

St Helens Council's statement

In a statement, Councillor Andy Bowden, cabinet member for environmental services & climate change, said: “For many years, we have provided maintenance without charge on land leased to parish councils, despite them being contractually obligated to maintain or fund maintenance of the land themselves. 

“The council has covered costs of mowing, litter-picking and weed-killing, marking and maintenance of sports pitches, play equipment inspections, and health and safety site inspections, a benefit not afforded to those hiring pitches directly from the council. 

“We must protect our services against mounting financial pressures for the good of all residents and the removal of this subsidy to parish councils will increase fairness, consistency and transparency in our land lease arrangements across the borough. 

“We engaged with the five parish councils in October last year to forewarn them that we must begin charging for these services from April 2023, with the option to end their lease if they were unable to meet costs. 

“Rainhill Parish Council has continued to charge some of the teams that use the fields, while refusing to pay for maintenance, the only parish in the borough to do so. 

“Grassroots sports clubs across the borough are of course incredibly important to us and we continue to work with their best interests at heart to engage with Rainhill Parish Council and reach a fair agreement, consistent with the other parish councils and clubs across the borough.” 

Parish Council's position

Rainhill Parish Council has denied "collecting rent from teams for playing on the football pitches", stating that it only receives a small income from one adult team.

The parish council also said that it pays the costs for the changing rooms on Albert Fellowes and Holt Playing Fields, making "no money or profit from football".

In a statement, the parish council said that in October/November it was sent a breakdown of new charges that came to nearly £50,000 from the local authority.

It says further meetings were held with St Helens Council officers, who advised the parish councils would have to start paying to have fields and pitches cut.

The parish council, which says it feels "disgusted" by the situation, stated: "Rainhill residents are already paying for this service through their council tax, but St Helens Labour now want us to pay a second time through Rainhill Parish Council."

Parish councillors say that in March of this year, they received an email to say that it would be charged £24k for the fields to be cut going forward. They say they informed the council their next parish council meeting would take place in May and at the meeting it was agreed to "try to negotiate a lower figure with St Helens Council, as we can’t afford to agree £24k a year that hasn't been included in our budget".

The parish council's statement, which was shared on social media on Saturday, added: "In June, we asked if we could pay £8k a year as this would be more than what St Helens Council would receive if they took the leases back and began to charge the children’s teams."

But parish councillors say their offer of £8,000 a year was rejected and they were asked to pay £12k for the rest of this financial year before paying £24k for a year from next April.

"They also said, again, that we could hand the leases back," the parish council's statement added.

The statement went on to add: "Last week we contacted St Helens Council to ask if they would continue to cut the grass until we held our next Parish Council meeting, at the end of this month.

"This request was refused, and we were told that we would have to pay an interim payment of £1k for the month if we wanted them to cut the grass.

"We explained that we can’t agree to payments like this without approving it at a Parish Council meeting.

"We are a voluntary organisation and we don’t operate for profit.

"It is not fair or reasonable for St Helens Council to tell us in March this year that they want to charge us £24k a year to cut the grass and then expect us to have a decision in place and make payment by June.

"We have been working with the local football teams over the last couple of years to try and improve the football pitches in Rainhill.

"No councillors have previously tried to do this in recent times and as soon as we start to see progress and a solution, St Helens Labour create more problems."