Commons Council won't ask States for money

This is being done two years before the present lease of one half of the commons, which comprises the golf course, ends. Our proposals for the future include the playing of golf for at least the next 25 years.

The future cost of managing, repairing and enhancing the commons is estimated at £160,000 a year, plus RPI. While this may seem a large sum, just the resurfacing of the Vale Church car park will cost £70,000 and, by comparison, the Parochial Cemetery (not a responsibility of the council) requires £90,000 a year and two men to maintain it.

Since 2000, the income of the council has been £30,000 a year from the States, with other contributions supplementing that amount to about £35,000 in all, from which the council has to pay its one employee at a cost of £20,000. The Royal Guernsey Golf Club and L'Ancresse Golf Club have jointly contributed £100 a year for the last 70 years.

The council believes that, in the present financial climate, it is not possible to ask the States to contribute more than its Resolution of 2000 provided for. Taking account of inflation as a result of the increase in the RPI, this would now stand at £45,000, which is the sum requested from the States. The council aims to generate £35,000 a year from various other sources. The two clubs therefore would jointly pay the remaining £80,000 each year, increased by RPI, which represents half of the council's required income, and given that the golf course occupies one half of the total area of the commons.

The response from the committees of the two clubs has been to reject the council's proposals, citing the fact that £500,000 a year is paid by their members to maintain the golf course. However, this money is paid to the members' own management company and none of its goes to the council for the general upkeep of the commons. Thus, it is exclusively connected with the playing of golf by those members and unconnected with any other uses of the commons.

To put the contribution of £80,000 into perspective, it will cost each of the 1,500 or so members of the two clubs less than £5 a month each. In contrast, single membership of Beau Sejour in 2017 is likely to cost more than the present £37.66 a month and marina fees for a modest 18ft boat will certainly exceed the current level of £46.50 a month. Given that the two clubs have had the use of the present golf course for all but nothing for a period of 70 years, the rate proposed by the council is neither unreasonable nor punitive and is in the best interests of all Guernsey people.

One of the reasons for bringing the discussion forward now is so that, should the two clubs maintain their present position, it gives the Council two years to arrange for alternative management of the golf course, after 2016. In this event, the members of the two clubs will still be able to play the course and will continue to enjoy the use of their clubhouses and the driving range, which the members own. It will simply mean that, in common with golfers elsewhere who wish to play the course, they will share the 50,000 or so rounds of golf which the course can support each year and pay a green fee per round. Even so, this would probably amount to about one half of the rate of £55 per round (limited to six rounds a year) which a local non-member presently pays to the two clubs for a round of golf.

We have set a limit of 25 years on any future agreement between the council and the clubs for the playing of golf on the commons. The council has had its hands tied for 70 years and is not prepared to see that repeated. In 25 years' time, the population of Guernsey may be such, or the leisure needs of all Guernsey people may require, that a greater area of the commons is given over to use by all islanders. Of course, this may not necessarily be the case, but the point is that the Commons Council of 2042 should be free to address the question of the use of the commons by all islanders at that time, as is its mandate.

If the members of the two golf clubs remain unwilling to agree to the proposed terms, the question for us all, including Deputy O'Hara, himself a member of the Royal Guernsey Golf Club, should he take the matter before the States, is, 'How will the Vale Commons be properly funded for the next 25 years and just who will be paying for it?'

GEORGE DOMAILLE,

President,

Vale Commons Council.