Canonbury Kids Get All-New Playing Fields in Time for New Season

11.54.00am GMT Wed 28th Nov 2007

Cllrs Watt and Belford at the newly opened football pitches

Local Liberal Democrat councillors Paula Belford, Lucy Watt, and Barbara Smith joined local children, members of the community, business and Council leaders, and Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport James Purnell, for the opening of a brand new sports facility at Rosemary Gardens in Canonbury.

Cash was provided by the council in partnership with the Barclays Space for Sports initiative, the Football Foundation, and Arsenal FC to give the pitches a complete overhaul. The playing fields, which can be used for football or hockey, have been given a grasslike third generation rubber crumb surface. The tennis and basketball courts have also been resurfaced, and a new four-team changing rooms has been built. Further improvements to the playground and paddling pool are in progress.

The total cost of the project was £830,000, with £600,000 being given by private businesses.

Councillor Ruth Polling, the council's Lib Dem executive member for Leisure, said:

"This investment into Rosemary Gardens forms part of Islington's programme of improvements to sports facilities and greenspaces in the run up to the Olympics in 2012. Well-maintained facilities that meet the needs of the community are what people have asked for so it's great that we've been able to deliver."

Local Canonbury councillor Paula Belford commented:

"This is a really great new pitch for local sportsmen and sportswomen! I've coached four boys' football teams and two girls' teams, and it's been a big goal for me in the council to get better sports facilities for our kids.

"It goes to show what the council can achieve when it works with private businesses and the local community. I'd really like to thank Barclays, the Football Foundation, and Arsenal FC, as well as the Council, for giving us this brilliant new community facility."

She added:

"James Purnell, the Secretary of State, came to open the pitches. He used to be a Labour councillor here in Canonbury East as it was called then. In his speech he said that when Labour was in charge here the borough had nothing as good as these new pitches! He was right: Islington has got so much better since the Lib Dems took over and is still getting better all the time."