Rother cabinet gives BATS and BLODS funding warning

Under similar aid, it has been giving Bexhill Light Operatic and Dramatic Society, which attracts larger audiences, more than 4,000 a year.

The aid is given under what are known as service level agreements - grant aid given in return for an agreed amount of service to the community.

Both organisations had to stage productions at St Peter's Community Centre while the 1,100-seat De La Warr Pavilion theatre was closed during the pavilion's 8m restoration.

A report by council chief executive Derek Stevens recommended agreements giving the BATS 7,620 in the coming year and the BLODS 4,922.

Mr Stevens said that neither society had achieved good attendance figures over the past two years. He said Rother amenities officers would liaise with both organisations during 2008 "to ensure that maximum benefit was realised from the council's financial support for these groups."

Cllr Robin Patten, who had earlier opposed cash aid to other bodies in the district because of the authority's difficult budget-making position, went further.

The former council chairman told colleagues that as chairman he'd had the pleasure of attending productions by both societies.

"They do a good job and have excellent performances which are enjoyed by the community.

"However, the kind of cuts we are going to have to look means we have to make sure we are getting value for money.

"When I was chairman, the De La Warr Pavilion was closed and both societies gave performances in community halls.

"At St Peter's Community Centre the hall was crammed full for the BATS' productions. Seating was wall-to-wall.

"It was a part of the production which added to the performance and it was a real joy, the two or three evenings which I had there during the course of my year.

"But this money is for productions at the De La Warr Pavilion where so much of it is lost.

"Eighty four people attending on average is ridiculous in a theatre of that size.

"As society, you would have thought they would have been very much more receptive to the synergy of the huge effect of being in a small area and getting the same numbers.

"This also applies to the BLODS - where the audiences are higher figures."

It was not right that the council in its present financial difficulty should give that sort of money, he concluded.

Bexhill member Cllr Deirdre Williams was Town Mayor at the time that Cllr Patten was council chairman.

They both attended the same productions.

She said: "I agree with everything he said - with the exception of the fact that the BLODS do need a bigger venue because of they put on musicals which require it.

"I do agree that so far as the other company is concerned St Peter's was a better venue for them.

"In St Peter's if you have 84 people you at least have some atmosphere."

Fellow former Town Mayor Cllr Joy Hughes said: "I really do feel that this is something we must support.

"We do need to put things on at the pavilion.

"I really don't agree with my colleagues on this one!"

Director of services Tony Leonard said the societies would by now have entered into commitments for the coming year.

He successfully suggested putting off the coming year any change in funding policy "to give the societies forewarning that there could be change in subsequent years."