West Devon Borough Council today confirmed that Tavistock’s Meadowlands leisure centre will reopen on October 12 - but its swimming pool will remain closed for the time being.

Meadowlands has been shut since late March because of social distancing caused by the Covid-19 crisis, despite attempts by community groups’ attempts to have it reopened. Councillors agreed less than two weeks ago to pump thousands of pounds into the centre to enable it to reopen.

The council-owned centre is run by charity Fusion, who said in a statement with the authority that the centre’s gym will reopen on October 12, but the pool ’will take a little longer to bring back online, due to the length of time it has been closed. We will notify all users as soon as we have a confirmed date when the pool will be up and running’.

The news will be a blow to Tavistock Swimming Club, who led a local campaign to get the pool re-opened as soon as possible.