THE chair of Wellington Tennis Club has said she has been having “sleepless nights” because she is worrying about the club’s financial insecurity.

Sue Rackley told members of Wellington Town Council that the club’s rent on land at the Wellington Playing Fields – as laid out in a lease - had gone up from £1,763 in 2019 to a whopping £5,372 a year.

“We are in a precarious financial situation at the club,” she told members of the council’s policy and finance committee on May 13.

Councillors were told that as it was only a small club, it pulled in just £10,000 income per annum, but had to shell out nearly half of that on maintenance over the year. Couple that with the £5,372 a year on rent and the club finds itself in financial dire straits.

“We really do rely on grant support, but the increase in the rent has been a big shock to us,” she said. “I’m having sleepless nights over it.”

Wellington Playing Fields, which is now managed by the town council, is also home to Wellington Cricket Club and Wellington Football Club – but both of those organisations have to pay far less for their lease arrangements.

Councillors heard that there had been an increase in the lease when the award-winning club opened its third outdoor court in 2020 and “big spikes” since the Covid-19 pandemic along with inflationary rises.

The mayor of Wellington, Cllr Mark Lithgow, said: “All three clubs at Wellington Playing Fields have got leases which we’ve inherited from other councils. We need to set up a working party to look at all three leases properly.”

Cllr John Thorne said: “The tennis club seems to be playing an awful lot more. I agree that we need to look at the leases and see if there’s anything we can sort out, but we will need legal advice.”

Cllr Mike McGuffie said: “There’s clearly something wrong in the calculations over this.”

Cllr Lithgow warned: “We can’t start changing things because these are signed legal documents and we could end up in all sorts of trouble.”

It was agreed that a working group of Cllrs Lithgow, McGuffie and Janet Lloyd would investigate the situation.

A report showed that the tennis club’s lease was reviewed every year and the new policy and finance committee chairman, Cllr Justin Cole, said they could look to amend the lease arrangements for the next financial year.

Councillors were told that the football club’s three-yearly lease - £1,874 a year – was next up for review in October 2027, while the cricket club’s five-yearly lease, amounting to £2,257 per annum, would be looked at again in April 2029.

The town council’s democratic services and finance manager, Alice Kendall, in the report, said: “We’ve not been given any background information on how the terms in these leases were negotiated, or if the tenant parties undertook independent legal advice.

“It is unclear why the calculation in the tennis club’s lease differs from the cricket and football clubs.”