The Bradley Stoke Journal

The new Bradley Stoke Bowls Clubs (BSBC) was officially opened on Saturday (1st May) by the legendary David Bryant CBE, three-times world champion and four-times Commonwealth Games champion.

Club bowling has been absent from Bradley Stoke’s Baileys Court green for the past two seasons after the eviction (and subsequent demise) of the former Northavon Bowls Club following a rent dispute with the Town Council.

Moves to form a new bowls club in the town were revealed by Bradley Stoke Deputy Mayor Cllr Ben Walker in September last year, following an approach from Jim Durlacher, a former Northavon president.

The Bradley Stoke Bowls Club held its inaugural meeting in January and an agreement with the Town Council was signed by the two parties at the beginning of March.

The new club has signed up around 70 members, about half of whom are said to be newcomers to the sport.

For its first season, the club has arranged 61 friendly games together with ten matches in the Fourth Division of the Bristol & District Bowls League.

BSBC Vice-Chairman Brian Newman told The Journal:

“We were honoured to have David Bryant CBE, three-times world champion, and his wife Ruth to officially open the club on Saturday 1st May.”

“He praised the condition of the green and complimented the Town Council on the manner in which it has been maintained.”

Also attending Saturday’s opening ceremony were Mr John Scott, President of the City & County of Bristol Bowling Association and other dignitaries from Gloucester and Somerset.

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Bowls legend David Bryant CBE, three-times world champion and four-times Commonwealth Games champion, is to perform the opening ceremony of the new Bradley Stoke Bowls Club on Saturday 1st May.

Representatives of  the City & County of Bristol Bowling Association and the Gloucestershire  Bowling Association are also expected to attend the event.

The sport is returning to the Baileys Court green two years after the former Northavon Bowls Club was controversially evicted from the ground by Bradley Stoke Town Council in a dispute over rent.

A spokesperson for the newly-formed club says they have already signed up 62 members and are expecting numbers to grow even more by the time the new season gets underway.

Annual membership of the club has been set at £35 and new bowlers are being offered training from two qualified coaches.

Bradley Stoke Town Council’s Finance Committee recently agreed to set the new bowls club’s first year rent at £1,500, inclusive of maintenance of the bowling green – an estimated £8,000 p.a. cost previously borne by members of the Northavon club.

The deal received cross-party support from members of the Finance Committee, with the notable exceptions of Cllr Julian Barge and spouse Cllr Elizabeth Todd, who both abstained.

The agreement must now be ratified at a meeting of Full Council later this month.

The club is holding its ‘Spring Meeting’ on Tuesday 13th April (7pm start) at the Baileys Court Activity Centre and welcomes enquiries from new and experienced bowlers.

More information: Bradley Stoke Bowls Club (The Journal)

Hopes of seeing a new resident bowling club at the Baileys Court green have taken a step forward with the inaugural meeting of the Bradley Stoke Bowls Club.

Over forty people, including many former members of the now disbanded Northavon Bowling Club, attended the meeting on Tuesday 13th January.

The meeting was also attended by the Mayor of Bradley Stoke, Cllr Mark Forsyth, Cllr Ben Walker, who has spearheaded the latest negotiations with the bowlers on behalf of Bradley Stoke Town Council, and Cllr Jon Williams.

Members of the new bowls club’s committee were keen to stress that the formation of a new club represents a new start and any talk of what happened between the old Northavon club and the Town Council should be condemned to history.

That statement, however, did not stop two prospective members asking questions about the dispute that led to the Town Council evicting the Northavon Bowling Club in May 2008.

Both questions related to the involvement of Cllr Julian Barge, Mayor at the height of the dispute, who many of the bowlers feel harboured a grudge against the old club.

The two questions were met with mutterings of disapproval from the majority in the room, who were clearly not in favour of going over old ground.

In response, Cllr Mark Forsyth said the dispute had been caused by “a clash of personalities”, adding:

“Now, you [the club] don’t have the personalities and our [the Council's ] personalities are not in the driving seat.”

The meeting went on hear about the large number of friendly fixtures already arranged by the committee and its plans for acquiring new equipment, grants and even sponsorship – Specsavers have apparently expressed an interest!

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A public meeting on Wednesday evening this week is to discuss the possibility of forming a new bowling club in Bradley Stoke.

The move comes almost twelve months to the day after the town’s  long-established Northavon Bowling Club was forced to wind itself up after a dispute with Bradley Stoke Town Council (BSTC) over the rental of the bowling green at Baileys Court.

The Town Council had insisted upon increasing the rent by 8% p.a. over a ten year period and when the bowlers refused to agree to the new terms they were locked out of their ground.

The dispute, dubbed “Battle of the Bowls” by the national media, hit the headlines in April 2008 when a group of bowlers found their way into the ground to stage a protest match. The Council reacted by calling in the police, who turned up in force to deal with the elderly rebels.

Hopes of a possible settlement were raised in December 2008, when senior Councillors and representatives of the club were said to have informally agreed new terms, but the proposed deal failed to gain the support of the Council’s Finance and Leisure Committee.

The bowlers subsequently called an extraordinary general meeting on 24th January 2009, at which it was unanimously decided to wind the club up.

The fracas has had serious financial implications for the Council, which is now liable for the maintenance of the bowling green at Baileys Court, an £8,000 p.a. cost previously borne by the bowls club. It has also lost out on the £2,000+ clubhouse hire fees previously paid by the bowlers.

Cllr Julian Barge, Mayor at the time of the April 2008 ground invasion, told BBC Points West that the bowls club “needed to get into the real world”. Two years on, the Council is now having to face up to the “real world” consequences of its decision, which in financial terms must already amount to something in the order of £20,000 (excluding legal expenses).

The possibility of forming a new bowling club in the town was first raised by Cllr Ben Walker at a Council  meeting on 16th September 2009. That meeting was told that former Northavon President Jim Durlacher had expressed a interest in forming a new ‘Bradley Stoke Bowling Club’ to be based at Baileys Court.

The following morning, Cllr Walker and Mayor Mark Forsyth took part in a  live interview from the Baileys Court ground on BBC Radio Bristol. Representatives from the would-be bowls club were, however, conspicuous by their absence, which rather reduced the impact of the broadcast.

A press release put out the same day by BSTC quoted Mr Durlacher as saying he was confident of attracting 50 bowlers  to the new club in time for the 2010 season.

The previous bowls club is thought to have had around a hundred members at the time of its demise, but the majority of those have now joined neighbouring clubs and many are likely to be reluctant to return to join a fledgling group in Bradley Stoke.

When The Journal spoke to Mr Durlacher last week, he seemed to have set his sights somewhat lower, saying that he hoped he could attract 30 members for the new club’s first season. His concept of a maximum £35 annual membership fee is also likely to be at odds with the Council’s expectations – at that rate the Council is only going to recoup one tenth of the annual £10,000 hole in its finances caused by the demise of the old club.

The inaugural meeting of the new bowling club  takes place at the Baileys Court Activity Centre at 7:30pm on Wednesday (13th January). All those interested in bowling are invited to attend and training is promised for all new bowlers.

A new bowls club could take up residence at Bradley Stoke’s Baileys Court Activity Centre in 2010, following secret talks between Deputy Mayor Ben Walker and a former president of the now disbanded Northavon Bowls Club.

The bowling green at Baileys Court has been virtually unused for the past two seasons after the old bowls club failed to come to agreement over the terms of a new rental agreement with Bradley Stoke Town Council (BSTC).

The dispute hit the national headlines in April 2008 when bowlers from the club staged a protest match at the Baileys Court green, despite being barred from the premises by the Council.

Seven police officers and PCSOs were called in to deal with the disturbance – a reaction dubbed “Operation Overkill” by the the Daily Mail, which portrayed the bowlers as a group of harmless pensioners being bullied by their local Council.

Northavon Bowls Club was formally evicted from the site in May 2008 and the club disbanded in January 2009.

In evicting the bowls club, the Council landed itself with an additional expenditure of about £7,000 p.a., arising from the fact that the bowls club had previously maintained the green at its own expense. This is because the Town Council is obliged by the terms of its own lease with South Gloucestershire Council to provide a bowling facility at Baileys Court until 2041.

Cllr Walker revealed details of his talks with potential members of a new bowls club to a meeting of Bradley Stoke Town Council last night (Wednesday). Fellow Councillors agreed to endorse a statement that “welcomed the interest shown by [former bowls club president] Jim Durlacher in forming a new bowls club at Baileys Court – to be named Bradley Stoke Bowls Club”.

The proposed name of the new club is significant as the fact that many members of the old Northavon Bowls Club lived outside Bradley Stoke was one of the main arguments put forward by the Council in justifying the rental increase it was demanding from the club. The bowlers countered this by pointing out that many of the Councillors involved in the negotiations were also “out of towners” – Cllr Julian Barge (Mayor at the time of the April 2008 invasion incident), Cllr Mark Forsyth (Chair of the Finance Committee during the negotiations in 2008) and Cllr Ben Walker (current Deputy Mayor) all live outside the town’s boundaries.

Cllr Walker told last night’s meeting that Mr Durlacher believes he can recruit around 50 members for the new club and emphasised that these would be “mostly from Bradley Stoke”.

Councillors agreed that the Mayor and Chairs of Committees be authorised to enter further negotiations with the interested parties.