New vision for sport (Jeremy Hilton)

New vision for sport

April 11, 2010 9:46 PM

Liberal Democrat candidate, Jeremy Hilton, who is standing to become Gloucester's next MP, has set down three key tasks to improve sports provision in the city.

Jeremy Hilton said that improving sporting life, facilities and opportunities in Gloucester would become one of his top priorities if he is elected as the city's MP at the General Election.

His three priorities will be to see a new all-weather athletics track built for budding Olympians to train on, a return home of Gloucester City Football Club with a new stadium located in Gloucester and a 50 metre swimming pool built.

Jeremy Hilton said: "Gloucester is in the premier division for rugby with an excellent network of local clubs and I want to see other sports do as well.

"Football is our national game and an important part of British culture. I consider bringing the Tigers home to Gloucester to be important for the city. The club helps to inspire upcoming young soccer players on a local level. This is one reason I recently led a council motion helping to secure the clubs future and received cross-party backing for it.

"Our athletes deserve much better facilities to train on than the substandard track at Blackbridge. Liberal Democrats have been at the forefront of the project to build a new 8-lane all-weather track.

"I am a keen swimmer and in my youth swam for my school. I believe Labour let city swimmers down when they built GL1, reducing the Barton Pool from 33 metres to 25 metres was a backward step.

"As the city MP I would be keen to secure funding to build a new Olympic size 50 metre pool for our swimmers. Of my three key sporting projects a new pool would be the icing on the cake of my time as Gloucester's next MP."

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