A POWYS County Council consultation meeting at Knighton Community Centre recently saw the centre completely full with over 480 people present including on the stage Jeremy Rowe, Freedom Leisure head of operations in Wales and the west, Stuart Mackintosh PCC, mayor of Knighton Sally Vaughan, deputy mayor Bob Andrews who jointly chaired the meeting, Cllr Graham Brown, cabinet member and portfolio holder and PCC director Paul Griffiths.

The meeting started with a short presentation by Paul Griffiths who told everyone about the money the council had to save and how they were proposing to save it including closing Knighton Sports and Leisure centre.

Next to speak was Cllr Graham Brown who gave everyone in the room hope by saying, "The settlement from the Welsh government was better than we thought so hopefully now we can come up with a positive proposal regarding Knighton Leisure Centre. I'm certainly hopeful that we will be able to come out with a positive outcome because I think it is a lot more positive than we all thought".

Next came questions from the room first starting with children from Knighton Primary School council junior mayor Emelia Watts asked "Are you worried about our children playing by the river when they haven't had lots of time learning to swim?

And a question from deputy mayor Will Thomas relating to one of the issues put forward by the children's commissioner for Wales, Sally Holland "Have you completed a children's rights assessment on the closure of the centre?"

Rhianna and Chloe then asked "How can children get to the pool in Presteigne if their mum and dad don't drive?"

And Alisha and Saskia asked "Where will the Rainbows, Browning, Scouts and Guides go if it closes?"

All the questions were answered by either Paul Griffiths or Graham Brown who said these are all issues that will need to be discussed when making the decision. The Junior Mayor and Deputy then handed a petition asking for the Leisure centre to be kept open with nearly 1800 names on to Cllr Graham Brown.

At the end of the meeting Sally Vaughan thanked everyone on the stage for answering all the questions and then thanked everyone who came to the meeting.