ORGANISERS behind a rescue bid aiming to save a leisure centre which was closed due to council cutbacks are optimistic they have saved the facility.

Ferryhill Community Partnership wants to save Ferryhill Leisure Centre, which was closed in October last year.

The centre was one of six closed by Durham County Council as it sought to reduce its costs.

A strong anti-closure movement spread, leading to the setting up of the partnership.

Leading partnership members said yesterday a tenancy on the centre has been signed with the council and they hope a lease will follow.

County councillor for Ferryhill Dave Farry, partnership chairman, said: "We hope to be able to open as the Ferryhill Community Hub.

"We estimate it will take about £110,000 a year to run and we fully expect to be open by September.

"If it was closed, people would have to travel to places like Spennymoor and it would be hard for those without cars.

"This is absolutely magnificent news as the last thing we wanted was for the centre to be closed and demolished."

Councillor Farry and his county council colleagues Charles Magee and Brian Avery have each pledged £20,000 to the bid from their neighbourhood budgets.

Fellow county councillor Christine Potts will give £5,000 from her neighbourhood budget and Ferryhill Town Council has offered £20,000.

It is hoped to the effort will receive a further £10,000 from social housing landlord livin.

It is believed that the council will charge a yearly £1 peppercorn rent for the Lambton Road centre.

Groups including Ferryhill Indoors Bowls Club and Seconds Out, which will offer a boxing-style gym, are to use the facility, which it had been hoped would open in March.

There will also be a bar and bistro and the groups' rent will help to cover the running costs of the centre.

Sport England has worked with the council and the community group to try to ensure the centre stays open.

Dave Mitchinson, senior grants manager for the North-East and Yorkshire with Sport England, said: "The group has business plans in place and it should be a success.

"We will help them as much as possible."

A council spokesman said it felt it was too soon to comment on the scheme.