LEISURE World gym membership numbers have been hit because of the opening of the state-of-the-art David Lloyd centre.

Documents which were in front of senior councillors on Tuesday show a £135,000 shortfall in Leisure World income between April and the end of June.

Colchester Council leader Paul Smith (Lib Dem) put the drop down to a £1.5 million refurbishment at Leisure World starting late.

He said: “Income is certainly below what we would have projected in terms of growth.

“The growth we expected with the refurbishment has not quite materialised.

“That has coincided with the opening of David Lloyd, in north Colchester, as well as a number of other gyms seeing David Lloyd and deciding to up their game a bit.

“We were a little bit late in getting the refurbishment done so it’s fair to say we were having trouble getting new people in.

“Obviously, when the refurb was going on, there was some disruption and people may have decided to try elsewhere as a result.

“However, now that it is complete, we are seeing membership go up.

“We are, however, still behind where we would have projected.”

As a result of the drop, council documents state new membership packages have been introduced and “a number of new income streams are being identified”.

Council accounts also show the authority spent £260,000 less than planned in implementing the new waste strategy.

That saving was put down to being able to buy wheelie bins for cheaper than first thought and striking a deal with a vehicle supplier which allowed the authority to buy two used wheelie bin-ready vehicles rather than having to convert some of its existing fleet.

In total, the council made an overspend of £488,000 by the end of June.

Mr Smith added: “We do expect some variance, especially this early in the financial year and that is down to a number of factors.

“For example, there are lots of people using the planning system and paying their fees, which is good, but you need more staff to cope with that, so we’ve had an increased staff cost there.”

The figures were debated at a meeting of Colchester Council’s audit and governance committee.