An U18s football club has been forced to stop playing after a dispute over cutting grass on their home field.
The Rainhill Rockets were formed over 29 years ago and the club runs teams for children aged five to eighteen. Their home ground is The Holt field on Martins Close in Rainhill where they have played for over ten years.
However, the team has not been able to train after a dispute between St Helens Borough Council and Rainhill Parish Council has left the grass uncut for months.
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St Helens Borough Council has provided maintenance without charge on land leased to parish councils, despite the parish councils being responsible for maintenance of the land themselves as part of the lease agreement.
This is the case with The Holt field and last year St Helens Borough Council decided to remove this subsidy to parish councils unless they start paying a fee. This has left Rainhill Rockets with nowhere to play or train and Chairman Nick McCoy has said the children are "losing their social life".
Nick told the ECHO: "There are a few teams affected by the cuts and the parish council would need to spend 75% of their budget to maintain the field in the area. The kids can't play and at this time of year, we need to prepare them for the start of the season and the little kids who will be playing for the first time.
"Nobody told us that the grass would not be cut and it started to get really long so I emailed the parish council. We are stuck in the middle and now the parents are going to start cutting the grass themselves just so we can keep going which is not right."
St Helens borough council previously covered the costs of mowing, litter-picking, weed-killing, marking and maintenance of sports pitches, play equipment inspections, and health and safety site inspections. The council stopped paying for the service in April this year and this was to ensure that parish councils had time to "consider their budgets and precepts."
Nick from West Derby said: "The pitches were in a poor state and we have spent years getting them up to scratch. It is our home and we look after it but it feels like the money we have spent has been wasted.
"The children can't go and meet their mates they are losing their social life and not getting any exercise. The kids look forward to it and it has been taken away from them."
A spokesperson for St Helens Borough Council said: “Grassroots sports clubs across the borough are of course incredibly important to us, and as such we continue to offer subsidised pitch hire on council-run pitches to junior clubs.
“With more sports pitches in Rainhill than any other parish in the borough and the need for year-round maintenance, the work needed and therefore the charges are greater than elsewhere.
“We continue to work with the club's best interests at heart and will be meeting with the clubs affected and continue to seek to engage with Rainhill Parish Council to agree arrangements that are consistent with the other parish councils and clubs across the borough.”
