CAMPAIGNERS fighting to keep Temple Cowley pools open urged council bosses to accept their offer to run the site.

The Save Temple Cowley Pools TCP) group made the call ahead of the end of a delay in the site’s sale to enable it to put together a bid.

Oxford City Council, which is building a new pool at Blackbird Leys Leisure Centre, wants to close and sell the Temple Road site.

But campaigners used a new law to register the site as a community asset, putting its sale on hold for six months. That expired on Tuesday.

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Campaigners handed over a petition with 1,800 signatures to Monday’s meeting of the full council.

The group urged the council to “accept this bid as offering best value for the community and so keep health, fitness community facilities on this site”.

But executive board member for leisure Mike Rowley said: “This petition invites the council to accept a bid which has not yet been submitted. We have a legal duty to give proper consideration to all bids and this petition would be contrary to that duty.”

He added: “The decision will be made in a process which is as open as the law allows, but we cannot pre-determine that decision. This is, in effect, a call to make a decision that would not be open to public scrutiny and would potentially be illegal.”

Council leaders have said TCP is beyond repair and swimmers could go to the Blackbird Leys facility in Pegasus Road.

Campaign group leader Nigel Gibson said the group would submit a bid before the deadline, but would not give a figure.

He said he had signed a non- disclosure agreement about details of the bid. The council has not given an asking price for the land. Mr Gibson said campaigners were in discussion with a range of bodies, including developers and charities, about supporting the bid. He told councillors: “If you sell this site it will be gone forever, but working with us means that the land will be held by the community. Our exciting plans, which we are asking you to endorse, have been developed with the community.

“Next week we will be submitting a proposal, but fundamental to that is that you must be willing to cooperate with us.”

Green Party group leader Sam Hollick said the council should adopt a motion to give preference to any bid which kept a leisure use on the site.

Councillors on the Labour-run authority voted to receive the petition but the Green motion was defeated.

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