THE PUBLIC were shut out of an important update on the leisure park debacle this week.

Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council's cabinet was receiving an update on the proposed £300 million redevelopment of the leisure park on Tuesday, but excluded the press and public from that part of the meeting.

The exclusion is justified in public council documents as coming under Paragraph 3 of Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act 1972. This covers information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person, including the authority holding that information.

The Gazette had challenged for the update to be heard in public, claiming the public interest outweighed any reason for excluding the public, but the cabinet unanimously voted in favour of moving the meeting into private session.

Press were asked to leave the meeting room, and the live stream on the council's website was switched off.

At the end of Tuesday's meeting, The Gazette asked council leader Ken Rhatigan whether there was any update he could give to the public. He said there was not.

Basingstoke council and development partners New River are currently planning to transform the leisure park, currently home to the aquadrome, ice rink and Hollywood Bowl, into a retail village.

But the plan was labelled "dead in the water" by an opposition councillor just two weeks ago, and Cllr Rhatigan himself told The Gazette earlier in the summer that the proposals cannot come forward in its current form.

There is now uncertainty over whether it will go ahead.

The plan to redevelop the leisure park have been a long time in the coming, after the council had to defeat a legal challenge by the owners of Festival Place.