Town council changes cost of hiring Assembly Hall

A NEW ‘reasonable’ and ‘sensible’ pricing structure has been introduced for the Melksham Assembly Hall. 

Instead of a number of different rates, dependent on which areas of the venue are used, Melksham Town Council has decided on one flat hourly rate to hire the whole Assembly Hall building, with discounts available for residents that live in the town council area, not-for- profit organisations from Melksham, and not-for-profit organisations from outside of Melksham. 

The cost of hiring the entire venue for commercial use, has jumped from £42 per hour to £90 – not including VAT – in a move that will, according to cllr Jon Hubbard, pass on the ‘real cost’ of hire to commercial users, rather than offering it to them at a subsidised rate. 

Melksham not-for-profit groups – such as charities, community groups and organisations – will be able hire the venue at a reduced rate of £22.50 per hour (£27 inc VAT). 

Geoff Mitcham from Melksham Rock ‘n’ Roll Club – who hires the venue once a month – has described the increase as ‘reasonable’. He explained to Melksham News that the rock ‘n’ club looks to be facing a £2 increase in their hourly rate – they currently pay £25 an hour, a concessionary rate given to them for hiring the hall every month. 

“It makes more sense to have one rate to hire the whole building,” said Geoff. 

However, he did question the town council’s method for agreeing the new pricing structure at a meeting earlier this month.  

“It did look like they started the meeting with no clue as to what the costings were going to be,” said Geoff, “as nothing has really happened in the past two years, they could only reflect on the income and costs of the hall in 2017 and 2018 – so it did feel like they were sticking a finger in the air to see which way the wind was blowing!” 

He supported an idea from cllr Graham Ellis to form a town council taskforce to re-evaluate the pricing structure in the near future – but he called on the town council to ensure that they include residents and groups that use the hall in any future discussions. 

The new pricing structure is based on the predicted cost for the 2022/23 financial year of £159,485 to ‘keep the doors open’ at the Assembly Hall, a figure that does not take into account any income from hall hire or bar sales. 

For 2022/23 the town council has a budget of £82,362 to subsidise the running costs of the Assembly Hall – a shortfall of £77,123, that the council aims to cover with the income from hall hire and bar sales. 

Using ‘best guesses’ about the future usage of the hall it was estimated that it will cost the town council £116 per hour to run the hall – cllr Jon Hubbard explained he had asked for figures from previous years about how many hours the hall was hired for and by who, but they were not available. 

With these figures, councillors debated how much they should charge per hour for hire of the venue, eventually agreeing on a new pricing structure of: £90 per hour (£108 inc VAT) for commercial hire; £63 per hour (£75.60 inc VAT) for hire by not-for-profit organisations from outside of Melksham – a 30% discount; £45 per hour (£54 inc VAT) for hire by Melksham Town residents for private bookings – a 50% discount; and £22.50 per hour (£27 inc VAT) for hire by not-for-profit organisations from Melksham – a 75% discount. 

Prior to the change, it cost £42 per hour (not including VAT) to hire the whole building, with local organisations and charities able to negotiate a price or apply for grant funding from the town council to help cover the cost. Other rates were available to hire just the auditorium, lounge, kitchen, stage, and dressing rooms. 

According to cllr Hubbard, the new pricing structure will help the town council understand how it is spending its money on the Assembly Hall and help them to cover the costs of running the hall. 

“At the moment what we say to our Assembly Hall team is ‘make as little a loss as possible’ on the hall and then every year we make a fuss about the loss that is made,” said cllr Hubbard. 

He also explained that the new pricing structure will allow the council to focus more on subsidising the use of the facility by not-for-profit organisations, passing on the ‘real cost’ of hire to commercial users. 

Cllr Hubbard also said any money not used from the £82,362 budgeted for 2022/23, could potentially be used to subsidise community events at the Assembly Hall. “Let’s free up money to subsidise other events in the hall,” he said. 

At the meeting there was some resistance from cllr Ellis on agreeing the new pricing structure that evening, urging caution on making decisions based on ‘assumptions’.  

He called for more time and the creation of a taskforce, made up of councillors and local residents, to look at the costs and usage of the hall in previous years and come back with a proposal for a pricing structure later in the year. 

However, cllr Hubbard urged the council to set the pricing structure that evening, explaining that the pricing structure should have been debated in June last year. But he agreed with cllr Ellis’ proposal that a group should be set up to gather evidence to help carry out an informed revision of the rates for the next council year. 

“Let’s get some scores on the door now, so our staff can get on and do their jobs,” said cllr Hubbard. 

And whilst cllr Simon Crundell said the proposed pricing structure was a ‘sensible way’ of looking at how much the town council should be charging for the Assembly Hall; he did raise questions about its future. The councillor questioned if the Assembly Hall is still needed in its current form, describing it as ‘too big’, highlighting that a number of groups that use it have smaller audiences. 

“Do we need a hall that costs so much?” said cllr Crundell. “Would it be of greater community benefit having a hall that we could give out to more people at a cheaper rate?” 

Cllr Tom Price also called for ‘aggressive public consultation’ to ask residents what they want from the hall. “We need to not look at what it is right now,” he said, “but what it could be in the future.” 

It was expected that the town council would discuss a proposal to rebrand the Assembly Hall with a new name and a ‘more fitting strapline’: ‘The Assembly – the Place where Melksham meets’. However, the proposal was dropped prior to the meeting, something that was described as a ‘relief’ by cllr Ellis.