It's quite touching how many people seem to think Lewisham really is going to make provision for swimming in Forest Hill.

Face it. You've been sold down the river.

The pool closed several years ago, after a period of deliberate neglect. The council did not want to provide a pool then. Nothing has happened since. It doesn't want to provide a pool now. It's just going through the motions - the lowest cost and least controversial option to appease public opinion. To this end all the debate about listing, the consultation, the endless optioneering, the conjecture about land values and build costs and spiralling sums being talked about are grist to its mill.

If it was determined to provide a pool - that's right, something open, that you can swim in (let's not forget what this is fundamentally about) - it would have maintained the old building while it thought about the above and planned for the future. Even at the point it turned out to be knackered after finally succumbing to the years of neglect there was the opportunity to go a long way to putting it right and providing something fit for another 10 or even 15 years for a fraction of the costs now being discussed.

If it was determined to provide a modern facility then there has been more than ample time to demolish (all or part) and rebuild the pool that satisfied most people in most respects.

But they've already got away with no pool for over 3 years and will get away with no pool for at least another couple before it becomes sustaining the pretence becomes too difficult.

As a recap, (as the facts tend to get buried under the propaganda) I'll leave you with the words of His Steveness back then:

"The report indicates that we can renovate Forest Hill for around ?1.5m. This would make the building safe and give it at least 10 years more life. Alternatively we could flatten and build a new facility on the site for about ?2.5m which would clearly have much more modern facilities".

I'm surprised he's not dizzy from all the U-turns: