Colomendy in cut-price vow.

Byline: BEN TURNER 

A DISCOUNT scheme to give hundreds of Liverpool children cheaper admission to Colomendy outdoor activity centre will be extended on the back of bulging visitor numbers.

The ECHO can reveal overnight bookings by city visitors to the north Wales venue is set to smash the 9,500 mark by the end of December.

The figure is up 4,000 on the previous year.

But critics today said continuing discounts would do nothing for the city's poorest children, who cannot get cut-price deals at peak times.

Liverpool council owned Colomendy from 1957, but after pounds 1m annual losses, it transferred management to school trip expert Kingswood, which signed a 30-year lease.

The new owner is carrying out a multi-million upgrade of the facilities to create a secure 500-bed centre by 2012.

In January, Kingswood increased a subsidy, allowing all Liverpool children to get a pounds 20-a-night discount for a maximum of four nights at the centre near Mold.

Previously, only pupils eligible for a free school meal were entitled to the offer at the centre, where attractions now include an assault course, watersports and underground caves.

Now a council report reveals the deal is set to be extended for at least another year.

It comes on the back of projected figures showing the number of city visitors to the centre are set to go through the roof.

Last year, Colomendy saw 5,766 overnight stays from Liverpool groups - almost identical to the 5,877 taken during the last full year of council ownership in 2004-5. That should shoot up to 9,541 - an annual increase of nearly 4,000 by the end of the year.

But today, one of the fiercest critics of the Colomendy transfer said families still have no discounts during May and July.

Cllr Jane Corbett, chairman of the council's education committee, said:"I am delighted more Liverpool children are using Colomendy.

"But the council's choice to transfer it instead of investing in it means children from low-income families are effectively barred at the most desired time of year."

But Cllr Paul Clein, the city's former education boss, said: "The figures vindicate the decision, which kept the centre open.

"Children were choosing to go elsewhere. You pay a bit more for better facilities."

Essentials THE original wooden huts were built at Colomendy in 1939 by the National Camps Corporation as a wartime refuge for Merseyside schoolchildren and the first evacuees arrived in 1940. More than 350,000 Liverpool children had enjoyed the country life since the cabins were built. The site recently underwent a pounds 1.2m refurbishment including new disabled accommodation and dining facilities, underfloor heating, and a pounds 1m adventure park with climbing towers, a tree top aerial course and 200m zip wire.

CAPTION(S):

FUN: The centre at Colomendy in north Wales MEMORIES: An old view of the Colomendy camp