… is the name of a chain of gyms operating since the early 1990’s; it used to operate the gym above the Cannon Park Shopping Centre in Coventry that is now run by Simply Gym. Two of their competitor chains are Pure Gym and Everyone Active. The latter of these runs the council-owned leisure centres in Warwick District amongst many others. During 2017/18 two of the principal leisure centres had very welcome multi-million pound extensions and refurbishments done; however in spite of a petition being raised by local residents, the Conservative-run administration decided to outsource all of the jobs. To be fair to Everyone Active and its staff they have done a good job in running those leisure centres. Perhaps Labour support for lockdown of this specific area is to hope that private leisure companies such as Everyone Active go bust and the jobs get insourced again.
One part of the draconian lockdown measures introduced by the Conservative government on the basis of being ‘three weeks’ subject to review, was to close all fitness facilities for the sake of ‘public health’ allegedly, although there was no proof that gyms or any other sports / leisure centres were hotbeds of COVID19 infections. Hospitals and care homes were and have been all along. A deliberate decision to undermine the health and fitness of millions of people in this way was and remains a highly irresponsible decision. All to ‘Protect the NHS’ from the fit and healthy people who are least likely to need what services it offers, such as they are anymore.
At the time of the unusually warm dry Spring, many people kept fit by going on long walks, if they lived in a locality conducive to it; Newbold Comyn Leisure Centre in the photograph at the bottom of this post, is one of those, being located adjacent to a former golf course and close to a nature reserve, both accessible to the public. Not so easy for those who live in inner cities, particularly with travel restrictions in place. Resistance training would mean buying one’s own fitness equipment if one could afford it and had room to install it. Again, millions of people don’t, not least those living in apartments. Swimming? Take your chance in the nearest river or canal.
All indoor sports facilities were forced to close for eighteen weeks in total, so they remained closed whilst drive-thru junk food joints were allowed to re-open; so much for the government having the health of the public at heart. Gyms in England were finally allowed to re-open in late July, however the subsequent introduction of the Tier system of lockdowns led to the Liverpool City Region (that includes the Wirral) going into Tier 3 and gyms there being again forced to close, with armed police trying to prevent their being open. Local gym owner Nick Whitcombe of Body Tech Fitness, with the help of local Labour MP Angela Eagle (to give credit where it is due), led a successful campaign to revoke this decision, helped by a parliamentary petition that gained nearly four hundred thousand signatures.
When re-opened, gyms introduced ‘social distancing’ measures by spacing the equipment further apart, something that could have been done within a few weeks, increased the emphasis on cleaning, although the antiseptic cleaning spray was always available and Everyone Active, amongst others, introduced an on-line booking system (compliant with the government’s Test & Trace, but that would be the case for any sports facility that already had an electronic swipe card system). The number of ‘cases’ nationally compared to the number of gym visits was very, very low. At Newbold Comyn, during the weeks that it was allowed to open, it was zero.
However the four-week ‘circuit breaker’ Tier 4 lockdown in late Autumn – with its ever shortening daylight hours and often less than amenable weather not really that conducive for outdoor exercise – meant that gyms were forced to close yet again, with every MP who voted for this, including Angela Eagle herself having voted that way, being complicit in that decision. The backlash against the Tier 4 lockdown and the forced closure of gyms with it helped to boost the number of petition signatures by more than two hundred thousand, many gym users highlighting on Twitter how important regular attendance is for their mental well-being as well as their physical health, the two being inextricably linked, noting also that gym attendance is an important social activity for them.
In spite of the pro-lockdown anti-gym lobby on social media, gyms are now being allowed to open in Tier 3, though fitness classes are still not allowed to go ahead, affecting the revenue level and hence business viability of many fitness facilities (particularly those which are independent, i.e. not part of any chain). One could be forgiven for thinking that the twenty-two weeks so far this year – and particularly the recent four weeks – where indoor sports facilities were forced to close, was a deliberate government policy to weaken the respective immune systems of the fittest and healthiest members of society in order that they beg for the toxic COVID19 ‘vaccine’, although the vast majority will never need such a ‘vaccine’ even if it were safe.
Nigel Huddleston, the Sports Minister, cannot provide any proof (because there is none to provide) of indoor sports facilities being hotbeds of COVID19 infections, merely rambling on that any form of social interaction could result in that, in doing so giving the game away as to the real reason for the lockdowns. In addition, to maintain the fear factor, when one is not taking part in an activity, that is to say when entering, leaving or spectating, one is supposed to constrain one’s breathing by wearing a face mask. Almost all gym users, even those who may follow that guideline in shops, ignore this idiocy in sports facilities and so they should. Without explicitly saying so, they know that this guideline is all part of the scam.
However, the primary danger that faces us all is the regime enforcing injection with the toxic ‘vaccine’ to access all walks of life, fitness facilities included. Given that the companies running these lost eighteen weeks of revenue during the Spring, leading many people who had the space at home and the money to do so, to buy their own fitness equipment and create their own home gym, then these companies lost some memberships accordingly. Do these companies running the fitness facilities want to take the risk of losing even more members? People who don’t have enough space at home or the money to buy their own fitness equipment could pool resources with neighbours or friends to do so, for example.
Warwick Freedom 