Dear Sir,

I read your lead story “Become a Friend  Of PCP” a scheme designed to encourage and thank people for their continued support. The article included the PCP’s mission statement  which is ‘ improving health, well- being and learning for all’. which I found to be entirely ironic.

I have attended the PCP,  since September 2012, joining the class ‘Tai Chi for Health’ because of residual health issues  following  chemotherapy. Following a great deal of research I decided that this low impact controlled activity would best suit my  needs and was encouraged to discover  it was recommended on NHS Websites.

The class was attended by others who had joined for a variety of reasons many of which included health matters. Whilst the numbers attending  fluctuated there was a core group of regulars.

The instruction given by Ken Hornung was of the highest quality. He was clearly very experienced, extremely knowledgeable, very under-standing and targeted his tuition so that those attending benefitted enormously from what he did. My personal health improvements have been quite marked.

I was dismayed therefore to discover, the classes were now cancelled as they were not cost effective. I do acknowledge the centre has running costs but I would suggest that Jane Hartley, Chief Executive of PCP, amend the mission statement to read ‘improving health, well-being and learning for all as long as it is cost effective’.  A pity that the health benefits were not taken into account.

I would also suggest the PCP has now lost a number of potential ‘Friends’ who are left without an easy to reach accessible venue to continue their health improvements.

Paul Wray, School Aycliffe.

CHARITY CANNOT RUN COURSES AT A LOSS says PCP

Dear Mr Wray,

I am writing in response to your letter commenting on the cancelation of our provision of Tai Chi classes, due to them not being economically viable and the irony of  PCP’s Mission statement being ‘Improving health, wellbeing and learning for all’.

You suggest that our mission statement should perhaps read, ‘Improving health, wellbeing and learning for all as long as its cost effective’ and there is some truth in your suggestion, as sadly as we do not receive any public sector or grant funding to support lifestyle classes in the Pioneering Care Centre and we cannot afford to run classes at a loss.

We have not come to the decision lightly; we have tried to keep the class going for 2 years despite it not achieving sufficient attendance to generate enough income to break even. We have also tried to promote the class more widely to generate interest, but despite our efforts and due to the economic climate we are operating in, we simply could no longer afford to run it.

We are always reluctant to stop running any class that is benefiting individuals to improve their health and we constantly try to secure further funding to fund and subsidise our activities. Therefore we will now be working in partnership with Nouveau fitness, who have some funding which will mean classes will be offered at a reduced rate. A new timetable will be published soon which includes low impact physical activity suitable for those with health or mobility problems.

In the meantime I understand that Age UK run a Tai Chi class at Newton Aycliffe Youth Centre on Wednesdays 12-1pm for people over the age of 50, and there is also a Tai Chi class at Agnew Community Centre, Wednesday 6.30 – 8pm which may be of help to you.

I hope this letter has gone some way to explaining our situation, that as a registered charity we do not receive any grant funding to run the Pioneering Care Centre and its activities; therefore we have to ensure that all of our activities are funded in some way.

Some of our activities such as ‘Colour Your Life’ art classes are funded through the NHS which means we are able to offer this activity for free, but sadly this is not the case for our Tai Chi classes.

Jane Hartley

Chief Executive