A bid to secure grant funding from the Football Foundation has been delayed after concerns over microplastics seeping into the river Brett.

Rolf Beggerow, Hadleigh councillor and treasurer of the Layham Road Sports Ground sub committee had wanted the town council to join the Football Foundation framework subject to; completion of HM Land Registry, agreement in principle on acceptance of a charge on the land for 21 years, and agreement in principle to the terms and conditions.

He also wanted the council to commit £50,000 of the £112k Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) reserves to be allocated towards the project.

Cllr Beggerow said at last Thursday's town council meeting: "This would be stage one. Signing up to the Football Foundation framework does not mean we are committing to a specific 3G technical solution or pitch.

"It would be a commitment for the council to follow a formal structured approach and link us with the Football Foundation and a number of potential suppliers."

Layham Road sports ground (Picture credit: Hadleigh Nub News)

However, councillor Huw Roberts warned that signing a funding deal with the Football Foundation would commit the council to use rubber crumb infilling on the 3G pitches favoured by organisation, as stated in the Football Foundation's glossary of terms.

He wanted assurances the council would be able to use another type of infill for the artificial pitch, which would not lead to polluting the nearby river,

Given the uncertainty on the legal aspect of signing up to the framework the council deferred the decision to sign up to the Football Foundation Framework to get money for a new artificial pitch. This was in order to get more advice.

Fears new 3G pitch would add to pollution to nearby river Brett (Picture credit: Hadleigh Nub news)

Representatives from the Hadleigh Angling Club and HEAT were among members of the public who, while supporting the sports pitch initiative in principle, voiced their concerns about the environmental risk from microplastic pollution from some types of artificial pitch.

Advice from environmental charity Fidra was also sought and more research is set to be carried out.

Cllr Roberts said after the meeting: "There were some reassurances about the 'rubber crumb' infill used in some artificial pitches, and how leakage from them might be reduced. However, following information provided by Fidra and others, councillors expressed concern about the potential environmental impact.

I believe councillors accepted that other solutions that do not use micro plastics are available and are preferable.

The remaining question was whether or not, by signing up to the agreement, the council would be giving up the power to stop a microplastic pitch as the only solution.

The meeting heard several reassurances that the decision on what type of pitch would be bought was much further on in the process, and so the council could sign up now.

However, the background documents provided were not clear on that, and some of the wording in the documents seemed to suggest rubber crumb as the foreseen solution. This, and the fact that a limited set of artificial pitch suppliers would sign up to the same agreement, may have given some councillors pause.

So, a majority of councillors voted to defer, pending more advice on exactly what the council would be signing up to."

Given that the decision was deferred it was agreed not to commit the £50,000 CIL money at this stage.