Devonshire Park tennis courts set for long lease to LTA

Eastbourne Borough Council has agreed in principle to hand the Devonshire Park tennis site to the Lawn Tennis Association on a long-term lease. Five council groundstaff would transfer with it, and the financial terms were discussed behind closed doors.

Cabinet took the decision on 16 September. The council’s announcement the next day framed it as talks to “secure the long-term future of international tennis in Eastbourne”. The report councillors actually voted on is more specific, and so is the recorded decision: Cabinet agreed “the proposed long-term lease arrangement with the Lawn Tennis Association (LTA)” and delegated authority to officers to finalise it.

The tournament was already secure until 2038

The framing matters here, because the existing arrangement is not about to run out.

The report states plainly that the current formal agreement with the LTA “allows for the tournament to take place each year until 2038”, which it puts at a further 12 tournaments. The Eastbourne Open is not in danger in the short term.

What prompted the talks was the council’s own finances. Officers write that discussions began in 2024 “in light of EBC’s financial position”, and that a new arrangement “would clearly be in line with the Strategic Finance Programme”. That programme’s stated focus is “reducing non-statutory spend, the majority of which occurs within the Tourism and Place portfolio”.

The council currently maintains the grounds and buildings all year and works through the weeks around the tournament. The report says that if things carry on as they are until 2038, the council “would remain exposed to ongoing revenue costs, inflation, asset-maintenance pressures and operational risk”.

What is in scope

The lease would cover every Devonshire Quarter asset not already tied up with Trafalgar Entertainment Group, the Towner or Headland. That is six things:

• the International Lawn Tennis Centre
• the tennis courts
• the locker room
• the pavilion
• the Point
• the equipment the grounds team uses to maintain the site

Around five full-time equivalent staff in the Devonshire Quarter grounds team would be formally consulted about transferring to the LTA. The report says those staff have already been briefed.

What the LTA has offered

The LTA would run the site all year. The report lists what it “has indicated” the investment will include:

• public access to the courts outside the tournament cycle
• new padel courts for the local community
• access for local schools and other community groups
• upgraded facilities for players, officials and fans during the tournament

The obligation to stage both a WTA and an ATP tournament each year carries over into the new agreement. If either tour proposes a material change to the event, the council or its successor can amend the agreement’s terms.

Chris Pollard, the LTA’s managing director of commercial and operations, said the organisation is “excited by the opportunity to take on a new long-term lease of Devonshire Park, protecting the annual grass-court tournament for future generations of Eastbourne residents”.

Councillor Jenny Williams, cabinet member for tourism and place, said the priority is “to safeguard international tennis in Eastbourne for generations to come while unlocking new investment”, adding that the council also has “a responsibility to ensure the most financially sustainable arrangements are in place for local taxpayers”.

No figures, and one appendix the public did not see

The report contains no financial terms at all. Paragraph 7.2 says they “remain under consideration and are subject to further negotiation”, and that it is “not yet possible to confirm the final level or timing of any savings, income, payments, retained costs or one-off implementation costs”.

The detail exists. It sits in exempt Appendix 3, and the Cabinet agenda flagged that any discussion of it had to happen at item 14, after the public was excluded from the meeting.

Officers do set out what the eventual appraisal will have to weigh: lease premium or rent, hosting payments, implementation costs, staff transfer and pension implications, and any residual liabilities the council keeps. Any LTA capital investment would be funded by the LTA and would not sit in the council’s capital programme.

There is also a legal test. Because this is a disposal of General Fund land, section 123 of the Local Government Act 1972 requires the council to obtain the best consideration reasonably obtainable, or get the Secretary of State’s consent to accept less.

What the tournament is worth

The figures in the report come from the LTA’s own impact assessment of the 2025 tournament. The 2026 numbers were not available when officers wrote it.

The tournament runs in the week before Wimbledon and is classed as a WTA 250 and an ATP 250 event. The first women’s tournament was held in Eastbourne in 1974 and the first men’s in 2009. This year marked 50 years of wheelchair tennis at the site, with an International Tennis Federation WC500 event, and the tournament’s final Sunday carried a free community tennis day for the first time.

Four options, and why the council rejected them

The report sets out everything else officers considered:

• Keep things as they are. Rejected as not viable: it addresses neither the financial sustainability of the site nor the long-term future of the tournament.
• End the agreement that runs to 2038. This would remove the council’s longer-term financial exposure but “would likely involve material damages”.
• Split the site up and sell the assets separately. Judged to deliver financial sustainability, but only from 2039, and to secure neither the tournament nor the wider community offer.
• Find a different partner. Officers concluded the LTA is “the only feasible 3rd party”, citing its long operational presence, the investment it has already made in buildings and facilities, and a site configured specifically for the tournament.

The 2028 deadline behind it

Local government reorganisation runs underneath this decision. Eastbourne Borough Council is due to be replaced by a single East Sussex unitary authority on 1 April 2028, with shadow authority elections in May 2027. The report says this “has necessitated serious considerations about how the tournament can best be managed and safeguarded in the future”.

In practice, a council with roughly 18 months left is settling the future of one of the town’s biggest assets on behalf of the body that replaces it. Officers address this directly, saying any arrangement must be in the best interests of the council “and any successor authority”. Since our report on the abolition being paused, those dates are under government review.

It would follow a pattern. Over the past two years the council has leased the Congress Theatre, the Devonshire Park Theatre, the Winter Garden and the Welcome Building to Trafalgar Entertainment Group, and transferred Sussex Downs Golf Club and the Stage Door pub, now the Bohemian, to private operators.

What it means for you

Nothing changes at the site yet. No lease has been signed, no figures agreed, and no date set.

For residents who use Devonshire Park, the offer on the table is more access, not less: courts open outside tournament week, new padel courts, and a route in for schools and clubs. Those are commitments the LTA “has indicated”, not terms in a signed document, so they are worth watching as the negotiation proceeds.

The decision is a key decision, which means it can be called in for scrutiny. The Scrutiny Committee has been briefed on the proposals during 2026, and a Devonshire Quarter Stakeholder Group has been set up to coordinate across the site.

The next milestone is not a public meeting. Cabinet delegated the rest to the Director of Tourism and Place, in consultation with the chief finance officer, the leader and the cabinet member for tourism and place, after liaison with the Strategic Property Board. That means the terms may not return to a public agenda before they are settled.

Sources: The Future of Tennis at Devonshire Quarter, report to Cabinet, 16 September 2026; Cabinet agenda and decisions, 16 September 2026; Council and LTA in talks to secure long-term future of international tennis in Eastbourne, Eastbourne Borough Council, 17 September 2026.