Campaigners have revealed their frustrations that the Oasis Leisure Centre has been used as a dumping ground for rubbish.

The group, who have been trying to ensure that the closed leisure facility and its surrounding car park remain in good shape, were dismayed to see that someone had managed to access the land and fly-tip.

Just months after a large-scale community effort to tidy the Oasis grounds, and after leaseholder SevenCapital promised to fulfil its requirement to maintain the area, large amounts of wood, tubing and insulation were dumped.

The Save Oasis Swindon campaign group, which fought tirelessly to ensure the Oasis' iconic dome and pool would be preserved with Grade II listed building status, posted about the latest blight on the beloved building on social media. 

A spokesperson for the group said: "Unacceptable rubbish this past week at the Oasis Leisure Centre following on from the shipping container removal.

"Sort it out Swindon Borough Council and stop ruining our town. 

"We are furious! The Oasis was the pride of our town. How did it get to this? What on earth do we pay our Council taxes for? The Oasis, reduced to this! a wasteland."

For comment on the fly-tipping, The Adver approached both Swindon Borough Council as the owners of the land, and property management company SevenCapital who are leasing it off of the council on a long-term basis. 

A council spokesman said the authority had been in touch with SevenCapital about getting the site cleared.

The leader of the council,  David Renard said: "The Oasis site is the responsibility of Seven Capital and they are taking measures to ensure the tidiness and security of the site. The Save Oasis group know this and is being disingenuous by suggesting it is a council responsibility."

Seven Capital has not responded.

However, South Swindon MP Robert Buckland appears to have raised the issue separately and did receive a response from SevenCapital. 

It said: "We actually have a team going down later this week.

"Please also note, only last week we installed extra bins to encourage people to not drop litter but to put it in the bins.

"In addition, we have this week ordered concrete bollards to stop all access to the site which will hopefully help with the fly-tipping issue."

Members of the public were frustrated with how frequently rubbish would build at the Oasis site so took matters into their own hands in February and cleaned it themselves, filling 70 bin bags. 

This prompted a crunch meeting between the council, Save Oasis Swindon and SevenCapital in March after which it was promised that regular maintenance would be carried out.

After this, a reopening date of January 1, 2026, was set, even though an important Levelling Up bid failed, and the majority of the plans have not yet been revealed or approved.