A move to close leisure centres in west Wiltshire on bank holidays in a council cost-cutting exercise has outraged users.

From April 1 Springfield Leisure Centre in Corsham, Bradford on Avon swimming pool, Castle Place Leisure Centre in Trowbridge, Trowbridge Sports Centre, Christie Miller Sports Centre in Melksham, Melksham Blue Pool, Warminster Sports Centre, Westbury Pool and Leighton Recreation Centre will all be shut on bank holidays.

There was further bad news. Springfield Leisure Centre, on Beechfield Road, has had its Saturday closing time reduced to 6pm from its current 9pm, while Melksham Blue Pool will open at 9am instead of 7.30am each day.

Wiltshire Council said the change was brought about by a need to save money.

It has just renegotiated its contract with DC Leisure to provide the service and the change in opening times and shutting on bank holidays made it cheaper.

The decision to close the centres on usually busy bank holidays has left users furious.

Dr Davina Griffin, an educational psychologist from Union Street, in Melksham, uses the Melksham Blue Pool at weekends from 8am and on bank holidays.

She said: “I have been using the centre almost every weekend for 15 years. I am actually devastated by this. It is going to change the whole structure of my weekend. There is a group of people that use the facilities from early in the morning who are not going to be able to from now on.

“The people that go at that time are likely to continue going but at a different time and it just feels like they are hitting those people who are the centre’s biggest supporters. I am furious about it.”

A regular user of Trowbridge Sports Centre’s swimming pool, who did not want to be named because they run a club at the facility, said: “It’s wrong because bank holidays are when the kids are most likely to go with their parents to use the pool facilities.

“I would have thought they would have made more money on those days as more people would want to go. If they shut sports centres what will the kids do, especially as Trowbridge has nothing else for them.”

There was some reprieve for some leisure centre users however.

Castle Place Leisure Centre will stay open an hour longer on Saturdays until 6pm and it will open daily from 7.30am instead of 8.30am, while Trowbridge Sports Centre will benefit from an extra two hours on Saturdays until 7pm.

A Wiltshire Council spokesman said it had to save £480,000 a year on leisure.

He said: “The proposals are being made so they will impact as few people as possible.”