A community bid to reopen Deangate Ridge Golf Course has been rejected by Medway Council after cabinet members described the application as “inadequate and incomplete”.

Deangate Community Partnership’s expression of interest to take over the running of the site in Hoo, near Rochester, was reliant on working “in collaboration” with social enterprise Mytime Active.

But its business development manager Adam Smith said the bid was submitted without consent, and suggested the so-called relationship had been “overly expressed and, in fact, misconstrued”.

Cabinet members discarded the application this week, citing a number of grounds including the fact the application was submitted after the decision to close Deangate was first made on February 6.

Cllr Rodney Chambers (Con) said: “The first flaw, and the major flaw for me, was the assumption that the Deangate Community Partnership and Mytime Active were in partnership on this particular application.

“The letter from Mytime basically disassociated itself from this application, so I was beginning to ask questions about it – and that’s where the plan starts to fall before any further consideration.

“I congratulate those who have put this in over a short space of time, but that doesn’t actually counter the fact that there are flaws in it. Dare I suggest those flaws should have and could have been recognised by those who were putting this in?”

Cllr Howard Doe (Con), deputy leader, told members there was “no alternative” but to reject the expression of interest application.

He added: “The officers find, and I must agree with that, the financial information is inadequate and incomplete. There is no clear financial information on how the long-term service would be funded.”

Cllr Doe also said the bid could be used as a way of “frustrating” the ongoing Local Plan consultation.

All cabinet members, apart from long-term campaigner Cllr Phil Filmer (Con), supported the motion to reject Deangate Community Partnership’s plans.

Speaking last week, campaigner George Crozer said: “There was no formal arrangement between us and Mytime Active. We were in discussions with one of the managers, and we were under the impression we would be given more time to develop the relationship with them.

“We had about six days to put the document together, so we put forward the expression of interest so we could develop the relationship with them moving forward. When it was put in, we were told by our contact that Mytime Active would not speak to us at all.”