Royal County Down Golf Club has been urged to consider repaying a £1.5 million Covid support grant from Stormont amid a significant hike in its green fees since the pandemic.

The Newcastle club received £1,526,452 from the Sports Sustainability Fund in 2021.

The payout was the largest single award made under the £23 million scheme, which was designed to help sporting organisations in the pandemic.

Visitors will pay £495 (€577) for a round of golf on the course in 2027, up from around £300 (€350) in 2022, a rise of 64 percent.

SDLP MLA and leader of the Opposition Matthew O’Toole, who grew up near the course, said the club should now consider handing the money back.

“Royal County Down is a major and amazing asset for the town of Newcastle and the wider area,” he told The Irish News.

“It’s consistently ranked one of the best golf courses in the world. It is an amazing place.

“But it’s true to say that it is exorbitantly expensive to play a round of golf there. Unless you have a connection or a membership, which vanishingly few people have, it’s far beyond the means of most ordinary golfers.”

The South Belfast MLA said the scale of the grant was hard to justify given the subsequent fee increases.

“I don’t think it’s defensible for a club which has gotten such a huge, significant sum from the taxpayer to have then ramped up their green fees,” he said.

“Royal County Down has increased its green fees more than virtually every other elite golf course on the island. In a context where they have used public money, that is uncomfortable, and I think they should consider their response to it.

“They should consider paying all or some of the grant back, to demonstrate to the public the worth of that grant.”

Previously, the grant was heavily criticised by Stormont’s spending watchdog.

A June 2021 report by then Auditor General Kieran Donnelly found the club had a “very significant bank balance and a high level of reserves” when it received the funding from the Department for Communities.

Mr O’Toole said the £1.5 million sum “represents the wages of many teachers or nurses or bus and train drivers”.

“While we all want to see tourism assets supported, that particular grant in retrospect is hard to justify when you’re seeing the vast increase in green fees at Royal County Down,” he said.

“It’s an elite institution which is completely closed off from ordinary people and ordinary golfers.”

The club said at the time that the grant would fund improvements to the course’s drainage system.

“That’s fair enough, they needed to change their drainage system,” Mr O’Toole said.

“But given the huge increase in green fees they’ve instituted since, presumably they would have been able to pay for that new drainage system out of the increased green fees they’ve been charging people.”

The Opposition leader said the club could instead make a gesture towards ordinary golfers and struggling grassroots clubs

“There are grassroots golf clubs all over the north that are struggling for members and struggling to invest, and there are other grassroots sports clubs in the GAA, soccer and cricket who really have to stretch to make ends meet,” he said.

“They’re doing a lot for participation, getting people into sport and supporting communities. So I would ask Royal County Down to reflect on what they’re doing, not just in terms of the tourism impact for hospitality in the area, which is really important, but in terms of widening participation.

“They could think about offering some discounted rounds at different times of the year, or some other method of allowing people to see what the public has effectively invested in.

“I’m not in any way attacking Royal County Down, it’s a jewel in the crown, and I want to see them hosting more tournaments. I’m just saying that given they have received this public money and they should think about how that looks to the public, particularly to the ordinary person who’s struggling.”

The Royal County Down Golf Club was contacted for comment.