From today, Tuesday 12 April 2011, your blue and brown bin, recycling collections will be changing from a fortnightly to monthly collection schedule.

Under the new scheme:

• Your blue and brown recycling bins will be collected once a month (instead of once a fortnight) on the same day as your black bin.
• Collection of all other bins will not change with your general domestic waste (black bin) collected weekly and your garden waste (pink lidded bin) collected fortnightly.

All households in Salford should have received a new calendar sticker attached to your blue and brown recycling bins which detail your new monthly collection dates. Please make a note of the calendar dates showing your new sequence of recycling collections.

Because I live in Langworthy, I’m frequently checking planning applications to see if any potential development could cause problems for my neighbours and this evening I have come across a troubling application from Tesco, in relation to the Pendleton Store.

Late last year, Tesco were controversially granted planning permission for their new “eco-store” in Pendleton (despite nothing about the building being eco-anything) and to protect local Langworthy residents from noise and being disturbed in the early hours, a restriction was put in place on the times that Tesco would be allowed to deliver their produce to the store.

These restrictions were no HGV movements/loading/unloading outside the hours of 9am and 9pm and no other loading or unloading outside the hours of 9am and 9pm.

Tesco is now seeking to remove these planning restrictions by way of planning application number 11/60166/FUL which is a variation of their original application number 10/59130/FUL which has already been granted permission.

All local Pendleton and Langworthy residents should immediately write to Salford Council’s planning committee quoting planning application number 11/60166/FUL. Langworthy and Pendleton residents have an automatic right to quiet enjoyment of their homes without being woken by deliveries on a Sunday morning before 9am.

Tesco’s reason for removing the above loading/unloading restrictions are “to enable the foodstore to operate more efficiently with regard to deliveries to the store” which is a nonsense reason. Tesco takes no account of it’s neighbours and the store is fully capable of operating just fine with loading and unloading between the hours of 9am and 9pm.

You can comment on this planning application by going to http://publicaccess.salford.gov.uk/publicaccess/ and searching for planning application number 11/60166/FUL and then clicking on ‘Make a Public Comment’

I took this photograph in June 2009 a few months after construction began of the new Willow Tree Primary School on Greenland Street in Langworthy. As you can see from the state of the road, contractors heavy goods vehicles that delivered and removed building materials completed wrecked the road.

We were promised this would be “looked into” by Urban Vision and the state of the road has regularly been reported to Community Committee with a view to insisting the building contractor return the road to the condition it was before they started their work.

Today the condition of the road on Greenland Street is no different (ok, it’s slightly worse). While the school has now opened and the HGVs have gone, the potholes and uneven surface of the road remains.

My neighbours and I are sick to death of having to drive down roads like this – and I cannot imagine what is must be like to cycle down it!

What really annoys is that they “forgot” to paint the yellow “no parking” lines outside the school entrance and had to come back and do it after the school has opened. The even painted the lines through the potholes!

Unfortunately, as a mere resident (and community committee member) I have reached the end of what I can do to remedy this problem. If I was a Councillor, I could speak directly to Salford Council’s Highways Department and Urban Vision themselves, perhaps even with the school building contractor, to reach a resolution to this 2 year problem.

Our Labour Councillors in Langworthy have failed us. If you elect me as your Councillor in Langworthy on May 5th I promise to do everything I can to have Greenland Street resurfaced out of the extra “pothole cash” provided by our coalition government.

These are difficult times for people across Britain, but this week has shown that this can also be an opportunity to reshape Britain into a fairer, more equal and greener country.

Labour’s financial legacy has left Britain needing to borrow an extra £400million, every single day, just to get by. Labour also left us paying £120million in interest on our debt each and every day – for that we could build a new primary school every hour.

Salford’s share of the country’s debt now stands at a monstrous £7.98billion and in order to sort that out the government is making the savings which I know a lot of people are finding painful. As a public sector worker myself, having a pay freeze as prices go up, I know exactly how a lot of people feel about this. But the alternative would be worse.

I am pleased that despite all this, Liberal Democrat policies coming into action this week are making a positive difference to people’s lives in our great city.

Over the last seven days in Salford, thanks to Liberal Democrats:

• 74,000 local people are getting a £200 income tax cut – benefiting 23 million people across the country
• 3,400 local people have been lifted out of paying income tax altogether, with more to come
• 39,500 Salford pensioners have been given an extra £4.50 a week – and those retiring from today will be on average £15,000 better off over their retirement.
• Nationally, £625million extra has gone to our schools, aimed at the most disadvantaged pupils – rising to £2.5billion a year by 2015

Liberal Democrats in government will not stop there.

This week also saw Pensions Minister Steve Webb announcing that the Government will be introducing a simple, flat-rate state pension of £140 to replace the current complicated, unfair and means-tested system.

Business Secretary Vince Cable is cutting regulation to promote small business and create jobs.

Energy and Climate Change Secretary, Chris Huhne revealed that Britain will be hosting the 2012 Clean Energy Summit – putting Britain at the heart of the Green Energy Revolution.

These are some of the reasons I am proud to be a Lib Dem candidate in the coming local elections. In these tough times (and, let’s face it, they’d be tough whoever was running it) we’re making the most of our position as a junior partner of the coalition and putting into action nationally things that are really helping Salford people.

It’s now under a month until the Salford local elections on May 5th and I am proud, to once again, be selected as the Liberal Democrat candidate for Langworthy.

My main reason for standing again is simply because I enjoy helping people and solving problems. Being a Councillor allows me to do that in an official capacity and offers me an opportunity to put resident’s concerns and problems direct to council officers.

While party politics is important, I see myself more as a local champion than simply “the Liberal Democrat candidate” – the Lib Dem way of getting a pothole fixed, a broken street light repaired, an illegal off-road motorbike reported or graffiti cleaned up is no different to the Labour way. There are only the differences between good Councillors and bad ones – Councillors who respond to calls for help and stay in touch, and ones who don’t. I hope people vote with that in mind, and that they think I am worth their vote.

Living in Langworthy (unlike all my opponents in this election, apart from the UKIP candidate) means that my wife and I are a part of this community and we want it to thrive.

I hope that people feel I am worthy of their vote. I would be happy to speak to anyone about any issue, large or small, at any time. Just drop me a line on 07870 444 235 or email me at steve@stevemiddleton.info

People can also read this blog which I have updated often over the past couple of years to give people the chance to hear my views and engage in debate. A few Salford Lib Dems from my party have sites like this in Salford and I am proud of this as a tool to keep people informed and engaged. You’ll also notice that many of my opponents in Labour and  the Conservatives have commented on my blog posts – I actively encourage them to do so, as I am not afraid to debate my points, I welcome the opportunity to do so.

Over the next few weeks I’ll talk about the issues and why I think I am worth your vote more than my opponents. I hope I can convince enough people. If you’re unconvinced, let me know why and I’ll see what I can do.

Whilst reviewing a response to Monton residents and business owners from Salford Council’s Lead Member for Planning Labour Councillor Derek Antrobus on the excellent Salford Online, I notice a startling sentence in his official statement:

“It is important to bear in mind that…users at Monton have had nearly a decade of free parking when charges should have been imposed”

It’s an astonishing fact that almost 10 years ago, Salford Council’s Planning and Transportation Regulatory Panel passed a resolution to introduce car parking charges in Monton, but then forgot to do so.

And while I have every sympathy for Monton residents and business owners, since I disagree with having to park to shop locally (Bury Council can manage free parking, why can’t Salford?) – it seems that this is yet more proof of Salford Labour’s financial mis-management of our beloved city.

If Salford Council had implemented the Monton car parking charges back in 2002 when they were supposed to, that might have stopped this month’s increases in all the other council-controlled car parks across Salford.

You can see Councillor Antrobus’ full statement, including his admission that they simply forgot to implement car parking charges in Monton on Salford Online here.

Vote  out incompetent Labour on May 5th.

Vote Liberal Democrat in Langworthy.

The candidates for Langworthy ward in the 2011 Salford City Council local elections were published yesterday, revealing six candidates have been validly nominated in Langworthy. They are as follows:-

• Andy Behan, Trade Unionists and Socialists Against Cuts
• George Darlington, Conservative Party
• Keith Fairhurst, British National Party
• Graeme Hulse, UK Independence Party
• Gina Loveday, Labour Party
• Steve Middleton, Liberal Democrats

A few interesting names in that list. Yours truly is at the bottom of the ballot paper and current incumbant Gina Loveday (who lives in Blackfriars, Irwell Riverside ward) is 5th on the ballot.

Andy Behan stood for TUSK/TUSC/Hazel Must Go last year in Ordsall and garnered 255 votes. It’s hard to believe he’ll even match that in Langworthy, since most of his Ordsall voters were undoubtedly making a “anti-Hazel Blears” vote.

George Darlington was the Tory paper candidate here in Langworthy last time and managed a distant third place, just managing to beat the BNP by 67 votes.

Keith Fairhurst recently stood as the BNP candidate in Walkden North on 3rd March this year finishing 4th with 92 votes. He didn’t stand anywhere last year but in 2011 has suddenly popped up on the electoral register, living in Irwell Riverside ward.

UKIP didn’t stand a candidate in Langworthy last year, this year newcomer Graeme Hulse is nominated by them and, thankfully, at least lives in the ward like me (unlike the Labour, Conservative, BNP and TUSC candidates).

I suspect UKIP and BNP will split their small representation between them this year and it’s clear from previous years that the Conservatives just can’t win here.

It’s a straight fight between local Langworthy Lib Dem Steve Middleton and Labour’s candidate from Blackfriars. Who would you choose to represent your neighbourhood? A fellow neighbour….it makes perfect sense.

Kick Labour out by voting Liberal Democrat in Langworthy on May 5th – it’s the only way to get rid of Labour here.

Local Liberal Democrats have welcomed a commitment made in last week’s Budget to give another £100m to repair potholes in the nation’s roads. The extra funding, which will see £608,644 to repair pot holes across Salford, comes on top of the £100m earmarked for pot holes which was announced by the coalition government in February.

Commenting on the news, Liberal Democrat Candidate for Langworthy ward Steve Middleton said “This is great news, and brings the total extra funding prioritised by the government to £200m. Hopefully this will start to undo the estimated £100m maintenance backlog for Salford roads which accumulated under our Labour-controlled council.”

Steve continued “Road and pavement repairs are one of the biggest issues local people have asked me about while I’ve been campaigning this year. We are crying out for investment, and locally Lib Dem Councillors and Campaigners have been pressing for repairs year after year. Now the Lib Dems in government are coming up with the goods even in these bad financial times. Potholes are bad for cars, bikes and buses, and wonky pavements are bad for pedestrians. This money from the government will help sort it, and we’ll campaign hard to get the worst local roads fixed.”

Greater Manchester Police has issued a warning to smartphone and iPhone users to keep their expensive gadgets and mobile phones safe after a theft earlier this month at the Langworthy metrolink stop.

A thief snatched an iPhone at about 2.30pm on Friday 4 March 2011 from a 27-year-old woman who was travelling towards Eccles on the Metrolink.

She was flicking through applications on the phone when the tram stopped at the Langworthy Road stop on Eccles New Road and a stranger snatched the phone from her and ran out of the tram.

The victim and another passenger chased the offender.

There is no clear description of the offender and it is not known whether the person responsible is a man or a woman. The person was wearing a grey hooded top.

Police Constable Mark Gingell said: "The offender may have thought he or she could get away with this but we are now actively pursuing this person.

"We are appealing to anyone who was on this tram and who might be able to paint a better picture of the offender. The descriptions we have are scant because the incident took place so quickly.

"The more witnesses we get the better the chance we have of tracing the person responsible."

Anyone with any information is asked to call police on 0161 856 5250 or call the independent charity Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.

Following Salford Council’s budget and their announcement that school crossing patrol numbers are at risk I note that Liberal Democrat-controlled Sefton Council (just down the East Lancs Road) has voted in it’s own budget to reduce Councillor allowances by 5%.

This measure (suggested by both opposition parties on Salford Council and rejected by Labour) has saved all of Sefton’s “lollipop services”.

Sefton Councillors now receive £8,520 which also includes a fixed amount for travelling expenses. Compare that to Salford Council’s £10,080 standard allowance plus travel expenses can be claimed on top of that.

All councils throughout the country are getting less taxpayers government grant money to pay for running their services because Britain is hugely in debt and they are having to make big savings. The previous government spent money that it simply didn’t have.  Instead, it borrowed.

Our “national credit card” debt is now equal to £22,400 for every person living in our country. We are in hock to others who lend us this money and we cannot go on like this and must reduce this huge national overdraft for us and future generations.  Government has to pay out millions of pounds every day in interest payments.

It’s difficult to realise, as we all go about our daily business, that Britain’s finances are in such a dreadful, perilous state. In fact, worse than any other developed country. That’s how bad things are and they are no different at a local level.

Huge cuts to frontline services have already been made by Labour-controlled Salford Council, with more than 600 job losses – but savings could have been made elsewhere without impacting essential services.

The Liberal Democrat group on Salford Council wanted to help make sensible savings in the budget, but Labour refused to allow local Lib Dems to engage with them, affectively shutting us out from the process. The Conservative Group faced the same shut-out from Labour and they offered a budget of their own they knew would be voted down by the Labour-controlled Council (it was).

If Labour had listened to some of the budget suggestions made by the Liberal Democrats and Tories, we could have had a budget agreed by all local parties that would not have seen frontline services slashed, but expensive and unnecessary projects such as sponsoring the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, commissioning a “world-class” opera and moving two lumps of metal (aka the Quays cranes) a couple of miles up the road.

Labour have their priorities wrong, it’s time to make a change on the council and send Labour a message on May 5th by voting Liberal Democrat and shifting the balance of power away from those that do not deserve it. Cuts to our frontline services in Salford are Labour cuts, don’t let them convince you otherwise.

Liberal Democrat Councillors in Salford were today welcoming the news that due to changes in the national tax system, implemented by Liberal Democrats in the Coalition Government, 3,290 of Salford’s poorest residents have been lifted out of the personal income tax band altogether.

A further 91,000 residents will also find themselves better off when the changes are implemented in April this year – paying up to £200 less per year in income tax.

When the coalition was formed the two parties agreed to implement a key Liberal Democrat policy that the personal allowance for income tax should be increased in order to help lower and middle-income earners.

The change is being funded with the money that would have been used to pay for the increase in Employee National Insurance thresholds proposed by the Conservatives, as well as revenues from increases in Capital Gains Tax rates for non-business assets.

After pressure from the Liberal Democrats the two parties also agreed to a longer-term policy objective of further increasing the personal allowance to £10,000, making further real terms steps each year towards this objective. Achieving this would provide much more tax fairness towards the poorest in our society, something Liberal Democrats are committed to.

Speaking about the great news Councillor Norman Owen, Leader of the Liberal Democrat group on Salford Council said,

“This is great news for thousands of Salford’s residents, especially for the 3,290 residents who are being lifted out of the threshold for paying income tax. This will be a really positive bit of news for those people, who are amongst the poorest in our communities, at a time when many are struggling. Liberal Democrats are continuing to push for yearly increases to the allowance until we reach £10,000 as the threshold. This would provide much more tax fairness towards the poorest in our society.”

Residents of Pendleton are celebrating now that the Liberal Democrat-Conservative coalition government has approved a PFI scheme for the area which will see it transformed. Over £100m of investment from the government will build over 1,200 new homes as part of the scheme and see a massive refurbishment of 1,200 council homes.

Pendleton is already the home to 13,000 proud and passionate residents and they will benefit from this government-backed large scale regeneration which will return the area back to the once thriving community it used to be. Under PFI the properties will remain in council ownership and tenants will remain as council tenants with all their existing
rights, including right-to-buy.

I welcome the government announcement. Pendleton has been in need of modernisation for far too long and for many years Labour dragged their feet over investment here. The regeneration of Pendleton will create a better choice of
quality houising for new and existing residents. In addition to providing new homes and bringing existing ones up to
the Decent Homes Standard, we will now see a much needed re-modelling of streets and estates.

There has been no real investment in Pendleton in the 34 years since it was built and that’s a sad reflection on Labour’s
dismissive attitude towards the community-spirited people who live here. I’m glad that the government has approved the PFI scheme and I think this is an opportunity to make Pendleton a better place.

Liberal Democrat Councillor for Langworthy Lynn Drake said “People have been frustrated by the lack of investment in Pendleton so I am extremely pleased that the coalition has given the green light to Pendleton PFI. I’m particularly gratified to see that social and private housing will be developed in a way that means there is no obvious visual distinction between them.”

Lynn added “Pendleton has a great community but the estate does need redesigning to help reduce crime. I think most residents will welcome the proposals.”

Local Liberal Democrat Councillor Lynn Drake has been asking Salford Council officers if they can shed any light on the future of Seedley Primary School. So far the school, which closed last summer, has not been earmarked for any future
use and local residents are worried that the building will be allowed by the council, to fall into unsafe disrepair, just
like the adjacent council owned shops on Liverpool Street.

Councillor Drake who lives behind the school said “The shops on Liverpool Street partially collapsed in June last year and I’m worried this will happen to the school building if it is not maintained properly.”

Recently, Salford Council published a notice of intention to demolish the old school building, but there’s no indication of when that might happen, how the site will be secured both,during and after demolition and what (if any) plans the Council have beyond that. It’s possible the Council will try and sell the site to a developer, if so, both Councillor Drake and I will be keeping an eye out for any future planning applications.

Langworthy residents were left angry and upset after January’s Community Committee meeting where it was revealed by council officers that it was unlikely there would be enough money left in the budget to pay for much needed car parking and an access road behind the shops on Langworthy Road.

I attended this meeting and raised my concerns about the council’s priorities.

By the time the Langworthy Road shop car parking scheme reached the community committee, it was too late as council officers wanted the money left over in the budget to be spent in Ordsall on some new ‘super crossings’ at the soon-to-bebuilt Oasis Academy.

If the Council can afford to spend nearly £700,000 moving the two blue cranes from the Quays to Regent Road roundabout, I’m sure they can afford to fund the supercrossings themselves and let us spend community funding on the essential car parking and an access road behind the struggling shops on Langworthy Road.

Local Lib Dem ward Councillor Lynn Drake was astonished at the decision.

She said “Shop owners and residents on Langworthy Road were promised the parking 5 years ago as part of the re-generation. It never happened then and looks like it won’t happen now.”

Last summer Langworthy Lib Dem campaigner Steve Middleton and local
Councillor Lynn Drake submitted a 250 name petition to Salford Council in protest over the alarming rise of speeding cars and heavy goods vehicles cutting through side streets across the ward.

Residents of Seedley Park Road, Lower Seedley Road & Seedley Terrace in particular have had to put up with their streets being used as rat runs and short cuts by motorists trying to avoid traffic jams on Langworthy Road and HGVs delivering to the new Willow Tree Primary School and the surrounding house clearance demolition.

Local residents have had enough of late night car crashes on their streets and this petition was the final straw for some. We are glad the council has finally seen sense and approved two schemes to slow down the traffic.

I’ve always stood up for free, fair and unbiased reporting as I believe it’s one of the things that makes this country great. To stand up and speak the truth is, I think, a universal right. The Egyptian people are struggling with this same problem as we speak, their media’s right to free speech was quashed yesterday when the popular news network Al Jazeera was banned from broadcast.

So it with disdain that I read in our local paper, The Salford Advertiser, the week before last about how the Langworthy ward contained the most benefit claimants compared to the rest of Salford. Whilst this snippet of information is true, the article written by Salford Advertiser reporter Denise Evans was slanted (along with unhelpful comments from Langworthy Labour ward Councillor John Warmisham) to suggest that because Langworthy had the highest number of benefit claimants, they therefore must all be benefit cheats.

The Langworthy article was poorly constructed to sensationalise a statistic that exists purely because of the geographical and diverse community that we have in Langworthy, compared to say Worsley and Boothstown (which the article helpfully points out has the lowest benefit claimants).

My letter, which was published in last week’s Salford Advertiser readers viewpoints page, addressed some of the problems with the assumptions in the original article and I won’t repeat those words here.

Manchester Evening News

It was doubly disappointing to therefore read a Manchester Evening News article written by respected MEN reporter Pamela Welsh (see here), which is basically a government-bashing piece that shows the MEN is decidedly biased in it’s reporting.

To openly support an anti-government petition is surely beyond the remit of The Manchester Evening News – this goes beyond mere news reporting and comment; it is making the news itself.

Pamela Welsh and The Manchester Evening News should withdraw “support” for this petition and merely report on it. If they do not, I cannot take anything they write as the truth, but merely the opinion of an anti-community and anti-government mouthpiece.

Salford and Manchester’s free and fair local paper has died. RIP.

Back in November I wrote here about the cancellation of funding from the NWDA for phase II of the Quays Gateway Masterplan, which involved moving the old and disused Quays Cargo Cranes to the M602 roundabout and the construction of three key ‘supercrossings’ that would be built across Trafford Road directly in front of the new Oasis Academy at MediaCity:UK.

When the Manchester Evening News suggested that the whole plan had been scrapped, suddenly Salford Council came to the rescue and claimed the MEN had it all wrong (even forcing the paper to print a retraction and withdraw online versions of the articles) and that the Cranes had been saved after all. Salford Council generously offered to fund the continuation of phase II of the Quays Gateway Plan – minus the Trafford Road supercrossings.

A despicable plan has been hatched, and it would seem this plan was in motion as far back as November of last year when Ordsall & Langworthy Neighbourhood Officer Ross Spanner suggested that the community committee would have to consider funding the supercrossings from it’s road safety budget, following the withdrawal of funding from the NWDA.

So, in exactly 7 days time on January 11th (6.45pm), the Ordsall & Langworthy Committee will be asked to exhaust it’s road safety budget to pay for three supercrossings that Oasis Academy should have been forced to build as part of their planning application.

Further, if Salford Council can afford to fund the moving of 2 lumps of old, rusting metal to “pretty up” a roundabout but cannot fund essential life-saving supercrossings that would protect our children – they they have their sums wrong (at the very least their priorities).

I’m asking every resident of Langworthy if they think this is right. Please do your best to attend next week’s community committee meeting and send the council a message that we will not be manipulated in this way.

There are far too many road safety schemes that need the community committee’s attention to be exhausting our budget on a scheme that should have been paid for by Oasis Academy and could be paid for by Salford Council.

What do you think? Cranes or Crossings?

Blogging has been thin on the ground these last few months (a new year’s resolution may be in order to rectify that), but it seems that a new year has not brought a ‘new’ Labour. In fact, quite the opposite.

Nationally, we see Labour claiming the VAT rise is “the wrong tax at the wrong time” – and while I’m no fan of the VAT rise, I do remember Alistair Darling publicly discussing the need to bring in a rise of 19%. Just what would Labour have done if they’d won the election (or, god forbid participated in a coalition)? We’ll never know, Labour’s blank page is still waiting for a drop of ink.

Locally, Salford’s Labour are no better. The end of the year saw disaster after disaster: Salford Childrens Services being rated poor (the lowest possible rating), the previously excellent Adult Care suffered badly under the new stewardship of Langworthy Councillor John Warmisham and a dodgy land deal was done with Tesco.

The £4m under-the-counter “deposit” by Tesco as part-payment for land in Pendleton adjacent to the Precinct could be tantamount to a bribe, but to subsequently discover the land itself has probably been undervalued by possibly a further £10m suggests a return to the sinister and backhanded corruption that I personally always thought was the writings of  TV fiction.

I’ve submitted a Freedom of Information Request to attempt to find out which officers knew about the £4m payment and, if it’s even suggested anyone on the planning panel knew about this, I intend to report this whole sorry saga to the Council’s Standards Board.

Don’t for a minute think I am against the new Tesco at Pendleton, I’m not. But I am against council corruption.

This year, I’ll be standing as the Liberal Democrat candidate in May’s Salford Local Elections – where it’ll be my intention to route out corruption like this and expose the guilty. With more opposition councillors on the council, I’ll have more chance to reduce Labour’s waste and ensure we return our Adult Care & Childrens Services to the effective departments they have the potential to be.

It’s time once again to update the local community committee’s priorities for next year and we want to hear what you think. Last year our priorities ranged from Improving health and reducing crime all the way through to initiatives for investing in young people,  encouraging learning and creating prosperity.

You can email me your thoughts at steve@stevemiddleton.info, use the contact me page here or simply leave your comments below. Your comments can be anonymous if you wish, but I’ll make sure all suggestions are heard by the committee.

At the Ordsall & Langworthy Community Committee on 2^nd November Neighbourhood Manager Ross Spanner confirmed that funding is in place and secured for new fencing that will close off Chimney Pot Park from dusk until dawn. Regular readers of my blog will remember that this has been a contentious issue, with residents divided over whether to close off the park or provide better lighting, which would have made it safer to keep it open.

A consultation event was carried out by Seedley and Langworthy Trust (SALT) and after a worrying delay of a couple of months, ratified by the community committee. The majority of people who responded to the consultation decided in favour of closing off the park and erecting fencing to keep it secure. It was felt this would remove trouble makers involved in drugs & other crimes from the park and help protect Chimney Pot Park streets below from the constant problem of stones thrown at cars/windows from the elevated position of the park.

There is no definite date when the fencing will be installed, but Ross assured us it would not be too long.