Anger – as council
chiefs approve
school demolition plan
by David Skentelbery
MEMBERS of Warrington Borough Council?s executive board have decided to again seek planning consent to demolish historic Stockton Heath Primary School to make way for a new building on the same site.
The Lib Dem-Tory board voted unanimously for the move ? save for Conservative Fiona Bruce, who was ineligible to vote as she had been involved with the action group fighting to save the old school.
There were cries of disgust from action group members at the meeting and one shouted to council leader Ian Marks: ?Enjoy your moment of power.?
Earlier the group had distributed leaflets pointing out that in the recent consulation by the education department, only 43 parents voted for a new school and of these only 17 lived in Stockton Heath.
By contrast, of more than 5,000 people who signed a petition to refurbish the old school, 2, 642 lived within one mile of the school.
Coun Sheila Woodyatt, executive member for children?s services, said she understood the campaigners? feelings.
She had felt the same when the old Lymm Grammar School, which she, her husband and her three children had all attended, had been demolished. But sometimes hard decisions had to be taken.
The Department for Education and Science (DfES) would not fund the additional cost of refurbishing the old school as compared to building a new one ? some ?800,000 ? because a refurbished school would not meet the requirements of Ofsted, the Office for Standards in Education.
The council would have to find the extra money itself and it could not do that without depriving every other school in Warrington of money.
?We cannot, as a responsible council, do that,? said Coun Woodyatt. ?We have only two options ? to ask the development control committee to approve the demolition and rebuild option or to do nothing.
?We cannot, as a responsible council, do nothing. We have to think of the education of the children, now and in the future.?
Coun Peter Walker said there was clearly a very strong body of opinion in Stockton Heath which wanted to save the old school. It was not an easy decision for the council to take. But they also had to consider the disruption to the education of children currently at the school which the refurbishment option would cause.
Coun Marks said at first he had been open minded about whether the school should be refurbished or replaced. But the results of an independent assessment had convinced him that a new school was the only option.
?It is a great shame, but I am persuaded that a new school is the only way forward.?
The final decision will now depend on the development control committee, which has turned down the demolition and new build option once already.
The campaigners plan to carry on the fight to save the old school.
The decision was first reported in a late edition of Warrington-Worldwidelast night (Monday)
Town to go it alone on
waste recycling strategy
EXCLUSIVE by John Hendon
WARRINGTON looks set to go it alone on setting up a waste management strategy for the borough, following the collapse of its partnership with neighbouring Halton.
Town Hall chiefs are to start work on progressing the procurement of waste management facilities for the borough ? and expressions of interest are to be invited from contractors to work with the council to develop a Materials Recycling Facility (MRF) for Warrington.
Members of the executive board have ?noted with regret? the decision of Halton to terminate a memorandum of understanding with Halton Council, signed only in October last year.
But they are not to seek further potential partners as most other waste authorities have already started work on different solutions to that believed to be best for Warrington.
The fortnightly collection of ?green? waste which started in April is already helping to reduce the amount of waste sent to landfill by Warrington. But more will have to be done if the council is to avoid potential penalties under the Landfill Allowance Trading Scheme.
An early priority is to start collections of other recyclable materials from households, but before this a MRF needs to be established to enable the materials collected to be sorted quickly.
It is intended to consult with the waste management industry on a suitable facility to meet the town?s needs.
The plans is to introduce alternate weekly collections of recyclable and residual waste using the existing blue bin currently used solely for waste paper collection.
It will also be necessary to re-tender recycling and household waste contracts originally agreed with Halton.
A technical evaluation of Energy from Waste (EfW) technologies, previously produced for the Warrington-Halton partnership, will now have to be carried out for Warrington alone.
A MRF is a special ?sorting factory? where mixed recyclables are separated into individual materials prior to despatch to reprocessors and prepare materials for manufacturing into new recycled products.
First class honours
degree for Emily
by Lesley Wilkinson
A LYMM student who almost deferred her final year at university after her mother was diagnosed with a serious illness, has gained a First Class Honours Degree.
Emily Robertson, 22, daughter of Karen Hargreaves of Oughtrington Lane, and a former pupil at Lymm High School, graduated from Glasgow School of Art with a BA Honours in Visual Communications specialising in Illustration.
Karen, 49, was diagnosed with breast cancer in September last year and initially she wanted her daughter to come home and defer her studies.
“Fortunately on the day Emily rang me the Macmillan nurse was here. The nurse persuaded us that the condition was not life-threatening and that it would be a shame for her to abandon her studies,” said Karen.
She had intensive treatment, at one stage travelling every day for five weeks to Clatterbridge Hospital on the Wirral.
“There was a tense time when I thought I may not be able to make Emily?s degree show and graduation because of chemo and radiotherapy, but it was all finished with about two weeks to spare,” said Karen.
“She was an absolute star through all this whilst still studying very hard – which must have been very difficult being so far away from home – which makes her achievement even more well deserved.?
Karen, her husband Richard, and son Jamie, 21, are all proud of Emily’s success.
Emily was chosen to exhibit in London in July at a ?New Blood? exhibition where she won a Best in Show award.
She currently lives in Glasgow where she is setting up an illustration collective with co-founder Sophia Pankenier.
Karen said: “I was so pleased to make it to the ceremony. It was a very emotional day as I thought I may not have been there.”
National recognition for
charity’s campaign
by staff reporter
A WARRINGTON-based charity has won national recognition for its campaign aimed at reducing the number of children who run away from home.
?Talk..Don’t Walk?, a unique project ran by The Relationships Centre, in Warrington, to provide support to young runaways and their families, has received recognition from the Department of Further Education and Skills Training Programme which provides background to the Every Child Matters agenda.
Mary Galashan of the Department of Further Education and Skills said: ?It is important when training to relay best practices to increase understanding, we needed a case study that could demonstrate the success of integrated working and Talk..Don’t Walk does this on a daily basis.”
Alison McCausland, project manager for ?Talk..Don’t Walk? added “We successfully work with a number of key agencies such as Connexions, youth offending teams, police and many more to ensure that the needs of our clients are met at all times, integrated working is paramount
to our success and for this to be recognised in a national training programme is a great achievement”.
Cheshire?s Chief Constable Peter Fahy said: “Dealing with young people who have run away from home is costly and resource intensive for Police and partner agencies. ?Talk..Don’t Walk? in its first and second year has saved Cheshire Constabulary ?1 million through the reduction in the number of runaways in the Warrington area and their subsequent involvement as offenders or becoming victims of crime.
?These kinds of projects are paramount in proactively offering support to young people and their families before it reaches crisis point. The second year results show that the ?Talk Don’t Walk? project is effective and is proving that early intervention can have long-term success.”
More information about the work of ?Talk..Don’t Walk? is available from the helpline 0800 085 2136 or the website on www.talkdontwalk.org.uk
Stables plan appeal
falls at the fence
by John Hendon
A PLANNING inspector has thrown out proposals for erected stables and other buildings in an open field at Spark Hall Close, Stretton.
The scheme ? which was part of a proposal to use the field for horse riding purposes ? prompted an appeal when Warrington Borough Council refused planning consent earlier this year.
But the inspector who considered the appeal says the development would radically alter a largely unspoilt open field ? even though it adjoins the Park Royal Hotel.
He says while the keeping of horses can be considered appropriate in the green belt, the scale of building proposed at Spark Hall Close was greater than either essential or required in association with a small scale equestrian use.
Warrington?s director of environmental services, Alan Stephenson, says the inspector clearly decided the scale of the building was too large.
As a result, it follows that a smaller, more appropriately scaled development could remove visual impact and any policy objection.
Office-into-flats
plan rejected
by staff reporter
PLANNING chiefs have thrown out proposal to convert offices in one of Warrington?s top commercial developments into self-contained flats.
RAM Properties had applied for consent to convert offices at Tannery Court, Tanners Lane, Bewsey into 10 flats.
Tannery Court was for years a major Co-op store at the junction of Tanners Lane and Bewsey Road. But some years ago it was converted into a prestige serviced office development.
Parts of the building have, however, been unoccupied for some time.
Police community
action meeting
by staff reporter
POLICE are to hold a Community Action Meeting at Appleton Parish Hall, in Dudlows Green Road, Appleton, Warrington on Thursday (August 17).
Members of the public will be able to quiz police officers on local policing issues and members of the parish council will also be present.
The meeting starts at 7.30pm and will be followed at 8.45 by a special briefing on police proposals for controlling traffic, crowds, etc at the controversial Creamfields pop festival at Daresbury on Saturday August 26.
[ 17.08.2006, 08:15: Message edited by: DS ]
