CAST your mind back to the summer of 1998 and you’ll remember it was a very important one for music fans and for our borough.
The Verve’s homecoming concert at Haigh Hall was one of the defining moments of the band’s career and is still talked about to this day.
It also helped to put our borough on the country’s cultural map.
This year, Wigan Life is planning to recreate magic of music at Haigh Hall through its exciting Tuned In concert series.
From popular chart-toppers such as Ronan Keating and McFly through to the dulcet tones of Mezzo Soprano Katherine Jenkins, the concert series offers something for all musical tastes.
We really believe in encouraging the arts to flourish in our borough and we’re hoping lots of you will help by supporting this ambitious event.
AFTER what was said to be the most important election in a generation Wigan Council is continuing to encourage people to become more involved in the decision-making process in our borough and engaging in local politics.
Through this issue of Borough Life we are launching our Community Governance Review, which will give residents the chance to voice their opinions on how they think the decision-making process could work best at the local level.
Later in the year the council and its partners will be hosting the borough’s own Local Democracy Week once again.
Both are excellent opportunities to keep the current interest and enthusiasm for politics local and national, alive in our borough.
YOU’RE never too young to bury your head in a good book.
And in Wigan we’re helping even our very youngest residents to get switched on to the joys of reading.
The council is delighted to have joined forces with the first lady of country music Dolly Parton, to launch her Imagination Library at selected Sure Start Children’s Centres in our borough.
The scheme presents young readers with a new book each month for the first five years of their life.
Anyone who shares a passion for reading will know that the opportunity will give these children memories they will treasure far beyond their fifth birthday.
FINALLY, there has been much press coverage of the need to cut public spending.
We know we are going to have to look even harder at how to improve working practices so not to reduce those public services that you have told us you value.
