Home > Services > Council and Democracy > Council Publications > Borough Life

Borough Life Winter 2006: Contents

The Leader Column

By Peter Smith

Leader, Wigan Council

When government inspectors visited Wigan recently to put our services under the spotlight, they asked us about our vision for the borough… Building the future together – a place where people matter and you can afford to live the life you want. But what they really wanted to know is “how are you making sure it happens?” We told them that we are focusing on four key areas.

Borough-wide priorities

Delivering services often means making difficult decisions about competing priorities. We have closed outdated facilities, but we have introduced free swimming for thousands of people, two modern pools are planned in Leigh and Wigan, and we have opened a fine new service centre in Platt Bridge.

We have also recruited a dedicated band of town centre ‘caretakers’ who will act as trouble-shooters and ambassadors, helping to keep the centres spick and span.

Our customers

We want to make our services easier to access for everyone. Libraries are open longer, with staff on hand to answer all kinds of queries. An award winning call centre deals with council housing problems and a street care helpline handles all your bins, street sweeping and fly-tipping problems.

Joining up services

Services for children and young people, previously provided by several different organisations, are now delivered by a single council department. And three separate council departments are about to become Environmental Services, helping us to concentrate on making local communities cleaner, greener and safer.

Value for money

We are currently looking at how we buy goods and services to make sure we are getting the best possible value for the money for local residents. Our Adult Services and Children and Young People’s Services have jointly obtained the best possible price for transport for vulnerable adults and children across the borough.

We are continually looking to improve our services to make sure our vision amounts to more than just words.

If you want to get more involved in what we do, there are plenty of opportunities in your local township.

Have a happy Christmas and a prosperous New Year.

The future’s bright – and green – for Bickershaw

The borough’s biggest area of derelict land is set for a multi-million pound transformation on a massive scale. Abandoned land north of Bickershaw Colliery in Leigh – a 500 acre site that’s bigger than London’s Hyde Park – is to get nearly...

Teenager’s civic day to remember

BETH Pugh believes young people should take action! The 13-year-old from Hindley thinks children and teenagers should use their voices to have a say in the issues that affect them locally, nationally and globally. And that’s exactly what she did when she took up the famous chains and robes of office to become...

Making the Change

IN 2002 education chiefs in Wigan embarked on a course of action that was never going to be an easy one. When it came to education for children with special educational needs the borough was beginning to fall behind the rest of the country. Wigan had more ‘special’ schools than the national average and as a result had been classed as one of the...

Whelan the Freeman

JJB and Wigan Athletic chairman Dave Whelan has become the borough’s latest freeman. At an emotional ceremony in Wigan town hall he told councillors: “It is just wonderful for your home town to say we are giving you the freedom of the borough…

You dancing? We’re asking!

VICKY Thomas has just one ambition… to get Wigan dancing! The 27-year old who hails originally from Bedfordshire has just become Wigan Leisure and Culture Trust’s dance co-ordinator. And over the next two years she’ll be encouraging people of all ages from all over our borough to get up and...

Let's plan together

We all want to live in a place that is clean and safe, with good access to work, shops and other amenities. We want to feel happy and comfortable in the community where we’ve chosen to live. But none of this happens by chance. Now Wigan Council is drawing up a new planning system that will give residents a bigger say in the future of our townships and communities. Borough Life finds out more.

Who cares? We care!

Craig Lowe, 21, has just swapped troubled Sierra Leone for the streets of Wigan and Leigh as one of the council’s new town centre caretakers. Originally from St Helens, he was an operator mechanic with the Royal Navy and jokes that...

Cool heads tackle a red-hot topic

Wigan Council has been working out how to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide it puts into the earth’s atmosphere 3,700 miles above our heads. With the help of the government-funded Carbon Trust, the council is working on a carbon management plan which will spell out how it can reduce its impact on the planet...

Special places

TONY Bassett has dedicated his working life to the upkeep of our borough’s cemeteries. He started out as a trainee monumental stone mason at the age of 15. Now, aged 59, he is Wigan Leisure and Culture Trust’s cemetery services manager and is responsible for the huge swathes of open space that make up the borough’s nine cemeteries...

How your money is spent [156kb]

Hohodza

Making Westleigh a centre for world music IN the Shona language of Zimbabwe, Hohodza means “woodpecker”. It’s also a fitting way to describe Portia Gwanzura. Since arriving in Westleigh from the southern African nation four years ago, she’s been chipping away to...

Regulars

LifeLines
Whats On [251kb]