Last night was the regular meeting of the Council’s Executive Committee. This is made up of nine members of the majority Conservative Group on the Council, myself and the Leader of the Labour Group attend as non-voting members.

The decisions reached were as follows:

Local Area Agreement
The final submission to Government on the targets for Bury’s “Local Area Agreement” were finally agreed. Bury will now be monitored on how well it achieves on these targets over the coming year. The final agreement includes the target to reduce CO2 emissions in Bury as a whole, something that was hotly debated at the end of the municipal year.

New Community Library Facilities
Money has been secured from the Big Lottery Fund to develop two new Community Library facilities in the Radcliffe area, and develop two existing sites in the Bury town area. Very welcome news for those areas - perhaps one day we can have them down in Prestwich and Whitefield too!

Review of Primary Schools
This was the most important item on the agenda. Bury has to submit its plan for primary education over the coming years to Government, and this will unlock many millions of investment money to improve primary school facilities.

Schools have been identified on the basis of very extensive criteria for either “Modernise/Rebuild” (15 Schols including Heaton Park Primary in Holyrood Ward, and also Butterstile and St Hildas elsewhere in Prestwich.) I asked about the timetable for deciding when and if this work takes place - an “options appraisal” will take place up to the Autumn Term this year when schools will be identified to go forward (roughly at the rate of one a year over many years). The special school at Millwood will be the priority in the first year.

17 schools have been identified for “refurbishment/targetted” which includes St Mary’s in Prestwich. Other factors that will be taken into account include the development of more Children’s Centres in a number of wards - including one in Holyrood Ward - so things may change there.

I also asked about the surplus places that apparently exist in the system, particularly in the northern and western areas of the Borough (Prestwich has roughly the right amount of places for its children). Again these discussions will be looked at through the options appraisal later on this year.

Other Items
The Executive Committee agreed to write off a number of “bad debts” that are now deemed un-collectable under accountancy rules, and received the annual Risk Management Report of the Council. A number of detailed questions that my Lib Dem colleage Cllr Donal O’Hanlon has raised will receive written responses.

Any questions please don’t hesitate to ask.
Tim