The great leap forward

Hello everyone, and I hope you managed to have a wonderful Christmas.

One thing I can promise for 2024 – this is the year of regeneration delivery for our borough. Residents will finally see, with their own eyes, the plans to transform our town centres come to fruition.

All those many months and years of planning are finally paying off, with new developments coming alive and bringing jobs, prosperity and opportunities right across Bury.

Work is already under way on our two Levelling Up sites, particularly in Radcliffe. You’ll have seen the bulldozers carrying out the demolition works needed to bring new housing, leisure facilities and business opportunities to town. And very soon they’ll be moving onto the Spring Lane site to build Radcliffe’s new secondary school. Good times indeed.

In Bury, with the necessary land assembly in place we will be ready later this year to start clearing the way to build the new flexi-hall, which will complement our famous market and revitalise that part of the town centre.

This is all happening alongside the work we are doing with our development partners to regenerate the Mill Gate in Bury and the Longfield precinct in Prestwich, and more talks are imminent on proposals to improve Ramsbottom.

And in Whitefield, the High Streets Task Force are making their latest visit this very week to draw up improvement plans for the main thoroughfare and beyond.

But while all these major building projects are taking place, we must not lose sight of the daily realities of life. This is why our Let’s Fix It Together campaign is so important, calling on the Government to give us fairer funding so we can provide the essential local services that people want and need.

If you haven’t already done so, please can you consider signing our petition here: https://www.bury.gov.uk/council-and-democracy/budget-campaign-petition

We shouldn’t forget too, that the work we doing to grow our borough, build more housing and regenerate our towns is our contribution to supporting the finances underpinning local services. By attracting investment, creating jobs and providing more homes, we can limit the damage of Government budget cuts.

Imagine if we didn’t have those cuts to deal with though, this extra investment would give our local services a much-needed boost. That’s why our campaign is so important, we will do our bit but the Government must do theirs.

Long-term ambition and daily operations are two sides of the same coin, and both are vital to our prosperity, now and for decades to come.