SOUTH Ribble Borough Council is formally dissolving its relationship with the Preston and South Ribble Partnership.

At a meeting of the borough's full council last week, councillors unanimously agreed to withdraw from the partnership, creating instead a new South Ribble Partnership.

The partnership had been created to help source funding and work with various agencies to ensure Preston and South Ribble never missed out on new opportunities.

Councillors heard that, in the early days, the partnership with Preston fulfilled a useful role in the development of partnership working with outside bodies.

But in the past few years changes to the local government environment, including the creation of new agencies and new initiative undertake by the council, had made the partnership's work less vital. Council leader Councillor Gina Lewis said: "We have valued the relationship we have had with the Preston and South Ribble Partnership, but time and events have moved on considerably and we now feel we are in a situation where we are able to develop a number of initiatives without the partnership's involvement.

"We are working with the partnership to negotiate an amicable withdrawal.

"In early days, we benefited greatly from the relationship. The Central Lancashire Development Agency came out of this, as did a number of successful initiatives with other agencies."

The council agreed that the borough felt it now receives no substantial benefit from the partnership and that its annual contribution of £10,000 was not seen to represent value for money for South Ribble.

The council will now look at how the £10,000 can be spent.