I HAVE witnessed blatant glory grabbing by the chairman of Leigh Business Partnership over the proposed Railway Road parking scheme.
When this was first announced we organised a petition, and a few shops and other places helped by putting them up.
We filled approximately 30 sheets with names against it.
We stated in The Journal that people would not be getting anything different than they already had and would be paying for the pleasure of getting nothing.
I then sent a fax to Leigh's MP Lawrence Cunliffe, but as usual for him he just wasted House of Commons notepaper to say he had received it - and that was the end of that.
I decided to e-mail William Hague. At least he did something, sending word to the local Conservative Association to see if they could do something about it.
The local Conservatives organised a fighting committee, made notices and displayed them in shops and homes in Railway Road and up and down Leigh.
They approached Wigan MBC and forced a referendum, so the people could have a say in the matter.
What was Gordon Jackson and Leigh Business Partnership doing while all this was going on?
We went to a Leigh Business Partnership meeting in Leigh Library and, when we tried to bring up the point about the proposed Railway Road parking scheme, we were told to see our local councillor.
That is as far as the Business Partnership went. All they were bothered about were their radios.
Did they have any meetings with the people of Leigh? Did they get any leaflets or petitions going. What did they do? The silence was deafening.
They would have a hard job convincing all the people who were involved that they had anything to do with it, and that Gordon Jackson and Leigh Business Partnership had made a big issue of it, or even done anything at all for that matter.
Railway Road resident
Name and address supplied
Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article