Wirral's independent local news website
Welcome to “Sunday Snippets” a weekly feature from birkenhead.news. It is a round-up of important local news stories from the last seven days. Click or tap on each story to read the full article.
From bus stop to bush stop – the roof of a new bus shelter in Wirral has been transformed into a blanket of lush greenery to help attract bees and bring more biodiversity to the local area.
The bus stop and its living roof, part of a recent major revamp of Seacombe Ferry Terminal, has been installed in partnership with Liverpool City Region Combined Authority and Wirral Council by Clear Channel, who manage bus shelters in the region.
Nicknamed ‘Bee Bus Stops’, living roofs have been popping up in towns and cities around the country – from Glasgow to Brighton – but this is the first in the Liverpool City Region.
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Future Yard CIC has successfully secured investment through Arts Council England’s 2023-26 Investment Programme.
Awarded by the Arts Council, National Portfolio Organisations (NPO) are leaders in their areas and Future Yard will receive £150,000 annually following the announcement of Arts Council England’s latest three-year investment scheme.
The Birkenhead music venue is one of 990 organizations across the country to receive a £446m share each year as part of the Arts Council’s new national portfolio of funded organizations for 2023-26.
Following conflicting statements regarding the contract for the construction of the region’s first new ferry for 60 years, Liverpool City Region Metro Mayor, Steve Rotheram, has issued some clarification.
Steve Rotheram said, “There’s been some confusion about the procurement of our new ferry.
“We’re expecting to award the contract to Cammell Laird – but only they can decide how to subcontract the work.
The 12th Duke of Devonshire planted a Chinese tulip tree near to the Visitor Centre in Birkenhead Park to celebrate the life of Joseph Paxton, designer of the park.
Earlier in the day, he planted another Chinese tulip tree in the Paxton-designed Princes Park in Liverpool and will plant one later this year at his Chatsworth Estate in Derbyshire, where Paxton was head gardener.
The Chair of the Friends of Birkenhead Park, Graham Arnold, gave a short speech detailing the early history of the park, and then introduced the Duke and the Mayor of Wirral who each gave a speech to those assembled.
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Dame Angela Eagle, Member of Parliament for Wallasey, has called on the Government to increase education spending in the upcoming Autumn Statement.
Dame Angela Eagle MP has written to the Chancellor of the Exchequer and the Secretary of State for Education on behalf of Castleway Primary in Leasowe, urging the Government to prioritise education funding in the upcoming Autumn Statement.
On current spending plans and considering rising costs, Castleway Primary School is facing a loss of over £35,000 in 2023-24 which equates to £350 per pupil.
On Thursday 10 November, Historic England publishes its annual Heritage at Risk Register for 2022.
The Register gives an annual snapshot of the critical health of England’s most valued historic places and those most at risk of being lost as a result of neglect, decay or inappropriate development.
Over the past year, ten historic buildings and sites have been added to the Register in the North West because of their deteriorating condition and ten sites have been saved and their futures secured. Many have been rescued thanks to heritage partners and dedicated teams of volunteers, community groups, charities, owners and councils, working together with Historic England.
The Wirral Waters Sustainability Action Hub is set to receive £1.75m of Government funding, through the Birkenhead Town Deal project.
This collaborative facility will enable partners and the community to work together, share, innovate, train, and learn about all things relating to sustainability.
The Hub will be developed within and surrounding the vacant 1960’s NorthWest Ship Repairers building at West Float, which will be fully converted, retrofitted and extended.
Small businesses in Wirral enjoyed a boost in the national spotlight when the Small Business Saturday roadshow pulled into town to support and celebrate the area’s small businesses as they face mounting challenges over the winter.
Marking ten years of the iconic campaign in the UK, Small Business Saturday’s Tour arrived in Wirral and visited local business owners and community leaders, live-streaming their stories on social media.
This included a visit to The Chocolate Cellar where the team took part in a chocolate making class, a trip to Wirral Unplugged – a community interest group focused on helping children unplug and connect. A Small Business Happy Hour on Instagram also took place each day with giveaways from The Chocolate Cellar.
Margaret Greenwood MP has called on the government to introduce a bold and urgent plan to address the climate emergency.
The Wirral West MP was speaking in a parliamentary debate just days after the United Nations Secretary General gave a stark warning at the COP27 climate change conference that humanity is on “a highway to climate hell with our foot on the accelerator”.
Extreme weather events over the summer saw the UK endure record temperatures of more than 40°C for the first time – something the Met Office described as “virtually impossible” without human-induced climate change.
Eureka! Science + Discovery, a landmark new £11.4m visitor attraction aiming to inspire a new generation of young people about Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Maths (STEAM) has opened its doors to the public.
Expected to draw in around 180,000 visitors per year to its home on the banks of the River Mersey, directly opposite Liverpool’s iconic ‘Three Graces’ and set in one of the terminals of the world-famous Mersey Ferries, the attraction builds on the success of Eureka! The National Children’s Museum in Yorkshire and is the first expansion of the brand anywhere else in the world.
With a range of unique and innovative exhibits, including a huge 12 foot tall cat complete with swishing tail and a giant climbing tree, as well as sections exploring the human body, low carbon technologies and an exhibit on the environmental impact of fast fashion, the attraction has been co-created in close partnership with 120 children and young people from the local area, with support from renewable energies firm and funding partner, Ørsted to help influence the questions and issues Eureka! Science + Discovery will explore.
Wirral’s Parliamentary constituency boundaries are changing, and it’s your final chance to help shape the new map.
The Boundary Commission for England (BCE) is required by Parliament to undertake an independent and impartial review of all constituencies in England, to rebalance the number of electors in each constituency.
Constituency sizes currently vary widely due to population changes since the last boundary review. The new map proposed by the Commission will make sure each constituency has between 69,724 and 77,062 electors, so that each MP represents roughly the same number of electors.
Margaret Greenwood MP has said that retired people in Wirral West are “desperate for certainty” over whether or not the government is going to commit to the state pension triple lock.
The triple lock ensures that the state pension increases each year in line with whichever is highest out of inflation, the average increase in wages across the UK or 2.5%.
Both the Conservatives and Labour committed to keeping the triple lock in place in their 2019 election manifestos. However, the Conservative government broke that promise last year when it scrapped the wages link.
Tranmere had to settle for a share of the points in their fixture against Swindon Town.
Josh Hawkes got Rovers off the mark on nine minutes, when he made a well-timed run behind the Swindon defence and his shot from the centre of the box neatly found its way into the bottom left corner of Solomon Brynn’s net.
Kane Hemmings would have had an easy tap in from an Elliott Nevitt cross, but Swindon defender, Frazer Blake-Tracey, intercepted the cross.
This is the birkenhead.news weekly round-up of police activity in and around Wirral during the previous seven days.
Visit our “What’s On?” guide for Wirral and the surrounding areas in the coming weeks.
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