It was nice to see that Andy Flintoff MBE has now received his ‘Freedom of Preston’ for his team part in winning the ashes for England. Many TV viewers will have seen the presentation that took place in Preston’s City Hall. This longstanding ceremony and tradition has been retained even though most of its services are administered by Lancashire County Council.
Lancashire is a council that has also been honoured by the Government’s Audit Commission for the efficient running of its area by being given a 4 star rating and an excellence award. In stark contrast we in Southport are controlled by an oppressive Sefton Council, which for more than 30 years has operated at the most as a 1 star authority and was only upgraded to an abysmal 2 stars just 12 months ago. During all this time Sefton Council has refused to grant any ‘Freedoms of Southport’ to deserving local residents no matter what service they have given to the town. In fact, in our resort, the honour has been scrapped.
Our townsfolk have every right to ask the council why their record is so poor compared to a number of other nationally audited authorities whose 4 star rating makes Sefton Council look like an expensive, inefficient and clapped-out local authority.
The time has now come to clear away the years of cover-ups so that the truth can be laid bare for all to see. This will hopefully transform Sefton into a transparent council that will be as good as 4 star Lancashire’s high achievers.
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Finally, the sad demise of a number of our beautiful swans living on our rather unkempt Marine Lake, casts suspicion on the recently undertaken, but long delayed, lake cleaning. This appears to have disturbed years of contamination lying at the bottom. But the Council says that “the lake is cleaned regularly”. This of course is a gross economy of the truth as its entirety was only fully cleaned by a Dutch firm in the 1960’s, where they used the dragline principle and made islands out of the debris. Half-hearted attempts have since taken place rather infrequently. The embarrassing recent TV coverage on this sad episode was there for all to see with large areas of rubbish being clearly visible.
Our party would like to see swan numbers recover so as to continue this fine tourist attraction.