Coun Barbara Ashworth

Mayor of Rossendale

ON Monday, February 24 we were the guests of Britannia Primary School Newspaper courtesy of Catherine Smyth.

I visited the school wearing full mayoral robes and chains, which of course prompted plenty of questions from the school newspaper reporters, including some very interesting ones.

The idea of the school visits is to raise awareness amongst young people regarding how local democracy works and to encourage interest in the civic history of the mayoralty.

A similar session took place at Northern Primary school the same week where we were questioned by the whole school in two separate sessions as well as by the reporters from their newspaper.

I would be interested to see how these sessions were reported in their newspaper pieces.

On Friday, February 28 I had the pleasure of attending the Rossendale Rotary Annual Charter Dinner; where the guest speaker was the Rt Hon Jake Berry MP. It was an enjoyable event and it was nice to meet members of the Rossendale Rotary Organisation.

Our engagements for March commenced with an invite to the Sing Together Concert at King George’s Hall, Blackburn on March 12.

Both the Mayoress and I attended this event and were delighted to see a substantial number of pupils from St Paul’s,

Constable Lee, performing on stage. 135 primary schools from all over Lancashire had taken part in four evenings of concerts and I must say the one we attended was fantastic. I would like to take this opportunity to say thank you and well done to the organisers, teachers and pupils.

Finally, the Mayor’s Charity Ball took place on Friday 13 March at The Riverside, Whitworth.

This is an annual event in which each Mayor will host an evening of entertainment and fundraising in order to raise money for their chosen charities.

I am so pleased to announce that this year we raised over £2500 for my chosen local charities, including Bacup Pride,

M3 Project and the Rossendale Memory Choir.

It was a fantastic evening, ably MC’d by Peter Sweetmore, with entertainment from the Backstep Boogie Club. I would like to thank all the donors of prizes for the event, sponsors and those who donated cash, as well as everyone who came on the night and made it such a success.

As it stands now with Coronavirus outbreak, there will be no more events or engagements to attend for the foreseeable future. It is a rather abrupt end to what has been a wonderful year for me and Christine Lamb, my Mayoress.

I am now looking forward to collating all our figures and finally being able to distribute our donations to the much deserving local organisations. I will also write one final column next month in order to celebrate my Mayoral term and to say thank you for all the support we have received.

Please everyone take care, be sensible and look forward to better times ahead.