Welcome to the Harley Bank Community Association website !

19 Apr 2008 - Steph Booth and Hazel Blears came to visit Harley Bank

Pic of Hazel Blears (left) and Karen Devlin (right) on Broad Street

Pic of Steph Booth (right), Hazel Blears (Left) and Karen Devlin (centre)

waited in the cold for ages, me and some other Harley Bank bods, waiting for a goverment minister big wig invited by Steph Booth. By the time they arrived we were so cold we had already decided not to vote for em!

The bigwig turned out to be diminutive,a redhed, not unlike our karen, celtic warrior dwarves the pair of em! As we talked I was immediatly comfortable. This was someone who really knows what it's like to face a near impossible situation, dullard burocrats and complaining residents. The mean streets of Salford's gang land were her patch and she's only a few years ahead of us in the regeneration process, she knows how it feels.

It's Saturday, Harley Bank is to meet the demolition man's mallet on Monday, this is real,and here's someone I can imagine chatting with over the washing up, who sits in Downing street as Secretarty of State for Communities. We show her the area to be cleared,where we plan to make a garden and she asks who will own it. I explain that it will be mostly public, owned by the council. She tells me that her department are writing a white paper enabling communities to own their own shared spaces; this is something we've not even dreamed of. Our own space, not the "feeling of ownership" but the real thing, marvelous!

We show her Adamroyd mill,she is impressed with the potential and compliments Steph on the beautifull ward she will have.It feels good to hear our town praised and reasured we are on the right track by protecting it.

I wonder if Steph has any more old school buddies like this?