Salford's Got Talent

I'm not a regular attendee of the Langworthy Community Forum, which meets every other month. It's usually quite well attended but is also usually on a night when I'm off doing something else! However, this month, I happened to be free so went along with hubby. I'm so glad I did.

At the end of the meeting, in the small upstairs room of the St Luke's parish hall, we had the pleasure of a performance by four very talented Salford superstars-to-be. The performers - three singers and a dancer - were all supported by the Salford Foundation, which helps children and young people in Salford to pursue personal development opportunities that would otherwise not be available to them because of family or financial constraints. Their talent was amazing. The singers all had beautiful voices and transformed from nervous kids to true performers in the blink of an eye. The dancer showed wonderful energy and character, although I wonder how many of the people at the forum really 'get' street dance! However, one young girl in particular, Megan, really stood out as being very special. She sang a Carrie Underwood song called 'Temporary Home' that literally moved me to tears. Performance isn't just about raw talent, it's about engaging the audience and drawing them in. As a singer myself, I feel I can say that performance is just as much about emotion, expression and acting, as it is about the voice and despite her young age, Megan was able to pour so much emotion into her song, it was truly remarkable.

All four kids gave wonderful and surprisingly mature performances that were throughly enjoyed by everyone in the room. They will all be appearing in the show Ollie wiva Twist on August 25th at the Lowry Theatre. Tickets are only £6 via the Lowry website, or £5 from the box office.

Proceeds from the show will be donated to the Salford Foundation Trust and the Salford Lads Club. If you can make it, I highly recommend coming along. Not only will you be supporting all the young people involved in the show, you will also be supporting two very worthwhile youth organisations and, I'm certain, you'll get an evening of great entertainment too.

Our House

Moving on with the many things I wanted to blog about during the election campaign, I want to talk about housing. It's a significant issue in Salford. We have a multitude of different types of housing, from high-rise to bungalows and from tiny shoe-box studios to huge detached mansions. We also have a big social housing deficit with, at the last count, almost 20,000 people on the council waiting list. Yet at the same time, hundreds of potential homes are boarded up, lie empty for one reason or another, or have been demolished in the name of regeneration. However, rather than cover one of Salford's big issues, I want to spend some time considering the bricks and mortar itself.

Before the industrial revolution, this area, which is now part of the city of Salford, was a township known as Pendleton. It included a vast swathe of open space interspersed with a few large houses, such as Chaseley House (now flats). Buile Hill Park and Seedley Park at the top of our road were once much larger parklands and Salford was then a humble market town to the east. The industrial revolution brought railways. With the railways came the mills and with the mills came jobs. Jobs meant more people and people needed houses.

At one time, the most common type of housing in Salford was the two-up-two-down red-brick terrace. Indeed, much of Salford, including where I live, is still characterised by geometrically arranged streets marched on either side by rows of orange-brown buildings. These Victorian constructions - a then modern take on the Regency town-houses of the upper classes - are solidly built and have stood for a hundred years. They offer generous accommodation, even with the later additions of indoor plumbing, central heating and fitted kitchens. High ceilings and large windows make rooms feel big, bright and airy. But these wonderful homes are a bit of a dying breed. There are still plenty of them but far less than 10 years ago or 10 years before that. Perhaps it is the lack of outside space - terraced houses have enclosed yards but no gardens. They are houses designed and built to make maximum use of the available space. They are the high-rises of the past, built horizontally across an industrial landscape, instead of vertically into the sky. This is the landscape of LS Lowry.

The next round of housing at greatest evidence in this area is the product of the great depression of the 1930s. Faced with a massive recession as a result of the 1929 Wall Street Crash in America, the UK government pumped money into the economy by building millions of new homes. 30's homes are mostly semi-detached. Unlike their terraced brothers, they have outdoor space to spare. Gardens front and back show a developing aspirational society. Homes were not just places to eat and sleep in between work, they became the castles of the working class. However, like the housing of the past, they are homogeneous. In between the columns of Victorian and Edwardian terraces, you will find rows of cloned 1930s semis squatting in little patches of green.

There is a third housing presence in this part of the city that dominates in a different way to the rest. The 60s and 70s brought the replacement of so-called slum housing. Vast tracts of terraced housing were demolished, either during World War II as a result of The Blitz, or in the late 50s and early 60s in the name of modernisation. Replacing them were the great towering high-rises of the late 60s and early 70s, augmented with larger low-rise accommodation. The high-rises offered a vision of apartment living with all the amenities of modern life. The maximised accommodation in the minimum of space and created communities in the sky. In some parts of the country, and indeed, in some of the high-rises in this city, the slums of the past may have been cleared but the modernisation of the 60s turned out to be the slums of the future. I have been in many of the high-rises in this area and they are generally well-maintained and attractive places to live. Some places, like Thorn Court, are genuine communities. But not all 60s domiciles are so pleasant.

Certain parts of our area are made up of the 60s version of the Victorian terrace. Set at odd angles to each other and built in quadrangles or walks without vehicle access, these areas area difficult to police, so are favourite escape routes for criminals. Although they make good sound homes, they are often unattractive externally. On approach you are never quite sure whether it's the front of the house or the back you're looking at, giving them a somewhat schizophrenic appearance.

Nevertheless, Salford has some great housing stock and it's been great to get out and have a really good explore of my area. Like it or love it, leafletting is the best way to get to know the place you live in. The fingerprint of the city's history can be seen in it's housing and when you look back to the past you can see the same steps being taken and the same mistakes being made time and again. Regeneration and modernisation marches on and poorly maintained or poorly planned housing of yesterday is demolished to make way for the demands of today. Here in Langworthy, housing is coming full-circle. The lost terraces of the past have been replaced with modern equivalents to one degree or another. It's fascinating to look around and imagine the cityscape of the past and what might come along in the future.

Letterboxes

It would be a strange circumstance indeed that would see me become Prime Minister tomorrow, or indeed ever. But should that strange circumstance occur, my number one priority would not be the economy, schools or the NHS. It wouldn't even be electoral reform. It would be letterboxes!

Over the last 7 days I must have walked 50 miles and posted thousands of letters and leaflets through the doors of my neighbours. It has given me a new appreciation of the plight of the neighbourhood post-person. It has also given me a nice set of nicks, bruises and scars on the back of my hands and on my knuckles.

So, as your new Prime Minister, here are the new rules that will be introduced as of June 1st (see... I'm fair... I'm giving you some time to sort out your letterbox!)

1. All letterboxes must be in the middle of the door. No more letterboxes at the bottom of the door. How more posties don't throw their backs out or get assaulted by their bags as they bend down to access such letterboxes, I will never know.

2. All letterboxes must lift up rather than push in. Push in letterboxes are usually so stiff that you can barely move your fingers by the time your done. They also have a nasty habit of taking your fingers off. There is many a campaigner out there that is missing the end of a finger, or a whole finger, or even a hand!

3. There must be no sharp edges on any part of the letterbox. Brushes on the inside of letterboxes are increasingly popular - they are a good thing because they stop drafts and in these eco-conscientious times, who doesn't want to stop a draft? The side effect is that you usually have to shove your whole hand into the letterbox to get the letter or leaflet in. Sharp internal edges have drawn blood more times than I can count and have left me with many a battle scar.

4. On the subject of anti-draft brushes, can we have nice soft ones, please. Soft ones are nice on our weary little fingers. We don't like the kind that feels like scraping your hands on sandpaper.

5. Brushes make internal flaps unnecessary and it's hardly fair that you get to try and sever our fingers twice in one go.

6. Narrow letterboxes are forbidden. Only children can effectively use these letterboxes and we do not condone child labour.

7. All letterboxes must be hung horizontally. Vertical letterboxes are hopeless - especially the ones that are hinged at the top. Although side hinged ones are almost as bad.

8. In houses where there are dogs, a cage must be provided, either for the dog or for the letterbox. A third opportunity for finger severance in the form of a dog (or dogs) lying in wait on the other side of a door, is most definitely not acceptable.

9. As an alternative to the above, an outside box for post can be provided. And if you want to put it on your fence or gate to avoid the trek up (or down) a hill that's like the north face of the Eiger, that would be most welcome. There will be tax breaks for homes with long or steep paths that use this type of post receptacle.

10. A letter box must be provided. What's the deal with houses and flats with no letterbox? I can understand the attraction - no pizza leaflets, take-away menus and election stuff - but how the heck do you normally get your post? You are strange people!

11. Everyone must test their own letterbox several times to ensure full compliance with the above. Trust me, it will give you a whole new appreciation of the trouble this small, rectangular orifice causes.

Now aren't you glad you ended up with the present no-man's-land of politics, instead of me? :o)