Bright future for our young people

The Pendle Young Musicians Bursary was set up in 2012 to give young musicians a chance of gaining substantial funding to help them continue their musical studies.

The bursary provides appropriate funding towards tuition, instruments and courses which help students pursue a career in music.

The performances of this year’s four finalists were all outstanding, and demonstrated the tremendous talent we have in this area.

We are very lucky to have such a contest and bursary available to help talented young people fulfil their dreams and I would like to greatly thank those that have made this possible.

I also had the pleasure of visiting two of Pendle’s three fantastic new school buildings, which opened last month.

On Tuesday, I visited the new St Paul’s CofE Primary School in Nelson to meet with the new headteacher and the chairman of governors, and on Wednesday I was given a tour of the new Barnoldswick Church School.

These two new multi-million pound schools, along with the new Whitefield Infants where I am a school governor, all look stunning and address a longstanding shortage in school places within Pendle – a huge investment in education, which I along with many other School Governors, teachers and parents fought hard to secure.

All the more impressive as it has been delivered despite the very challenging public finances the current Government has had to deal with.

Alongside other meetings this week at Lord Street Primary, Pendle Vale, Marsden Heights and Nelson and Colne College, it has been heartening to see what is being done to give our young people the best possible start in life. The future is bright for Pendle’s young people.