Manchester

Wythenshawe: Young People Need Decent Facilities

THE "WYTHENSHAWE Partnership" has now spent over £100 million in this area of Manchester. But more CCTV won't solve the real problems. Our youth are bored, they have nothing to do and the council and police scapegoat them.

Facilities are needed now to give our young people something positive to do! A fraction of the Partnership budget, or the £78 million spent on the new police station, would do. The council must deliver!

We plan future protests, especially to show up Willow Park Housing. They promised, as part of housing transfers, youth facilities which still haven't appeared.

We need a purpose-built youth facility. The council have funded a £70,000 skate park in the city centre. A North Manchester youth project reduced youth crime by 40%, by giving young people something better to do than hang around on the streets.

The not-so-small fortunes put into other projects - e.g. £1 million a year on the Urbis museum in the city centre - and into the Partnership shows the money is there. We demand youth facilities in Wythenshawe, like the best that exist elsewhere!

Demonstration

Lobby the Area Committee - Tell New Labour what you think!

Thursday 28 October, 7pm, The Forum

More info: 07769 611 320, manc_sfe@hotmail.com

Football For Fans Not Financiers

ON SUNDAY 24 October, thousands of Manchester United fans demonstrated outside Old Trafford, chanting "United not for sale". They opposed US tycoon Glazer's attempt to take control of the club.

Hugh Caffrey, Manchester Socialist Party

This was the latest of a series of protests called by IMUSA (Independent Man United Supporters' Association) and others to stop the takeover bid.

All the pressure may have paid off - for the moment. Fans are now celebrating the subsequent halting of talks. The United board broke off talks saying they weren't "in the best interests of the company", while leaving doors open to future talks "in order to seek to develop a long-term solution that brings stability to the company's ownership structure".

In other words they don't want to be trodden on by one fat cat, but if they can all band together it's a different story! While the club is controlled by the company - by the shareholders and subject to stock markets - corporate interests will dominate our club.

A recent run of poor results saw some shareholders demanding the sale of most of the first team. Unless the club is democratically controlled by fans, players, staff and communities, it will be controlled by big business and Glazer won't be the last to have a go at taking it over. Reclaim the game from corporate fat-cats - football for the fans not for financiers!

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In The Socialist 30 October 2004:

Unite And Fight