MORE than 32,000 Bury people have said "No" to massive cuts in school budgets. Parents have handed a huge petition to town hall chiefs demanding that the borough's proud education service is left alone.

It follows last Saturday's massive public protest in Bury when 4,000 people marched through the streets and laid a wreath marked "RIP: Primary Education" on the town hall steps.

Activists are now planning to take hundreds of people to a mass lobby of Parliament within the next three weeks.

And education bosses are sending parents a leaflet explaining the council's financial crisis and why budgets have to be cut.

The petition containing 32,105 signatures was handed to the Mayor, Coun Trevor Holt, by campaigners from the Bury Association of Primary Headteachers.

They collected the support in just two weeks, after every primary pupil was given a petition to take home.

Mr Peter Parker, BAPH chairman, said public feeling was so strong that there were more signatures on the petition than the number of parents with primary-aged children in Bury.

"We recognise that the council's problems are caused by the wholly inadequate funding which Bury receives from central government," he said. "However, we remain committed to seeking a reduction in the level of money being taken from primary school budgets this year.

"We believe that the council now share this commitment and we are working with them to help achieve this."

Meanwhile, posters are going up in schools asking for delegates to travel down to London in a protest led by the mayor.

Labour councillor Sue Arnall hoped the demo, aimed at getting Bury a better financial deal, would be all-party and held before the council sets its budget early next month.

Education chairman Coun David Ryder is also sending to parents, via schools, a leaflet showing Bury's poor funding compared to other councils and where it spends its money.

"I am angry that that we are forced to make such cuts," he tells parents.

"Letters arrive telling us to take money from somewhere else for schools but everywhere else has been cut so much there is no money to take." He urged parents to write to the Prime Minister, education secretary Gillian Shephard, and Bury's MPs.

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