The illumination of Birkenhead Town Hall tonight marks the first event of Wirral’s Borough of Culture year. We hope those who attended tripped the light fantastic. Meanwhile one of our readers has been in touch with kind comments on our own cultural credentials along with some interesting observations about Wirral’s appointment of ‘cultural ambassadors’ and their own experience of past approaches to local cultural events.
Dear Wirralleaks
Congratulations on the excellent work – please keep it going.
I understand that at the recent Wirral Borough of Culture launch event one of the ‘cultural ambassadors’ was none other than Stan Boardman. If this is an indication of what are civic leaders understand culture to mean, things are even worse than I thought.
I last saw Boardman dressed in a Nazi uniform at a half-time ‘entertainment’ slot at Prenton Park (this was a few years ago, and certainly not under the current regime of the Palioses, who are, in my opinion, doing a good job). He was goose-stepping up and down the pitch doing Heil Hitler salutes to the tune of his hit song about the Nazis bombing ‘our chippy’. Inconveniently, there were some German schoolchildren in the crowd, guests of the club. I wrote and complained, and received a response from Chairperson Lorraine Rogers who sympathised but said there was nothing that she could do.
There have been some worthwhile attempts to promote culture in Wirral, but with this level of philistine leadership they are going to struggle to take root.
I believe that Chris Boardman was also there, so maybe the organisers didn’t get beyond the letter B in the directory of local celebrities. Or maybe ‘Boardman’ was written in to the specification.
I am also reminded that for several years running the ‘Birkenhead Festival’ was a couple of bouncy castles and a disco behind the Crown pub on Conway Street. Lofty cultural aspirations indeed!
Well done on the mention in the current edition of Private Eye.
Keep up the good work
Wirralleaks 