making worthing worth it...
.…is a project launched by Worthing’s MPs Tim Loughton and Peter Bottomley to engage our town’s young citizens in shaping our town’s future.
Tim and Peter Bottomley set up this campaign to give young people a say in how the local community is being developed particularly on key sites like Teville Gate and the Aquarena. We need to get on with a state of the art mixed development at Teville Gate to include leisure facilities for young people easily accessible by transport links. Either the new Aquarena should go there or stay in central or east Worthing.
“There is nothing for young people to do in Worthing”
“Worthing is the biggest town in Sussex yet we haven’t got the facilities to match it”
“There is nothing for teenagers to do in Worthing on a Friday night except go to the pub and clubs and be underage drinkers”
“We have to go to Brighton, Chichester or Horsham for our fun rather than stay in Worthing”
“Worthing has been left in a time warp”
“Why can’t we have something like the Guildford Spectrum in Worthing?”
These are the sort of comments that we hear all the time. At the end of last year we spent a lot of time speaking to students and conducting special student surgeries in Worthing’s schools. Not surprisingly Worthing’s younger citizens had a lot to say about what was not happening in Worthing and what they thought should be happening here. In short they had a lot of rather interesting things to say…not that anyone ever takes any notice of them of course!
If Worthing is to move into the 21st Century and provide facilities befitting the largest town in Sussex then it needs a long term vision of what our town wants to become. If Worthing is to ‘punch above its weight’ again then we need to listen to the views of our younger citizens and let them help shape the future, as it is they above all who will be living, breathing and working in the legacy that the current generation leaves them.
Tim enjoys meeting young people from his constituency. Here he is pictured with Worthing Youth Council at the launch of their environmental project 'Use it Don't Abuse It'.
