Factfile and Whitehaven Town Information

Car Parking Follow town centre signs , take St Bees direction straight through traffic lights and then take right at T junction, multi-storey carpark (With new silvered cladding) is on left. Take the issued ticket with you and pay at machines on return to your car at the end of your stay. Car park run by Apcoa Tel:01946 64046.

Map of the Town and around
Bus Timetables
Taxi services:
Ajax 01946 695 000
A toB 01946 599 407
Brians Taxis, 01946 690 444
Ding Dong 01946 66666
L and G 01946 66644
Whiteline 01946 66111

Hospital: West Cumberland Hospital (Tel. 01946 693181) is located on the hills above the A595 trunk road in the Barrow direction. It has a 24 hours Accident and Emergency Unit.
Visiting hours:Ward:Buttermere-Crummock 4-8pm (Mon-Fri), 2-8pm (Sat and Sun only) - Any other time by arrangement.
Dalegarth (gynae) 7-8pm (daily), 2-30-3.30pm (Wed-Sat- Sun). Fairfield Open visiting for parents, 2-8pm for others.Gable-Honister 6.30-8pm (daily), 2.30-3.30pm (Sat and Sun only). ITU By arrangement with senior nurse. Jenkin-Kirkstone 7-8 pm (daily) 2.30-3.30pm (Wed, Sat and Sun only).Langdale-Melbreak day patients only. Overwater-Pillar 4-8pm (Mon-Fri), 2.30-8pm (Sat and Sun only). Rannerdale 2-3.30pm (daily). Ante-natal 6.30-7.30pm (daily, max two people at any one time). Post natal 7.30-8pm (husbands/partners only).
Skiddaw (opthalmology) day patients only. Thirlmere Open visiting for parents. Other relatives by prior arrangement with senior staff. Yewdale 3-8pm (daily). YDU 2-8pm (daily) (Any other time by arrangement).

Blood Donor Sessions: Regular blood donation sessions are held in Whitehaven at both the Civic Hall and St Benedicts High School: For more information about giving blood, or to make an appointment to donate, please call 0845 7711 711 or visit www.blood.co.uk. Each donation can go towards saving or improving three lives so why not do something amazing today?'

Whitehaven Library is located next to the town's Sixties style Civic Hall.Cumbrian Library on-line
The Cumbria County Council Archives service has a Local Archive in the former police station in Scotch Street Tel. 01946 852920 (Please remember to take identification if you wish to use this facility).

Local district council running sports centre, swimming baths etc is Copeland Council.

Supermarkets: Morrisons (Free parking for two hours) just south of the town centre opposite the eye-catching restored Whitehaven Castle. Close to Macdonalds outlet.
Tesco Open 24 hours....(Two hours free parking) Between the railway station and bus station on the northern entrance to the town. Both Tesco and Morrisons have petrol stations.
Netto, Aldi, Focus DIY and Iceland in the Preston Street area on the road out to St Bees.
Boots, Argos, Bargain Madness, Wilkinsons have town centre outlets.
Car Hire: Suggest Enterprise Rent a Car at Lillyhall on Tel' 1900/601600'

Swimming Baths. Small pool with associated learner pool on the edge of town on the B road to Cleator Moor.(Tel 01946 695021) Good beach at St Bees (two mile south)

Sporting grounds: Recreation Ground home of Whitehaven Rugby League, the Playground home to Whitehaven amateur soccer team and Whitehaven Cricket Club. Soccer and school athletics are played at the County Ground located off Coach Road.
Copeland Athletics stadium is located at Hensingham on the hill above the town near to the West Cumberland Hospital.
Attractions:For more information on The Beacon, call 01946 592302 or visit our new website at www.thebeacon-whitehaven.co.uk.
Haig Colliery mine museum, Rum Story (Tel 01946 592933), marina, skatepark by railway station.

Tourist Infromation Centre Whitehaven Market Place Tel. 01946 852939.

Adult Education; St Beghs CDC Telephone 01946 852 667 cdcman@st-beghs.cumbria.sch.uk
as an Adult Education centre offering courses in I.T. and non I.T. course for over 18's

Digital TV In 2007 Whitehaven swithced from analogue to digital signal. Channel Guide for Freeview in the Whitehaven area. The following were the initial channels:
1 BBC1; 2 BBC2; 3 ITV; 4 Channel 4; 5 Five; 6 ITV2; 7 BBC3; 9 BBC4; 10 ITV3; 13 Channel 4+1; 14 More4; 28 ITV4; 29 E4; 70 CBBC; 71 CBeebies; 75 CITV; 80 BBC News 24; 81 Parliament; 87 Community

Schools: Bransty School (primary) 01946 852652. Hensingham Primary 01946 852672. Jericho School Tel. 01946 852658. Kells Infants, Tel. 01946 01946 852687. Monkwray School, Tel. 01946 852678. St Beghs Catholic primary Tel. 01946 01946 852663. St Gregory and St Patricks Catholic primary Tel. 01946 852666. St James CofE Infants Tel. 01946 852662, St James Juniors Tel. 01946 852660. St Mary's Catholic, Tel.01946 852685. Valley Junior School, Tel 01946 852670. Valley Infants and Nursery, Tel. 852668.

Police Whitehaven police station inquiry desk in Scotch Street is open seven days a week 8am to midnight. Tel 01946 692616.
Registrar of Births, Deaths and 'partnerships'; Located at Flatt Walks and also at West Cumberland Hospital. Opening times limited.

EMERGENCY DENTAL SERVICE
Tel 01228 603620 for the number of the West Cumbrian dentist on duty.

CITIZENS ADVICE BUREAU
Whitehaven: (01946) 693321. Located above Blue in Tangier Street.

AGE CONCERN
Old Customs House, Whitehaven 01946 66669

WEST CUMBRIA CARERS HELPLINE
(01946) 592223
RECYCLING CENTRES
Whitehaven: Tesco, Kwik Save, Morrisons and Hensingham Road (Glass, cans, paper and textiles)
Cleator Moor Co-Op (glass and cans)
Egremont central car park (glass, cans, paper and textiles).
St Bees Foreshore (glass, cans, paper, textiles and oil).
Distington Main Street car park (glass, cans, paper and textiles).
Ravenglass, National Park car park (glass, cans, paper and textiles).
For general recycling enquiries call Copeland Council (01946) 852964

Housing: Now largely run by Copeland Homes Tel 0845 155 0980. Emails to: copelandhomesadviceservices@homegroup.org.uk
or txt: 07710 725 224. www.copelandhomes.org.uk


Labour's Housing sell-off. In June 2004, Copeland Borough Council transferred its social-rented stock to an arms-length management company, Copeland Homes through a Large Scale Voluntary Transfer. Copeland Homes now own and manage about 4,000 former local authority homes. These include around 119 in Kells and 569 in Woodhouse, which are the residential neighbourhoods adjacent to the application site. Under the stock transfer agreement, Copeland Homes will be investing significantly in the coming years in these properties, the environmental and local communities. This was a precondition for the stock transfer and formed part of the legally binding ommitment with the Borough Council.
Impact Housing (Tel. 01900 842100)
Industry: After closure of the last coal mine in 1986 the Marchon chemical was the largest industry in town. It has now closed as Huntsman pull out after numerous promises they were here for the duration!

A brief history of Marchon follows: Frank Schon and Fred Marzillier moved from London in 1941 after their factory there was destroyed by German bombs.
At first they made firelighters from sawdust, naphthalene and black fatty residues from the oil industry. A third member of the partnership was Otto Secher, Schon’s brother in law.
This was allegedly based on a loan of £10 when the business was feeling the squeeze.
The firm, Marchon was first in the Guinea Warehouse (Hanaratty’s??) before moving to the old Ladysmith pit coke ovens at Kells.
Then they started producung some of the first detergents in world. Two powders Four Square and Spell were packed by hand into paper bags. With the war still on there was an acute shortage of soap and the new detergents were a big success. In 1949 after a trip to the States they were able to take on the production of the detergent FAB Spray drying started in the S4 building. The Marchon site now faces complete closure in 2005 despite the fact that the Huntsman Corporation (detergents) in March 2004 announced £11 MILLION INVESTMENT TO HELP SECURE FUTURE OF A CONSOLIDATED WHITEHAVEN SITE.

The town also has a new call centre run by Vertex and weaving mills Sekers, also now facing closure (2005).

Beacon Collection
The Beacon centre on the harbourside at Whitehaven has one of the fnest collections of maritime paintings in the UK, much of the collection is kept in safe storage but examples are often included in exhibitions.

The Beacon, West Strand, Whitehaven, CA287LY Tel 01946 592302

Deprivation: Sandwith ward exhibits pockets of socio-economic and physical deprivation that are among the highest in England (as at 2004), with the Woodhouse and Greenbank areas in the top 3% for the income, health and education domains and the top 1% for the employment domain (source: lndex of Multiple Deprivation 2004). In these areas, nearly 50% of working age population are economically inactive and only 45% of the total population is in work, 40% of households have no adults in work, over 50% of the available workforce have no qualifications, 57% of the population have no access to a car and 65% live in public sector rented property. Indeed, unemployment in these areas has historically
been the highest in Cumbria (with nearly 14% on Job Seekers Allowance) and the Employment Indicator in the lndex of Multiple Deprivation is within the top 1 % nationally. All these figures are much
higher than Borough, County or National levels.

In 2005 Consultants are running the rule over our town and have some flashy ideas that might attract North West Development grant aid...Find out more by visiting their unit at the Lonsdale Centre or see their web info at http://www.seachangewhitehaven.com/

The small trawler fleet now benefits from a new EEC standard fish landing centre and ice making facility. There has been development of the marina and harbour thanks to government cash.
Map of town See also town centre map below. There is a new boatyard that can lift yachts out of the water, contact the Harbour Office for advice.

Politics: Whitehaven is represented by Jamie Reed MP for Labour.
The Whitehaven Parliamentary constituency has been a solid Labour seat for decades. But at the General Election of June 2001 MP Dr Jack Cunningham saw his majority shrink to 5,000. In 2005 Dr Cunnngham announced he was standing down. In October 2005 Dr Cunningham was honoured by PM Tony Blaor and given a seat in the House of Lords as Lord Cunningham of Felling. Felling being his birthplace.

There was much amusement as during the selection process for a successor to Dr Cunningham. A woman from Birmingham, who admitted working in her youth as a Tart in Paris, almost got onto the ballot paper, but then hurriedly removed by party officials.
Find out what your MP got up to in his maiden speech to the House of Commons.
Jamie Reed, grandson to the late well known union boss, Thompson Reed, romped home with a 6,300 majority for Labour in the general election. He netted over 17,000 votes.
Tory Chris Whiteside came second with 10,713 votes, while Frank Hollowell took third place for the Liberal Democrats with 3,880. UKIP candidate Edward Caley-Knowles won 735 votes, just one ahead of Independent Brian Earley, who had 734. Alan Mossop was last with just 662 votes for the English Democrats.

A proposed boundary change will see an extra 8,446 (predominantly Conservative voting) voters from Keswick brought into the geographically distant Copeland seat. When Labour entered power in 1997, Dr Cunningham joined the Cabinet as Minister for Agriculture - he had previously served as an Under Secretary in the Department of Energy under Jim Callaghan in the 1970s.

Throughout Labour's years in opposition, he was a leading frontbencher, holding many different shadow cabinet posts, most notably Shadow Environment Secretary, and gaining a formidable reputation as a political fixer on Labour's right. He achieved a few successes at MAFF, such as establishing the Food Standards Agency. He was moved to the Cabinet Office as an "enforcer", but like ministers there before and since, his career became becalmed and he decided to return to the backbenches in 1999, since when he has kept a low, but loyal, profile.

The Borough council of Copeland is Labour controlled following the 2007 elections.

Nightlife: Good Indian and Chinese restaurants in the Tangier Street area. New Zest restaurant by Harbour. Macdonalds outlet near Safeways. Recommended pubs are The Sunnyhill (above the town on the A595) and many more. J D Wetherspoon's pub at the Bransty Arch. Heapos is akin to a fun pub and The Park nightclub close to the harbour has a 2am licence. Details of Cumbrian cinemas here



Sea Trips
Trips out into the Solway are available with Charter boat Riptide

Whitehaven Brass Band
The band's main rehearsal, led by Mr Gary Williams, the
band's musical director, occurs each Wednesday at 7PM at the Methodist
Church Hensingham. New experienced players are always welcome to come
and join the band. Free brass tuition, including instrument loan, is
also provided at beginner and intermediate level with new classes
expected to start in early 2005. The classes are open to both adults and
children. The purpose of the classes is to teach and prepare players for
main band membership. Anyone interested in joining the learner classes
can contact Mike Kennedy on 01946 61573 for more information. The
engagements officer for the band is Alan Slater who can be contacted on
01946 692318.

Wine and Dine But before you do use the local council's environmental checks to see the star rating for hygene. Use their search button to locate a premises.

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