A number of Congleton organisations and groups were given a financial boost after councillors agreed to support numerous grant applications.

At Thursday's Congleton Town Council meeting of Finance and Policy Committee, councillors considered several grant applications.

The first application fell under the category of specific grants, which was the annual maintenance cost of the clock of St Peter's Church, for which the town council allocated £300 from the grants budget.

Applicant Pauline Drew stated that St Peter's Church was the only Grade I listed building in Congleton town centre and the cost to maintain the clock in 2020 was £249.

Cllr George Hayes said: "It's a great building very close to our town centre which has also started to open itself as part of more heritage events and I would therefore propose approval."

Cllr Denis Murphy said: "The town church which what St Peter's is, is part of the fabric of the town and as such should be supported by the town council."

The proposal was unanimously passed.

Congleton Men in Sheds applied for £500, which would be spent on Personal Protective Equipment, to help make their workplace safe where older men work on wood working projects in a Covid-19 environment.

Speaking about Congleton Men in Sheds, Cllr Hayes said: "It really is a fantastic way of working towards eliminating social isolation in our more elderly population."

Cllr Hayes proposed the approval of the £500 application.

Cllr Sally Ann Holland said: "I think this is great. Statistically it is greater in men than women that choose to commit suicide, so I think this it is really important that we engage with men, specifically around mental health.

"I think this is a great way to get men out there and be in an environment where they can just discuss things which they might not normally, so I'm all for this."

Cllr David Brown said: "It's great to see this growing year on year, it's a fantastic facility."

The grant application was approved.

Claire Addis, fundraising coordinator at Friends for Leisure, applied requesting a £264 contribution, which would go towards running face-to-face sessions over a three-month period.

Cllr James Smith proposed the application was approved.

Due to a number of applications being submitted relating to making environments Covid-19 safe, Cllr Paul Duffy queried whether the town council should be taking money out of the grants budget or a separate Covid-19 account, which money could be allocated from.

David McGifford, chief officer of Congleton Town Council, responded: "We have got adequate funds currently in the grants pot to support what we are getting at the moment. We are aware we have got a Covid-19 budget, and if we feel like we're getting close to using the budget up and we have had significant Covid-19 related ones, we could possibly look to utilise from that budget if required at that time."

Cllr Kay Wesley asked Gillian Jones, of Friends for Leisure, who was present at the virtual meeting, how children are selected for the "fantastic" program with the charity having 30 places available.

Gillian said: "At the moment because of Covid-19, we are putting the maximum numbers on all of our activities, so in normal times we would have up to 16 disabled young people at each activity and we have a booking system.

"We're having lower numbers as the maximum at the moment just to make sure we can keep everyone safe. If we get to maximum numbers, we have a waiting list, but we still anticipate 30 young people being able to attend at least one of the sessions that the council could pay for."

Friends for Leisure have 285 disabled children registered with them across Cheshire East and around 50 of those children are from the Congleton area.

The grant application was passed.

The Symphonia Verbum Orchestra requested £350 towards the cost of eight of their members to rehearse and to deliver up to 60-minute sessions to two or three schools.

Cllr Duncan Amies asked applicant Joseph Hearson, who attended the meeting, whether the schools had yet been identified.

Mr Hearson responded: "Not as yet, I was waiting for the new term to start before I approached schools because it was so uncertain with the coronavirus situation if we could go in before Christmas.

"Once I know what the budget is, I will approach schools."

Mr Hearson told the committee that he was initially targeting primary schools but hoped to expand into high schools in the future and do some GCSE and A-Level programs.

Cllr Amies said: "Sounds good, you have got my vote."

The proposal was approved.

Congleton Bath House and Physic Garden submitted an application requesting £308, which would go towards the production of an information leaflet and guide for visitors, promoting the site to the community and visitors to the town.

The town council's Responsible Financial Officer (RFO), Jackie Potts, told the meeting that in March 2019 the committee awarded the garden £500 towards marketing and producing leaflets.

Receipts were received for £234 in June last year and then the RFO did not hear anything else so in March 2020 she wrote the balance back into the grants pot.

However, a few weeks ago, the green space organisation sent the balancing receipts into the town council, which meant the RFO had to inform them to submit another grant application.

Congleton Bath House and Physic Garden's application was for half of the balancing receipts, which was £308.

Cllr Russell Chadwick stated that after speaking to the accountant of the project, he was informed that the bath house was building a disabled toilet by the bath house and they were "short of money".

Cllr Chadwick told the accountant that they could apply for a grant via the town council.

Cllr Chadwick added: "I didn't know that last year they were granted some money, but I am just highlighting to fellow councillors that there will be another grant coming through for the disabled toilet."

The independent councillor queried whether the town council wanted to reject the application before them and wait for the new application to come through.

Mr McGifford stated that the bath house would have needed to withdraw their current grant application.

Councillors were happy to consider another application from the organisation for two separate projects despite it being in a short period of time.

Cllr Kay Wesley said: "I wanted to confess that I had lived in Congleton 30 years before I discovered the Bath House and Physic Garden, which I think is an absolute hidden gem.

"Anything that is helping to promote it is excellent, I think really as a council perhaps we could maybe do a bit more. They have a Facebook page and we could maybe make sure these leaflets and their other promotional materials are made available and more visible in the town.

"They need this promotion because it is an excellent asset that more people need to know about."

Cllr David Brown said: "The brochure they have produced is absolutely fantastic, but ideally what they want is to put up a notice board to make it easier for people to understand what the content of the garden is.

"I can understand Cllr Wesley saying she wasn't aware of the bath house because it's only really in the last six/seven years that a project was set up to start renovating the bath house and getting it to a stage where it is more of an amenable and accessible facility, for our residents in Congleton. It was then they went on this ambitious project to build disabled toilets and some sort of cafeteria facility at the top.

"I would recommend that everybody goes for a walk round there at different times of the year because it has different aspiratons."

Councillors unanimously approved the £308 grant application.

Congleton Community Credit Union requested £45 from the town council, which would allow them to access the services of the Cheshire East Community & Voluntary Services Organisation with a 12 months membership.

Cllr Jean Parry said: "It offers a very good service to the people of Congleton, especially for those with not a very good financial rating."

Cllr Holland said: "With the way things are currently, families and people are probably struggling financially. We have to wholeheartedly support this."

Cllr Brown asked applicant Cllr Denis Murphy whether the organisation was getting "good value" from the £45 membership.

Cllr Murphy responded: "Yes, we get notifications from the CVS, if we need support for anything in the way of administered purposes that comes through and it's the membership that allows us to have that, so it is value for money."

The £45 grant application was passed.

The final grant application of the meeting was from the League of Friends of the Macclesfield and Congleton Hospitals, who requested £250 to help towards the cost to reopen their charity shop with Personal Protective Equipment, a separate facility to store quarantine donations and a 3G chip and pin reader.

Cllr Hayes said: "I think it has been reflected a number of times this evening, about the impact certainly the last six months and up to the next six months are going to have on our community.

" I would like to speak for all members of this council when I talk about the fantastic work which the Congleton War Memorial Hospital does and we must also reflect that there have been changes at the Macclesfield District General Hospital, not at least including the current withdrawal of maternity services.

"We are so incredibly lucky to have such a great local cottage hospital and a district general hospital."

Councillors agreed to grant £250 to the League of Friends of the Macclesfield and Congleton Hospitals.

If you are interested in applying for grant funding, visit the town council's grants section.