Further money to help reinvigorate the Fishwick and St Matthews area has been granted.

The Big Local Trust has already given £1million to the area but is now adding an extra £105,000.

Fishwick is following its own local plan – voted for by residents in a referendum – about how the area should redevelop.

It is a decade-long project aimed at helping the area and the money has already helped deliver arts projects and get people back into work.

Preston City Council and the Friends of Fishwick and St Matthews group are leading on administering the money.

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Vice-chairman of the friends group John Rochford said: “The Friends of Fishwick and St. Matthews welcome Local Trust’s announcement of a further £105,000 for each Big Local area. We are almost two years into the ten year plan to spend the initial £1million pounds funding for Inner East Preston.

“The group have been working hard to bring new projects forward for the area and have delivered arts projects, employment and training initiatives and financial inclusion schemes amongst others.

“The extra funding is aimed at ‘legacy’ projects, so the the group will be consulting the community and local partners shortly on how we can make the most of the extra money to benefit the area for years to come.”

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In a letter to the friends group the Big Local Trust’s chief executive Matt Leach said: “With several Big Local areas approaching full spend of their £1m, trustees have made the decision to bring forward the distribution of that proportion of the returns that can be guaranteed at this point.

“Having considered the performance of the investment, trustees have decided each Big Local area will receive an additional £105k from the returns generated from the original investment of £150m, and that this will be added to the balance of your area’s £1m.

“We are very happy to be able to allocate this additional funding to the Big Local programme. The energy and initiative released by Big Local is inspiring and amazing. We hope that through this funding you and your partnership have the resource to do even more.”

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