Cash boost for mining communities

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The government has pledged almost half a million pounds to compensate rural communities affected by quarrying.

Eight historical monuments that lie near quarries across England are to be repaired to lessen the environmental impact of mining sand, gravel or stone.

Churches in Cumbria, Northumberland and Yorkshire, a West Sussex guild hall and a Cornish mine will benefit from the Aggregates Levy Sustainability Fund.

Grants of £433,000 will be distributed by English Heritage on behalf of Defra.

Quarrying and transport of sand, gravel and stone can have significant effects on communities close by Barney Sloane, English Heritage

St Mary's Church in Dalton-in-Furness, Cumbria, will be one of the main recipients.

The grant of about £114,000 will be used to repair the tower and ringing rooms of the Grade II-listed church.

Ayton Castle in Scarborough will receive about £85,000 to stabilise and secure the building, and to conduct archaeological investigation within the site.

The stained glass windows of Christ Church in Sowerby Bridge, West Yorkshire, will receive £41,000, and Biddlestone Chapel in Netherton, Northumberland, will be restored thanks to a grant of £11,000.

Barney Sloane, head of English Heritage's Historic Environment Commissions, said: "The environmental impacts of quarrying and transport of sand, gravel and stone can have significant effects on communities close by.

"What we are trying to do is to lessen this impact by helping to ensure that deteriorating but much-loved and nationally important historic buildings in such communities are repaired so that they can play a stronger role in sustaining and restoring a sense of pride and place now and for the future."

Other recipients include St Michael's Church in Arlecdon, Cumbria, Beaumont Park in Huddersfield, Guildhall in Chichester, West Sussex, and the Prince of Wales Mine in Harrowbarrow, East Cornwall.