A GRANT for this year’s Marlborough Christmas lights has been approved, despite a previous Area Board meeting which deemed the application unsuitable.

The Town Council’s application for the £5,000 Area Board grant was met with some opposition at the meeting of Marlborough Area Board on Tuesday (September 27). With the council already budgeting £11,000 for the lights, there were hopes to gain more funding so the lights could be updated to newer LED bulbs.

Mervyn Hall, of Marlborough Town Council, said: “We needed to change the filament in the lights to LED as it is a drain on the power consumption and is costly. We put the application through to the Area Board thinking it would just go straight through, but at a pre-meeting of the Area Board they decided it wouldn’t be. I don’t see how it is any different to other towns in Wiltshire that get the grant, we need the grant at the moment as we have been handed the public toilets and that has come at a cost, but they are an important asset for the town.”

The grant was approved by the Area Board, at a lesser cost of £4,720, which will now pay for the LED lights for the Marlborough Christmas lights.

“The matter was put on the agenda as an urgent item, so it was discussed and we had our say on why it was important for the town. We are satisfied that we were able to get the grant from the Area Board,” added Coun Hall.