Wicksteed Park gets £250,000 grant from the national lottery

There are fresh hopes for the future of Wicksteed Park today after the National Lottery Heritage Fund announced a quarter of a million pound grant to help save the park.

Wicksteed Park Ltd went into administration last week, with the loss of 48 permanent staff and 67 part-time and other jobs, due to the huge financial strain caused by the coronavirus outbreak.

The National Lottery Heritage Fund announced it was providing an emergency grant of £247,000 - which will be added to the £132,000 already raised by the public after an emergency appeal was launched.

Oliver Wicksteed, the chairman of the Wicksteed charity, said the amazing and ongoing support received from local people coupled with the money from The National Lottery Heritage Fund would go a long way to helping the park recover and prosper.

He said: “The cost of operating the country park alone, without the park’s rides and attractions, is around £110,000 a month.

“The Trust was able to step in to secure the park in the short term but when we launched our fundraising appeal we deliberately didn’t set a target because the situation regarding coronavirus and the guidelines we are being given are changing on a regular basis, and so the amount we might need to see the park through to next spring and reopen fully is also changing.

The park say that the £370,000 generated so far will help to continue to support free access to the park and will be used for staffing, security, insurance, utility bills, maintenance, refuse collection and looking after the animals as well as things such as grass cutting and hedge cutting.

Ros Kerslake, Chief Executive of The National Lottery Heritage Fund, said: “Heritage has an essential role to play in making communities better places to live, supporting economic regeneration and benefiting our personal wellbeing. All of these things are going to be even more important as we emerge from this current crisis.

“Thanks to money raised by National Lottery players we are pleased to be able to lend our support to organisations such as the Wicksteed Charitable Trust during this uncertain time.”