Peace campaigner implores council to keep boys names on Peace Centre

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VIDEO: PEACE campaigner Colin Parry is imploring Warrington Borough Council to retain the names of Tim Parry and Johnathan Ball on the iconic Peace Centre.

As the Tim Parry Johnathan Ball Foundation charity, set up by Colin and Wendy Parry in memory of the boys killed by an IRA bomb attack on the town over 30 years ago prepares to vacate the building, no assurances have been given that the boys names will be retained on a proposed SEND educational facility for youngsters with special needs.

The borough council is in the process of purchasing the building, which was jointly owned between the Peace Foundation and the NSPCC, to transform it into an educational centre for youngsters post 16 and post 19, with special educational needs. The sale completion is expected to go through by the end of March, around the time of the 32 nd anniversary of the IRA Bridge Street bombing which claimed the lives of the two boys and injured 56 shoppers.

Colin said: “I Hope the name of the building will continue with both boys’ names for emotional and practical reasons. It is a massive part of our town and how it responded to the bombing.
“I accept the purpose of the building will change but I implore the council to keep the boys’ names attached to the building. I think it would be a very poor decision if the boys’ names were removed.”
Meanwhile the charity will formally cease trading in its current form and become a “grant making ” charity.

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Colin and Wendy Parry outside the Peace Centre

Colin added:” The fact that the Foundation would have celebrated its 30th anniversary in March 2025 is, in itself, a great milestone that Wendy and I would never have imagined we would reach, but the endless struggle for sustainability, and the fact that time and age has caught up with us both, means that this chapter in the Foundation’s history, will close, but as it does so, a new chapter will begin.

“With our 50% share of the proceeds of the sale (the other 50% goes to the NSPCC, as co-owners of the Centre), we plan to start the next chapter, as a ‘grant making’ charity.
“In our new guise, we will invite applications for funding from charities and not for profit organisations, which share our aims of reducing the threat and reality of violence in our society, and particularly violence against women and girls, and young people of all genders, race and faith, who are targeted by extremists.
“This change to our business operations does not, of course, preclude people helping with our funding needs,” he added.
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@warringtonworldwide #peace campaigner Colin Parry is imploring #Warrington Borough Council to retain the names of #TimParry and #JohnathanBall as the #charity set up in their memory after the #IRA bomb attack on the town in March 1993 prepares to vacate the building to make way for a new #SEND #education ♬ original sound – warringtonworldwide


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Experienced journalist for more than 40 years. Managing Director of magazine publishing group with three in-house titles and on-line daily newspaper for Warrington. Experienced writer, photographer, PR consultant and media expert having written for local, regional and national newspapers. Specialties: PR, media, social networking, photographer, networking, advertising, sales, media crisis management. Chair of Warrington Healthwatch Director Warrington Chamber of Commerce Patron Tim Parry Johnathan Ball Foundation for Peace. Trustee Warrington Disability Partnership. Former Chairman of Warrington Town FC.

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