Parade marchers face park ban
Marchers at this year's trouble-hit Sandwell's St George's Day Parade will be banned from Dartmouth Park on safety grounds, it has been revealed.
Instead the April 19 parade, if it goes ahead, will have to end in a town centre car park, a move organisers today described as "ludicrous". The parade, which attracts around 15,000 people and is the biggest in the UK, traditionally ends in the West Bromwich park, where war veterans lay a wreath at the cenotaph.
Trevor Collins, of the Stone Cross St George Association, said: "To me it looks like pure bloody-mindedness from the council.
"We have always finished in the park and it's been no problem before.
"Now they are saying they are going to lock the gates and we should just finish up in a car park, surrounded by pubs and with nothing to do.
"If anything is going to cause trouble, it's that."
Sandwell Council's safer communities chief Councillor Derek Rowley said: "The parade organisers have been given a safe place for people to disperse in the Reform Street car park.
"If thousands of people were to go into Dartmouth Park, where there is no available car parking, and then all leave at the same time that could cause problems."
