A TRIAL scheme for repairing street lights, which council chiefs claim will save thousands of pounds - is going on trial in Bewsey.

Under the scheme, being tested in Rixton Avenue, new lighting columns are 'slipped' over faulty or damaged lamp posts.

The initiative was developed in Tameside and is said to avoid the need for Manweb or Norweb engineers to be called out to connect and disconnect the electricity supply to damaged columns.

Residents living off Dewhurst Road, Birchwood, should be pleased by the prospect - it took more than a month for lamp posts, wrecked there on Boxing Day, to be replaced.