Sara Rowbotham: Last News

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Children were being raped 'every day' - but the 'lone voices' who spoke out about it were 'disbelieved' and 'silenced'.

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direct to your inboxRochdale’s new climate change tsar has called on the council to embrace radical protest group Extinction Rebellion.Coun Sara Rowbotham, who took on the new role last year, believes the environmentalists can play an important part in helping the authority hit its bid to become carbon-neutral by 2038.The global movement pressures governments into taking action to address the current ‘climate and ecological emergency’.However, its tactics - which involve non-violent civil disobedience - have drawn criticism from some quarters. Last September it held demonstrations in Manchester city centre despite pleas from councillors who said it would break lockdown restrictions.

direct to your inbox Concerns have been raised over a rise in anti-vax propaganda Covid conspiracy theories in Middleton. Posters purporting to be from lockdown sceptic group The White Rose appeared in parts of the town over the weekend.One described the pandemic as ‘the biggest scam in the history of the world’, while another claimed the virus was not deadly.Some homes reportedly also received leaflets bearing similar messages.

A lack of testing capacity was behind a ‘significant increase’ in coronavirus outbreaks within Rochdale care homes, it has been claimed.Councillor Sara Rowbotham - cabinet member for health during the first seven months of the pandemic - blames a lack of testing availability for care home workers for the rise over recent weeks.However, the government says it ring-fences 120,000 tests every day for the care sector and says 'any suggestion of a lack of available testing for staff is wrong'.The virus had been well contained in the borough’s care settings, with only one significant outbreak over the summer months.But Andrea Fallon, the council’s director of public health, told a Covid-19 engagement board that the picture had recently become

Rochdale is approaching 100 cases per 100,000 people, with an infection rate of 90.8.That's the fourth highest in Greater Manchester.The testing unit will be open from 10.30am to 3.30pm Monday to Wednesday between 10.30am and 3.30pm on High Street car park, off St Mary’s Gate behind the Dunelm store.Tests must be booked. Appointments can be made by ringing 119 or at nhs.uk/coronavirus.

may need to follow in the footsteps of Bolton and impose further restrictions on the hospitality sector to get the spread of the virus under control.

third highest in Greater Manchester. Rochdale, like the rest of the region, is still under tougher restrictions to stop the spread of Covid.Measures include not mixing with other households indoors or in gardens.Coun Sara Rowbotham, cabinet member for health and wellbeing at Rochdale Borough Council, said: “Increasing numbers of people who are testing positive for coronavirus have no symptoms so we encourage everyone to get tested."We need to identify who has the virus so we can stop it spreading.

preventing a local lockdown were introduced. The borough has the fourth highest coronavirus infection rate in the country, behind only Leicester, Blackburn and Bradford, according to figures covering June 29 to July 12.