TWO villages are celebrating after scooping grants of around £500,000 to brighten up community life.

Weaverham Community Centre bosses have been awarded £240,000 towards a £374,400 project to build a youth and community room while Cuddington and Sandiway Parish Playing Fields Association will receive £250,000, half the amount needed for a long-awaited village hall. Both are provisional.

The money will come out of Vale Royal Borough Council's Rural Delivery Programme, designed to help communities preserve their distinctiveness, providing that match funding for both projects can be found within 12 months.

Denis Kidd, chairman of Cuddington and Sandiway Village Hall Committee, said everyone was 'absolutely delighted' - and more determined than ever to find the rest of the money needed.

Their plans made national headlines when an application for funding was rejected by lottery chiefs because the hall would not serve enough ethnic minorities. Mr Kidd said: 'We got turned down last time, but we under-stand they have changed their criteria since and so we are more hopeful.'

The hall will be built on the Norley Road Playing Fields and provide a base for local organisations and community activities including the local film club.

Meanwhile over in Weaverham, celebrations are underway with all ages set to benefit from the windfall.

Eileen Bland, treasurer of Weaverham Community Centre, said the money would be used to help build a youth and community room and upgrade existing disabled and community facilities.

'We still have some way to go to match the bid but this is a fantastic launch,' she said. 'My thanks must go to Cllr Frank Dolphin for recognising the need for rural funding and also to the borough council for injecting new life into our rural activities.

'Making this funding source possible and available to Weaverham and other rural areas has brought support to the new and existing village facilities that are so important to village life.

'The award will allow us to address the problem of where our young people aged 15 to 19 can go to in the evenings, upgrade our facilities to the disabled and open up new space and services for elderly people in our community.'