A PRIMARY school has reaped the rewards of the work of a group of young volunteers and its pupils who have helped to transform an overgrown neglected area of its greenspace.

St Joseph's Catholic Primary School in Leigh was visited by members of the Prince's Trust over the course of two weeks to improve its kitchen garden by digging out weeds, painting flower beds and putting in new plants and compost.

The Prince's Trust provides work experience and volunteering opportunities to young people aged between 11 and 30 with many of them coming from disadvantaged backgrounds to give them a change to develop skills and benefit the community at the same time.

Headteacher Miss Michelle Daley, who organised a special assembly to thank the Prince's Trust and everyone involved in the project, said: "The Prince's Trust volunteers have worked so hard with our pupils and done a great job.

"It was so heart-warming to see the work they have done and I am so thankful to them."

One of the Mather Lane school pupil' parents, Mrs Gredecki, arranged for the Princes Trust to carry out the work with the group bag-packing at the Tesco Extra Leigh store to raise money for the materials needed to carry our the work

Nicola Radcliffe, who led the volunteer group with Amy Stark and Chad Grundy, added: “We wanted to help our local school.

"It is great working together and good for our young people to see how they can made a positive difference.”

Wigan borough councillors Kevin Anderson and Charles Rigby have also made a visit to St Joseph's to see how its new eco council is operating with the pupils sharing plans of how they can brighten up the school.

The pupils asked the councillors questions about how they could make improvements too.

Member of the eco council team, Year Six pupil Katie Powell, said: "We are very grateful to the councillors for visiting us because we know they are very busy.

"I think our kitchen garden looks really good and it’s very kind of the Prince’s Trust to help us.”

The school is hoping to achieve Green Flag status, a national recognition of public garden spaces, with other green-fingered projects in the pipeline to achieve this.