A MUCH-LOVED Consett institution has applied to become an official centre designed to help teenagers expelled from school.

The YMCA, which serves the whole of Derwentside, wants to become a main centre for Durham County Council's Impact scheme.

Consett YMCA already works with teenagers involved in the county-wide £2m education scheme, which encourages disaffected young people to become interested in education and other activities.

Now the YMCA wishes to take the scheme a step further and become the dedicated Impact centre for North-West Durham.

"It's exactly the kind of thing we do very well and we already do a lot of work with these youngsters," said Billy Robson of the YMCA.

Meanwhile the YMCA team at the centre on Parliament Street took the opportunity to reflect on how far the organisation had come since it first opened in an old, long-gone army hut in 1919.

Chairman of the group Roy Tyman said:: "It was all about table tennis and trips out and so on for years. It was a glorified youth club really.

"I remember it being like that when I was young in the 1950s. But the big change came when everyone knew they were going to close the steelworks. The place was effectively closed in the September of 1980 and by Christmas we had a full-scale renovation providing employment."

Mr Robson, who gave a glowing tribute to former YMCA stalwart the late Alex Forsythe for moving the YMCA forward, talked of the years of the from 1980 to 1988 when the Government used the centre as a major training centre, giving men a full wage, as the most effective years.

But he turned his thoughts to the latest developments at the centre. He said: "We do a lot of good work here. Besides anything else we employ people, we are operating 15 schemes and we are home to a number of community groups. Even The Advertiser uses us!

"This centre of excellence would be just the latest step."