David Owen - Our Principal

David Owen was brought up in Layton, educated at Layton Primary School, Baines Grammar School, Poulton-le-Fylde, and Manchester University. He has contested three Parliamentary Elections, losing in Lancaster by 1,400 votes. For eight years he represented Layton Ward on Blackpool Borough Council; and since 1987 has been a councillor for Victoria Ward in the south of the town. He founded Blackpool Civic Trust, the local amenity society, in 1975 and was heavily involved in the successful campaign to save Blackpool Grand Theatre from demolition. He was one of the eight people who set up Blackpool Grand Theatre Trust Limited in 1977; they went on to finance its purchase and to re-open it in March 1980 when Timothy West starred in The Merchant of Venice. Since then it has grown in reputation as a major lyric theatre on the national touring theatre and open throughout the year. For ten years he chaired Blackpool Airport, presided over the construction of its new terminal and establishing it as the helicopter centre for Irish Sea gas exploitation and the development of adjacent land as Blackpool Business Park He was Mayor of the Borough in 1995-96.

He has chaired the Libraries Committee and the Development Control Committee, and now serves as Chairman of the Council's Culture, Communities and Business Services Overview and Scrutiny Committee. He hopes as a Bloomfield Road season ticket holder to see a revival in the fortunes of Blackpool FC.

Despite a hectic life outside the Office, like so many busy people he has that capacity still to find time always to be approachable and interested in you and your concerns.


I don't know as I want a lawyer to tell me what I cannot do. I hire him to tell me how to do what I want to do.

From The Life Of Elbert H Gary by Ida Tarbell