A FREEMASONS lodge which has raised thousands of pounds for charity is set to close over a row about their meeting place.

Turton Lodge was established in 1946, and its leader estimates the group has raised more than £30,000 in the last 62 years. Now the lodge’s charity work is set to end because the group cannot find a suitable venue for meetings.

The lodge members want to hold their meetings in Horwich, but the Freemasons provincial authority will not let them because it is outside their borders.

The group has now decided that the lodge will close if the province will not let them move to Horwich.

Turton Lodge master Ian Birch, aged 53, of Bradshaw, said: “It’s purely political, and the province would sooner see us close than let us move to another venue.”

Turton Lodge currently meets monthly in an upstairs room at The Watermillock pub in Crompton Way, Bolton. Freemasons’ meetings require certain equipment to convert the venue into a lodge, including a chequered carpet. These need to be stored at the meeting place. At The Watermillock, members have to carry the equipment up two flights of stairs before every meeting.

The lodge’s preferred meeting place, Ridgmont House in Chorley Old Road, Horwich, falls within the West Lancashire provincial boundaries, while Turton is in East Lancashire.

Chad Northcott, director of communications for the East Lancashire Province, said: “The policy of the province is, and has always been, that if a lodge is consecrated in a province then it stays within the province. Over the last 12 months or more, the province has tried very hard to support the Turton Lodge in its deliberations. We have offered them the opportunity to meet at other lodges in the province.”