A GROUP of "sisters" are doing it for themselves...

They are a group of Oxford Grove mums who were once total strangers to the electric drill and the circular saw -- but now they can put Handy Andy to shame!

"Or rather, we are Handy Annies," laughed Quemmer Mahmood.

The women are all on a free DIY course at the "Ocky Grove" Urban Care and Neighbourhood (UCAN) Centre -- two converted terraced houses in Lily Street, off Chorley Old Road.

The classes should have attracted both sexes but, helped along by the TV-led DIY boom, only female DIY nuts turned up for the weekly sessions which have just been extended until June.

Marie Settle, Neighbourhood Advice and Support Co-ordinator, hammers home the course's message of "self-help", "enabling people" and "empowering women through DIY" -- but just one look at the group and it's obvious that they are simply having a good time.

"It has been going really well," said Marie.

"They can't wait to come back the week after -- they love it so much."

Complete novices to start with, they can now be seen clutching a power tool with the same ease as they once might have wielded, say, an electric whisk.

And yes, in the process, they all admit that their self-confidence has been given a boost by the class.

Small wonder, really, as they are being taught by the bubbly Carol Stewart, a psychology teacher with a special interest in assertiveness training.

She is also a self-taught DIY fanatic who thinks nothing of fitting out her own kitchen and bathroom.

"You can wait forever for a man to do something for you!" she laughed.

The first thing she taught the women were basic woodworking skills and, after a visit to a local builders' yard, they are now building shelves for the creche at the centre.

"Shopping was a laugh -- we had to put up with the usual male chauvinism," Carol recalled.

"They said things like: 'Who's going to put those up for you?'

"I still get that after 20 years of going into the same place..."

The Handy Annies are also being primed for building whatever they want -- whether it's "a barbecue or walls" and much to Carol's delight, some of the women have already put into practice what they've learned.

The idea is also to eventually offer their services around the Oxford Grove area -- which is part of a regeneration project for Halliwell.

"This week, some of the women have come back and said they have put up curtain rails at home," Carol said. "The women were a bit apprehensive at first about the tools, but I said: 'It's not as frightening as you think'.

"The saw was the one they were most scared off -- so now they've got that out of their system, they can come home now and think: 'I will just try to put that cupboard up'."

Quemmer Mahmood, 30, hits the nail on the head: "I used to leave it up to him but now I think: 'Leave him alone and I'll do it myself'.

"I do a better job than than him anyway!

"As soon as we started doing this course I put a lot of new locks on," she said.

Shopping has also taken on a different meaning because a visit to a DIY store now involves a lot of lingering in the tools aisle "to see what tools you can get."

Jaya Patel, a 37-year-old customer service adviser, agrees: "You wonder what this tool or that tool does."

Before, Jaya explained, she just used to "help her husband" when it came to fixing things around the house.

Quemmer added: "It's like being a labourer at home, isn't it? And you want to be chief.

"When you ask them to do something and they turn around and say: 'You do it', then we can say: 'Stand to one side, I will have a go'."

Margaret Waddington, a 24-year-old shop assistant, also sees practical benefit in the course.

Having just bought an old house in need of some repairs, she can't wait to "go through the whole house and do everything, be involved.

"I was a bit weary at first but once you get stuck in it's really good, because we are all learners.

"We all talk about DIY now and a lot of friends have said they want us to go round and come and put shelves up," she said.

Her 33-year-old work colleague Gail Dunne is looking forward to learning tiling so she can spruce up her new kitchen.

"You just want to do it yourself," she shrugged, adding that men have a habit of "dilly-dallying around with things".

Equally enthusiastic is Eileen Gillibrand, a 52-year-old.

"It's a whole different world," she said.

"It gives you enthusiasm for doing something at home.

"I'm thinking about changing door handles -- before you wouldn't even think about doing anything like that."

MORE DIY classes are planned at UCAN, which is financed by the European Regional Development Fund, Bolton MBC and Portica Housing Association.

For more information on these classes or any of the other activities -- including police surgeries, pensioner drop-ins, employment and grant advice sessions and much more -- contact Marie Settle on 465985.

Converted for the new archive on 14 July 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.