How do you solve a problem like Newton-le-willows?

As regular visitors to this blog will know, Newton-le-willows is a bit of an oddity. Slap bang in the middle of an unholy triangle of Wigan, Warrington and St Helens, people who live there tend not to feel much loyalty to any of these neighbouring towns.

It's neither Manc nor Scouse either, being about half way along the East Lancs.

It has a Warrington postcode but a Merseyside postal address. At a push you could describe it as semi-rural, but it's traditionally an industrial town whose heritage is based on the early days of the railways.

So what's the best thing to do with a peculiarity like this?

Well, if you're the Warrington Guardian at least, the answer seems to be to airbrush the whole place off the map.

Until just over a year ago, the Newton Guardian was the town's own version of the paper with a four page wrap devoted to Newton issues rather than the comings and goings at Warrington Wolves.

Then, almost without warning, the Newton edition of the paper was dropped. The Guardian's editor excitedly explained that all was not lost though as Newton and Earlestown were to get a whole page (wow!) devoted to their news every week.

Guess what? Just over a year later, the Newton page has mysteriously disappeared.

If I didn't know better I would suspect this is all part of some fiendish plot from Astral Developments. If Newton becomes a 'non-place', who would object to bulldozing huge chunks of it to make way for the Parkside Rail Freight Terminal?

Maybe we should all ask Miranda Newey what's going on. A couple of months ago, the Guardian trumpeted her as the paper's own Newton correspondent and she's covered a couple of good stories since then, including the kids of St Aelred's walking out in protest at the proposed closure of their school.

Taking a quick look through this week's paper though, she seems to have been saddled with interviewing the Birchwood kid who won Britain's Got Talent.

And the Newton-le-willows Gardening Society's monthly meeting at the Kirkfield Hotel hasn't even got a mention.