3
July 2009TWO people have
been charged in connection with burglaries in Chipping Norton
on Wednesday (July 1).Joseph
Hammond, 20, of Dunstan Avenue in Chipping Norton, has been
charged with two counts of burglary, theft of a motor vehicle
and driving otherwise than in accordance with a licence.A 17-year-old boy from Chipping Norton has been charged
with two counts of burglary and theft of a motor vehicle.They are both due to attend Banbury Magistrates' Court
on July 24.
A member of the public alerted police after a burnt-out
Volkswagen van was found off the B4026 in Spelsbury, and two
people were seen running away from the vehicle.Applegarth Nurseries was broken into but nothing was
stolen. The VW Van, tools and cash was stolen from Norton
Leisure Building.
West Street
rampage
When
John Podbury came down early this morning (2nd July) to open up
the papers at his newsagents shop in West Street he found a hole
had been smashed through the glass in the lower half of the shop
door (pictured left). And the till was missing. Whoever pulled
off this job must have been pretty small and pretty strong. Did
the CCTV camera at the Kings Arms opposite see anything?
It is truly astonishing that local thieves are now so confident
that there is no police presence in this
town at night that they can smash a glass door on a main
shopping street under street lights and make off with a till.
John has now been told that the till has been found and will be
returned to him later today. Lets hope there were some
fingerprints on it. But the yobs continued on down West Street.
They wrecked the hanging baskets outside the Kings Arms and then
went further down the road and smashed Gary Morgan's window at
the Carpet Emporium. The second time for him in two weeks.
(Gary is seen right with the lump of Cotswold stone that did the
damage) It seems that somebody heard the noise of
breaking glass at around 1.15am. They went out but could see
nothing. This afternoon the police seem to be back on the scene
in force visiting all three locations. Lets hope they are taking
this seriously. Shopkeepers who are just not convinced that
there is sufficient police presence in the town at night are
beginning to talk about steel shutters. Spare us that. That
would make Chippy look like Dodge City! Its pretty obvious that
CCTV cameras are no deterrent either. These crimes were
committed in full view of the cameras outside the Kings. We
need night patrols.
Its prom time!
Picture by Glyn Watkins
From left to right: Tom Lodge, Jessie Bartholomew, Billy Wolverton, Harriet Wooley,
Katie Overbury, Freddie Fritz.
Six ubercool sixth formers sip their Bucks Fizz by the Manor
House pool on the hottest day of the year in preparation for a
cross country journey to their Prom Ball at Eynsham Hall.
- By Fire Engine! Was Chippy ever this stylish?
Picture by
Sue Bartholomew
6th Chipping
Norton Cubs raise £150 for Helen and
Douglas House Well done you guys
Zoe ThomasAssistant Cub Scout Leader
writes:The 6th Chipping Norton Cubs decided that
they wanted to raise money for Helen and Douglas House and so
they did a sponsored chopstick challenge which involved them
having to eat different foods only with the aid of chopsticks.
On the 30th June we presented the
cheque of £150 to Helen and Douglas House. A massive thank you
to our cubs and Mitch for organising this event,
for all their hardworkand their fantastic achievement in
raising this amount of money.
So it's
true then.
The Chadlington toffs want to close Dean Pit!!
Where does Dave stand on the matter?
Sir
Your article “Dean Pit - Toff protestors
cause chaos” has caused great offence as well as being completely
inaccurate. The protest by concerned residents of the three
villages that neighbour Dean Pit is about the inadequate width of
the approach lane and the general concerns about a dangerous and
congested access to an essential facility which is for the benefit
of some 25,000 local residents.
As a secondary concern
residents would like to see better easier to use re-cycling
facilities. If your “correspondent” had bothered to inquire as to
the protest the matter could have been explained, and no doubt any
sane person would agree with the action very generously supported
by The Chadlingtons.
The council is in the process
of applying to renew the temporary planning application for
the site and residents want the access issues looked at as part of
the application, in addition we want the council to “consider”
other possibly more suitable sites which have been identified in a
paper produced by independent experts and paid for by Lord and
Lady Chadlington.The review which
should be supported by everyone for whom the tip is provided,
should look at improving the facilities since we are all very soon
going to be forced into fortnightly rubbish collections and as a
consequence traffic to our local tip will inevitably increase.
Your “article” inferred that
some upper class people decided to disrupt the tip this is a
complete fabrication and distortion of the facts resulting in
offence against people of every walk of life who are concerned for
the benefit of their fellow citizens, you should check your facts
and publish the truth.
00 44 (0)8450 940 634 Aspire House
Unit 15 Worcester Road Industrial Estate Chipping Norton
The webmaster
writes: At the last meeting of the Town Council Councillor
Greenwell proposed a motion which was unanimously endorsed that
Chippy should support the extension of the planning permission for
Dean Pit . In any case
it
looks as if Jaime of the Aspire Group is flogging a dead horse
because the Planners have already issued a report with their
recommendation which will be rubber-stamped at the Planning
Committee on July 6th The report concludes:
"Officers
consider that the continued use of the site as a waste recycling
centre isunlikely to have any further
impact on the residential amenity of nearby propertiesparticularly given the distance between the nearest
neighbours and the application site.
The proposed
extension of the time period would not result in any significant
increasein the level of traffic
generated by the current use of the site and as such officers do
notconsider that this would be harmful
in terms of its impact on the character of the areaor the amenity of properties to justify objecting to the
proposal.
Given the above,
officers are of the opinion that the District Council should raise
noobjections to the application for the
extension of the time period for the use of the siteas a Waste Recycling Centre".
Perhaps the scruffy hordes from
Chippy should doff their caps in future as they shuffle past the
gates of Dean Manor on their way to the tip as a mark of gratitude
for this indispensable facility being kept open. I
haven't seen Lord Chadlington's list of more suitable sites.
I bet Pool Meadow is one of them!!
A DAY TO REMEMBER
A DAY IN THE LIFE OF CHIPPING NORTON
Time for a second
edition!
The first one
was produced by
David Eddershaw, sponsored by the Chipping Norton Area Community
Education Council back inJuly 1989 - twenty years ago.
The
Local History Society are asking all
the people of Chipping Norton to go out with their cameras on
WEDNESDAY 15TH JULY 2009 and capture
the town as it is today and provide a
new record twenty years on from
1989.
We want people at work and play.
We want pictures of life today in Chippy schools, shops,
offices. playgrounds, pubs, cafes, the theatre, the hospital,
surgeries. We want faces young and old! Pictures of the town
characters. The Police, council workers, delivery men. Any
slice of Chippy life at all.
All we ask is that the
photograph states:
a) who took the photograph
b) names of people on the
photo ( if any)
c) The time of day on which the
picture was taken.
We need photographs from dawn
'til dusk.All photographs can be
taken into the Museum on High Street, given direct to any
member of the Local History Society or email to Pauline
Watkins on
Pauline.Watkins@tiscali.co.uk
The Museum will be holding a
stall at the Table Top sale in the Town Hall on 1st August
also.Hopefully if we get a good
response the book will be published in time for Christmas.
All gone now:
Menzies, ST Motorcycles and Tommy Aldridges.
The Beer Festival was Great
J Callow
writes,,,,,,,,I was
at the Rugby Club Beer Festival, it
was great. Man Make Fire are the best local band I've
heard in a long time.Thought you
might like to put a face to the name, also have attached a
couple of otherphotos of people
enjoying the evening.Guest beers
were pretty good too.
Mine's bigger than yours Hilary!
This splendid pic is by Glyn
Watkins
Hilary Biles is
now Vice-Chairman of Oxfordshire County Council and has a chain
of her own. It had its first outing with her in Chippy on
Saturday Night at the Armed Forces Day Celebration at the Crown
& Cushion (see below). Mayor Mike was delighted to find
that when it came to chain size there was no contest!!
Discretion and taste, importance - thats something different!
Honouring the Armed Services
Well over a hundred people
attended the Armed Forces Day Celebration at
the Crown & Cusion last Saturday night and were welcomed
by a guard of honour formed by Donald Branson and Malcolm
Holland from the British Legion. Guests
of honour wereMary Bradford widow of Norman Bradford who as many know was a
great supporter of the Royal British Legion for many years and
was fondly remembered and George
Colbourn who escaped from Poland
during the last war.An amusing story
was told by Neville Edwards about how
George escaped by hiding in a lorry.Little did he know that the lorry was
carrying Nazi Gold, hardly the safest place to be.
It was
marvellous to see all the service men and women
there - past and present.
The County was represented by the Vice Lord Lieutenant Malcolm
Cochrane and the Vice- Chairman Hilary Biles. The district
was represented by
Councillor
Patrick McHugh and The Mayor and Mayoress led
a group of Town Councillors
- Jo Graves, Martin Jarratt & Glyn
WatkinsMr Cochrane gave an
address in which he spoke of the many service
charities for the services and how honoured he was to be
present. Toasts
followed to the Queen and the Armed Services. The evening was a
great success and
will surely become a regular event
on the Chippy Calendar. Thanks to Neville Edwards, Mike Howes,
Ian Barnett and other members of the British Legion for
organising the evening so beautifully.
The
Mayoress, Mayor, Lord Lieutenant,
Neville Edwards (British Legion), Mary
Bradford & George Colbourn.
Neville Edwards and a mystery
guest! Dr Bruce Parker & George Colbourn
Sam Weston
(Royal Engineers) & Geoff Thompson (Kings Royal Hussars)Kate Briggs & Sam Weston.
Vice Lord Lieutenant of Oxon
Malcolm Cochrane and Donald Branson and will
somebody help us with the name of this cheerful veteran!!
All the pics are by Glyn
Watkins
90F heatwave to hit Britain
Britain
is expected to experience a 90F heatwave next week, leading to
the Met Office issuing its first Heat Health Alert in three
years. Meteorologists have told the elderly and the vulnerable
to stay out of the sun and drink lots of cold water as hot and
humid temperatures soar to dangerous levels.They issued the
level two warning, two off the maximum alert, after forecasts
showed there was a good chance that temperatures could top 90F
(32C) during the day and remain a hot and sticky 64F (18C) at
night.Meteorologists have told the
elderly and the vulnerable to stay out of the sun and drink lots
of cold water as hot and humid temperatures soar to dangerous
levels.They issued the level two
warning, two off the maximum alert, after forecasts showed there
was a good chance that temperatures could top 90F (32C) during
the day and remain a hot and sticky 64F (18C) at nightThe greatest risks of the thresholds being exceeded are
in the south and the Midlands on Monday and Tuesday but the high
temperatures could spread and remain for much of the week.
Following a weekend of warm weather in the late 70s with
sunshine and showers, the temperatures will begin to soar.Temperatures could reach 90F (32C) in London on Monday
and Tuesday, with other parts of the country also enjoying
prolonged
sunshine.Night-time
temperatures in London will fall no lower than 66F (20C).
Three more £140 Sainsburys
shopping vouchers won in Week 2!
The lucky winners were:
Brenda Smart
of Lords PieceRoad Rebecca Cox of
Choice Hill Road, Over Norton Barbara Blundell of
Lords Piece Road
Congratulations! Gary the
Store manager has your phone numbers and will be getting in touch
direct to arrange a time for you to call in and pick up your
vouchers.
Another Three £140 Sainsburys
shopping vouchers to be won in Week 3!
exclusive to chippingnorton.net readers
Same rules. New
questions. Have a go. Whats to lose?
E-mail your
answers to three simple questions to
gerry@chippingnorton.net Include your name, address and telephone numberClosing date for entries for the Week 2 prizes is Midnight on Monday
6th July
Entries with three correct answers will be forwarded to the Manager of
the store who will draw the three lucky winners on 23rd/24th June
Over 18 only. Only one entry per person. No Sainsbury employees or their families.
Good Luck Here are the three questions....
1. What are the new colours of the Sainsburys colleagues uniforms?
(Hint: You have to get the name of the maroon/burgundy colour EXACTLY
right. Better ask!)
2. Who is the longest serving member of staff (including working for
previous stores on the site?)
3. What do you get for every bag you re-use?
Oxfordshire - Home of the Quango
Did you think
the Chipping Norton Town Partnership (whatever happened to it?)
was just a bureaucratic aberration. A sort of small town quango
to keep the locals amused. Wrong!! Its actually part of a whole
network of Partnerships all over Oxfordshire with huge steering
groups stuffed with Oxfordshire's great and good. One up from
Chippy is the West Oxfordshire Strategic Partnership involving
luminaries like Barry Norton (Leader of WODC) Reggie
Heyworth
(Director Cotswold Wildlife Park) Lin Kennedy
(Community
DevelopmentOfficer RAF Brize Norton)
and no less a person than Jack Mahli (Police Chief Inspector).
WOSP (as it is known) meets regularly to keep a tight eye on the
progress of lesser Partnerships. WOSP met this week to consider
a Progress report from Dene Robson - Community Development
manager (you couldn't make these names up!) Included in the
report was this piece of unintelligible tosh
"The
tendering exercise for the Chipping Norton Enterprise Centre did
not produce an immediate solution to developing an enterprise
centre. There may be several reasons for this, but undoubtedly
the timing of the tender coincided with a period when credit for
property development was in short supply and business confidence
was low. There is scope to re-look at the prospects for
delivering an enterprise centre as conditions change".
(This is shorthand for the Chipping Norton Town Partnership
spent five years doing nothing and by the time it lumbered into
action it was too late because the country's economy had
collapsed)
This
blistering and challenging review of progress in Chipping Norton
will now be passed on to the next Partnership level - probably
the Oxfordshire Economic Partnership before being discussed by
the Oxfordshire Partnership itself.
In the same
report we also read about the remarkable progress with various
"Community Safety Actions" According to Dene Robson
"CCTV
is scheduled to be introduced in Carterton in the Autumn and
negotiations are still taking place with stakeholders in
Chipping Norton" .
Negotiations does not accurately describe the mauling which Bill
Oddy of WODC received at the Chippy Town Council last week when
he was told that the town would not be coming up with any money
for a CCTV scheme. This was the third time the Council had made
this clear. Why wasn't the truth included in the report?
Hopefully the situation will now be reported more accurately
upwards to the Oxfordshire Safer Communities Partnership.
It may then be discussed by the Oxfordshire Public
Service Board
Thank the
lord that Dave has promised to abolish all this nonsense when he
takes over as PM. How can we afford such rubbish and why are
intelligent people willing to waste their time on it?
Coming to Chippy later this year.....
Football sessions have been taking place as part
of a project to boost confidence and skills among young people
in West Oxfordshire, and encourage them to lead a more active,
positive lifestyle.Around 20 girls
from 10 to 16 years have been attending weekly sessions in
Witney organised as part of the RUSH project. West
Oxfordshire District Council is leading RUSH in
conjunction with a network of agencies that work with young
people. The aim is to create opportunities for young people to
engage in positive activities which may build their confidence
and self esteem. Six 15 and 16-year-old girls who took part in
football training as part of a pilot of the RUSH project in
Witney last summer are helping with the girls’ football
sessions. Witney’s Base 33 youth charity, which works closely
with socially excluded and hard-to-reach young people, is
leading the football sessions.In
addition to training sessions for girls, mixed sessions for boys
and girls also take place every Sunday in Witney.
Base 33 Youth Worker Staci Beevor said: “We’re
glad RUSH has been set up and that the Council and others
are taking an interest in these young people. The football
sessions have been really popular. A mixture of girls take part
in the girls-only sessions and they’ve been really enthusiastic.
This has presented a good opportunity for the six girls who took
part in last year’s trial as they’re now leading sessions, with
the help of a proper coach, and it’s a real achievement for
them. We also get around 40 young people attending the Sunday
sessions, some of them stay on the sidelines and have a chat
with the youth workers instead of actually playing, but we’ve
found this has been a good way of helping this particular group
of young people to burn off some energy and get into a positive
frame of mind ready to go to school the next day.”
RUSH has also organised for a group of
Year 6 pupils from Witney’s primary schools to take part in a
trial rugby scheme aimed at boosting their confidence before
they move up to secondary school. Rugby sessions will continue
over the summer holidays and into their first term at secondary
school.
Following
the launch of the project in Witney, RUSH will be extended to
Chipping Norton later this year. The project group is currently
looking at ways of reaching out to young people in the town.
Man injured
in Blue Boar fight
A
MAN needed stitches after being hit around the head with a
bottle during a fight in Chipping Norton.At about 1.30am yesterday on
Sunday morning Sunday, a fight broke out outside the
Blue Boar Inn, Goddards Lane, involving 15 to 20 people.A
28-year-old man required stitches after being hit with a
bottle. He also broke his ankle during the disturbance.
PC Jude Miranda, investigating the incident, said: "There
were a lot of people outside the pub at the time of the
incident and I appeal to anyone who knows who is responsible
for these injuries to contact police immediately."Anyone with information should contact Thames Valley
Police on 08458 505505 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800
555111
Charlbury's free festival voted 'simply the best'
SIMPLY
the best” was how the organiser of Oxfordshire’s only free
music festival described the weekend event. About 7,000 people
turned out to see a host of bands – including headliners
Inlight (pictured) Smilex, Little
Fish and The Epstein – at Charlbury’s 14th Riverside Festival
on Saturday and Sunday. Previous years have seen about 4,000
come through the gates.
Festival director Andy
Pickard said: “It was simply the best one we have ever had.
Already we have received lists of congratulations from total
strangers. It really is incredible. We have been going for 14
years now and word is getting about.” Costing between £17,000
and £20,000 to run, the free event is funded through food,
drink and T-shirt sales, as well as grants from organisations
including Charlbury Town Council.
CHIPPING
NORTON FAMILY HISTORY GROUP
Calling
all voluntary organisations and local residents
“Make some cash quick and easy” Table
Top Sale
August 1st
10am -12.30pm
Chipping Norton Town Hall
Just
£5.00 per table
No
Alcohol allowed (sorry) Raffle and Refreshments
To book a
table send your cheque made out to the CHIPPING NORTON FAMILY HISTORY
GROUP to the CHIPPING NORTON GROUP, 9 Walterbush Road, OX7 5DN.
Proceeds will go towards
our Bliss Mill publication
WITNEY
MP David Cameron has claimed for meals, taxis and phone upgrades
on his Parliamentary expenses. Last week, constituents were able
to view the full list of Mr Cameron’s expenses, claimed since
2004, online.
The Conservative Party leader
has been criticised for claiming £680 for repairs at his second
home in Dean, near Chipping Norton, which he has agreed to pay
back. The repairs included clearing vines and wisteria off the
chimney, repairing toilets and resealing a conservatory roof. He
wrote to the Commons Fees Office volunteering the repayment of
£947.29 – which included the £680 for repairs – after
identifying a series of over-claims. These included £218.91 in
mortgage over-claims and £29.38 he claimed towards a banner on
his website he was asked by the Commons authorities to take
down.
Mr Cameron said: “All
politicians should recognise that, jointly and individually, we
are responsible for operating a bad system. “Those who most
infuriate the public are the ones who say ‘I did nothing wrong,
because I obeyed the rules and therefore I am not going to be
doing anything about it’. The maintenance bill for my house, the
one I chose to pay back, was 100 per cent within the rules and
agreed by the Fees Office.”
Other expenses published show
that Mr Cameron claimed for his monthly broadband fee, office
stationery and the room hire for his surgeries in Witney. They
include £8,056 in 2006-7 on postage, of which £6,800 was on
envelopes. In total, from 2004 until last year, Mr Cameron spent
£19,433 on postage, and in the same period, spent £10,660 on
stationery.
Despite Mr Cameron calling for
the scrapping of the Communications Allowance – which allows MPs
to spend thousands of pounds on websites – last March the MP
claimed £564 of taxpayers’ money for his site. But a spokesman
for the MP said this was towards making the website more
accessible for those with sight problems. In April 2007, he
claimed £200 for meals and £304.50 in August the same year. In
2007, he claimed £6,879.52 for his constituency office costs,
which included the salaries for a part-time researcher and
secretary and room hire costs. The webmaster comments: £6800 on
envelopes in one year. I make that around 227,000 envelopes. Thats a lorra lorra letters!! Thats like
five letters to every home in West Oxfordshire. How many letters
did you get from Dave last year??
CCTV or NOT CCTV - that is the question
Another visit
from Bill Oddy of WODC last week to try and persuade the Town
Council to commit itself to paying £15,000 a year (around £5 per
household) for five years towards the cost of having four CCTV
cameras in the centre of town. This was the third time that the
Council told Mr Oddy that it had nothing against CCTV but
thought either the Police or WODC should pay for it. The Council
didn't see why Chippy should pay as much as Witney and Carterton
who had many more cameras. Unfortunately Chippy doesn't have a
huge number of businesses - like Witney has - to pay for a
scheme or a sugar daddy organisation like RAF Brize Norton who
are paying the lion's share of the Carterton scheme. The cost of
£15,000 (which we are told is certain to rise) would be 10% of
the entire Chippy Town Council budget at a time when a quarter
of million pounds has to be found to repair the Town Hall.
But most importantly, CCTV only seems to be much help when the
police can respond to incidents immediately. No use watching a
mugging on the screen if you can't be on the spot within
seconds. Nobody believes that the Police would get here any
faster than they do now by which time all you could do would be
to watch an Action Replay. And as for being a deterrent. Who's
kidding who? Our local yobs would simply destroy the camera or
move along to Back Alley. The cops already know who the trouble
makers are in this town...capturing their mug shots on camera
won't change anything. What is required more than CCTV is a
policeman on the beat in the town centre between 11pm and 2am
every Friday and Saturday night
'Business as usual' at fire service college after blaze
IT is still business as usual at
Moreton Fire Service College as the centre awaits the results of
an investigation into the cause of a fire which caused £1
million of damage. A month on from the blaze on Saturday, May
16, the investigation by the local fire authority has yet to be
finalised. However, the results are expected to be announced
soon, according to spokesman Neil Thompson. He said the fire had
not affected any of the courses at the centre which trains
firefighters from around the globe. Mr Thompson said: “It has
been business as usual since the week after the fire occurred.
“No courses, training or studies have been affected and they
have run as normal. “A lot of that is down to the fantastic
support we have received from the fire and rescue service with
whom we have agreed a loan arrangement to replace those
appliances which were damaged in the fire. We have other
buildings on the site which we have been able to use for
training activities. It has been a very positive response all
round. We always have contingency plans in place.” Sixty
firefighters from three counties were called to tackle the fire
which started in a workshop on the site, to stop it spreading to
an appliance bay which housed many of the college’s fleet of
appliances. Ten appliances, each worth £120,000, were severely
damaged in the fire, as was a training support vehicle and the
40-year-old workshop. No one was injured in the fire.
STOP PRESS
Today (Tuesday
17th) Hilary Biles was appointed Vice-Chairman of Oxfordshire
County Council. Well done Hilary. Richly deserved. If you share
my pleasure why not drop her a congratulatory e-mail
Hilary.Biles@WESTOXON.GOV.UK
£1m for a new Chippy Community Centre
WOW!
Oxfordshire
County Council have been successful in getting a government
grant of £800,000 towards the £1m cost of a new Chippy community
centre to be built next to the school - along Glyme Lane just
past the old tennis courts. The new centre will be the base for
Youth
clubs for juniors (ages 9 to 13) and seniors (14 to 19),
counselling services, health and fitness activities, advice
and guidance around drugs and alcohol, performance arts and
multi-media access
The Integrated Youth Support Service will support vulnerable
groups through prevention and early intervention methods, with
a particular focus on youth crime and anti-social behaviour
Adult
Learning programmes including parenting classes, IT courses,
job-related sessions and access to qualifications such as
GCSEs and NVQs
This very
ambitious outcome is a bit different from the idea of a
standalone Youth Centre which has been discussed in the town for
the last couple of years. We have been lobbying hard for
money from a very stretched OCC budget to try and get a new
Youth Centre but have only been moving slowly up the county
priority queue. The Town Council recently made an offer to sell
one of its own properties to contribute to the cost of a simple
building costing around £250,000. Even this was proving
difficult to achieve - given that the property market has
collapsed. Things changed dramatically earlier this year when
Councillor Hilary Biles persuaded Louise Chapman - who is the
OCC Cabinet Member in charge of Youth Services - to come to
Chippy with her Children and
Young Peoples Services Team
and listen to our case. Around the same time the Department for
Children, Schools and Families
announced a big new scheme which made grants available to local
authorities who were developing innovative approaches by
"co-locating" social services on one site that had previously
been supplied in different places. This was because there was
evidence that this "co-location" approach produced better and
more cost-effective results. Moreover, it was expected that such
facilities would best be provided on or next to school campuses.
This was a "competitive" bidding process and any proposal would
be in competition with others from all around the country.
Louise and her team saw their chance. They were already working
on a big grant application to this new fund for a scheme in
Banbury so a Chippy Centre was included in the programme.
Applications had to be in by the end of March. There was a lot
of fast action involved. Congratulations to them. The special
needs of Chippy added to the fact that parts of the town have a
high Social Deprivation score provided the basis for a strong
case. They put together a superb bid and won! This was really
smart work. In one step we had jumped the County queue!! Hilary
and Louise had proved a couple of really canny operators. We
were lucky to have them pressing our case.
What
everyone in town needs to understand is that we only got this
money because the proposal made was to locate several social
services on one site. We get a fabulous new £1m building that
will house a Youth Club but only on the strict conditions that
the new building must also host other social services and must
be located on an accessible site close to the school. The
challenge now will be to provide within this overall plan a
Youth Centre with as much of its own identity as possible -
hopefully with its own entrance and direct access on to a games
playing area. A detailed Planning stage must now follow and the
County have promised consultation. However completion is due in
2011 so there won't be too much time for talking.
This is a
terrific new addition to the town's facilities. Things are
really moving forward.
Dean Pit - Toff protestors cause chaos
A
correspondent writes:When I went there yesterday
the supervisortold me that on
Saturday they had protestors wanting the site closed outside
the gates. They were led by Lady Chadlington. It apparently
caused complete chaos on the road with access to the site
blocked. The irony was the staff at the tip had to lend the
protesters hi-viz safety jackets because they were standing in
the road. Elsewhere in the world the protesters would have
been shot or dragged off by the "police" Here
we lend them safety equipment so that they can carry on
protesting. Perhaps Britain is still great after all!
Before disembarking at the allotments will
passengers remember to collect all their hand baggage...
Alison
Sims writes: .....Thought i would send in these
pictures that i took whilst in my allotment tonight....the
balloon looked as though it would land in the allotment, but
just missed the last plot and safely came to a stop in the
field behind......it looked as though it may have had some
difficulties as there appeared to be a split in the balloon
fabric.....so it was a relief to see that it landed safely!
Local Honours
Vet
John Gripper (left) is made an OBE for
services to rhino conservation. The 79-year-old, who ran Chipping Norton
Veterinary Hospital for 15 years, set up the Sebakwe Black Rhino Trust
charity in 1989. Since then he and his wife Annie have travelled the
world helping animals. Mr Gripper, of Ascott-under-Wychwood, said: “To
some extent you see honours given out to pop stars and politicians and
it’s quite nice that it is given to a different sort of organisation.”
His interest in rhino conservation began when he worked for the Cotswold
Wildlife Park, in Burford.
Dr Helen Raine, 58, from Hook Norton,
will be made an OBE for her services to the agri-food industry. She
said: “I was absolutely overwhelmed with surprise and absolutely
delighted. “I’m very flattered and very humbled by it. Everything I have
ever done, I have done because I passionately believe in doing the best
job I can for the industry and for farmers.”
Post
office future secured
CHIPPING
Norton Post Office’s future was secured when the Midcounties
Co-operative agreed to take it over later this year. Townsfolk feared
the High Street post office would close when its sub-postmistress left
in October but the Co-op has agreed to take over from her. The Co-op,
which has a food store in High Street, plans to retain the three
employees. Jacqueline Frow, head of the Midcounties’ Co-operative Group,
said: “We were approached by Post Office Ltd to see if we would like to
take on Chipping Norton Post Office and we were happy to do so. As a
co-operative business, we are committed to serving local communities and
this will ensure an important service is retained in the same location
which people are used to".
Select Committee rapslocal councils
over Icelandic banks
COUNCILS
in Oxfordshire were yesterday criticised over “substantial failures”
that led to millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money being invested in
Icelandic banks that later collapsed. Oxfordshire councils invested
£23.5m in Icelandic banks which went under last autumn after credit
markets froze in the wake of US financial giant Lehman Brothers’
bankruptcy.
Oxford City Council had deposited
£4.5m, South Oxfordshire District Council £2.5m, Cherwell District
Council £6.5m, Vale of White Horse District Council £1m and West
Oxfordshire District Council £9m. In addition, Oxfordshire County
Council reportedly has deposits totalling £5m in the country’s banks.
None of the money is believed to have been retrieved, although the
councils have been told they may recoup some of the cash.
A report by the Communities and Local
Government Select Committee, published yesterday, said some of the
warning signs had emerged as far back as 2006. Committee chairman,
former Oxford city councillor Phyllis Starkey, said: “Our inquiry has
exposed a significant level of misunderstanding, misinformation and
complacency – not just within local authorities, but also among those
who provide them with specialist investment advice.”
OPENING DAY
The store is ready, the staff are ready
and the first customer gets a big welcome from the manager.
TATLER DISCOVERS YET
ANOTHER SMART SET
IN AND AROUND CHIPPY
Stephen
Glover writes in Monday's Independent:Rebekah Wade, editor
of Britain's best selling daily newspaper The Sun, is known neither by
her readers nor the general public. She has always avoided appearing on
radio or television to defend her paper, or to offer an opinion about
the state of the world.So it is a great shock
to see a four-page spread about Rebekah in the current edition of Tatler
magazine. It is true that she herself remains grandly off-stage, as
media royalty must, and is not quoted directly. Nonetheless the life of
"the dazzling redhead editor" is illuminated by the man she is planning
to marry this month, a former jockey and trainer turned writer and
journalist called Charlie Brooks. Mr Brooks, who is an old Etonian, and
I would guess a bit of a rogue in the nicest possible sense, describes
his ideal Sunday. He and Rebekah rise early "at their two-bedroom
taupe-painted barn outside Chipping Norton". They then scoot off to
Oxford airport to board a (presumably private) aeroplane for Venice,
where they snatch lunch at Harry's Bar. By evening time they are back at
Wilton's restaurant in Jermyn Street, where Charlie likes to put away
nine native oysters, washed down by a glass of Meursault.
We are told by Vassi Chamberlain, the
author of the gushing piece, that when not in Venice Charlie and Rebekah
like to go on holiday with Elisabeth Murdoch and her husband Matthew
Freud on their yacht, or stay with "the Oppenheimer Turners at their
house in St Tropez (where they hang out at Club 55.)" They spend
weekdays at their flat in Chelsea harbour. Charlie is evidently
completely infatuated with his temptress. It sounds quite an agreeable
existence, if perhaps a little aimless, and certainly very far removed
from the lives of most Sun readers, let alone previous Sun editors.
Vassi Chamberlain breathlessly describes the golden couple as being at
the centre of the Chipping Norton set, which is not to be confused with
the Chipping Camden set, or indeed the one at Chipping Sodbury.
Apart from Charlie and Rebekah, it
comprises such glittering figures as Jeremy Clarkson and his wife; the
afore-mentioned Elisabeth Murdoch, daughter of Rupert, and her husband
Matthew, a PR man; Charles Dunstone, the co-founder of Carphone
Warehouse; and various county pals of Charlie's, some of whom sound even
dottier than you might imagine. One gets an impression of pretty
constant sluicing at a succession of lunches and parties.
........Perhaps
the biggest shock of all in an article of jaw-dropping revelations is
the manner in which the 78-year-old Rupert Murdoch, proprietor of The
Sun and the world's richest media mogul, is accorded a small walk-on
part by Vassi. He is a figure as it were on the edge of Rebekah's court,
playing cards on the Freud's yacht with Charlie, Bono (can you believe
it?) and Emily Oppenheimer Turner "who is very much part of the new
Oxfordshire set that has built up around Charlie and Rebekah"..........Given
her habitual antipathy towards publicity of any sort, one can only
assume that Charlie spilt the beans with her full approval. (If not, the
nuptials, due at St Bride's in Fleet Street in a week or two, may have
to be deferred a while.) My feeling is that she has outgrown the bonds
of The Sun, and may have set her sights on a grander editor's chair, or
perhaps a chief executive's office. But would even that suffice? One
suspects that all the glories of Chipping Norton may not be able to
contain her much longer. The world itself is hardly big enough for this
latter-day Cleopatra and her devoted Antony.
Sunday, 14 June 2009When Rebekah Wade, Sun
newspaper editor and one of Britain's most powerful women, married horse
trainer Charlie Brooks this weekend, she didn't so much invite a guest
list to the reception as a power list.Gordon
Brown, David Cameron, and Wade's boss Rupert Murdoch attended a Saturday
afternoon reception at Brooks' family estate near Chipping Norton.The pair repeated their vows in a lakeside ceremony in front of
240 guests, who included BBC presenter and Sun columnist Jeremy Clarkson
– at whose house the couple met – Will Lewis, editor of the Daily
Telegraph; Carphone Warehouse founder, Charles Dunstone; Dow Jones chief
executive, Les Hinton; and Rupert Murdoch's children James Murdoch,
Elisabeth Murdoch and her husband, PR executive Matthew Freud.
A
hoard of gold coins found by a builder in the cellar of a
Chpping Norton house has sold
at auction for £76,360. The 400-year-old coins, minted during
James I's reign, were valued by auctioneers at about £50,000 and
were found in Chipping Norton 30 years ago. They were bought by
private buyers and trade dealers in a specialist coin auction in
London. The two rarest coins were sold earlier to the British
Museum. There were 50 bidders for the remaining 57 coins. The coins
were known as Unites, signifying James I's intention to unify
England and Scotland, and were worth about £1 in England when they
were first produced. Auctioneer James Moreton said the builder had
given the coins to his grandson along with some other items in his
personal collection. He said: "The gentleman who found them
originally didn't even realise they were
gold. It was only much later, when his grandson showed them to me in
2005, that I was able to tell him what they really were."
One door opens another closes.
Four
branches of the Lloyds bank-owned subsidiary Cheltenham and Gloucester
in Oxfordshire are to close with the loss of dozens of jobs. The banking
giant is today expected to confirm branches across the UK will shut
down, with the loss of up to 1,400 jobs. County branches are in George
Street, Oxford, and Pound Way, Cowley, High Street, Witney and High
Street, Chipping Norton. A Lloyds spokesman declined to comment on the
“speculation” and said the number of people employed varied from branch
to branch, although 10 in each county branch “would be a high number.”
Lloyds has cut almost 3,000 jobs since mid-April after its merger
earlier this year with Halifax Bank of Scotland.
The webmaster writes: According to local reports C&G are telling their
customers that the premises will be closed for two weeks and re-branded
as Lloyds TSB after which all banking and mortgage services will be
provided to Lloyds and C&G customers. That sounds like good business!
Morrisphoto.co.uk of Worcester Road
Industrial Estate took part inthe 2009
Photoplod; a 40 mile walk along the South
Downs Way This year 24 teams started
from Steying at midnight on the 6th June to raisemoney for Action Medical Research.With
24 teamsentered we knew we had our work cut
out to mach last years 5thplace, but with a
lot of training wehad a great result with our
first 2walkers over the line in 12 hours 7
mins and the further 4 teammembers overthe line at in 13 hours 36 minutesWe
raised well over £1000.00 and finished 4th overall.
HILARY SWEEPS
IN!
Tory
share of vote up from 40% to 67% WOW!
Labour and LibDems collapse
COUNTY COUNCIL ELECTION Chipping Norton
ElectoralDivision
Results in 2005
Hilary Biles
Conservative
1666
Derek Brown
Liberal Democrat
643
RobEvans
Labour
1428
Brian Luney
Green
233
Results on 4TH
JUNE 2009
Hilary Biles
Conservative
1518
RobEvans
Labour
548
Brian Luney
Green
243
Chris Tatton
Liberal Democrat
235
Thats another vote for Hilary then......
Some very classy Tory
birds were gracing the Town Hall steps today - counting up the votes
cast so far for Hilary Biles. And guess what? On the right is Hilary's
very own daughter - the lovely Anna. Helping Anna with the arithmetic is
Natasha Alden (left) a worker from David C's constituency office who
normally spends three days a week in Witney and two in London. Chippy's
luck is in this week! They were both totally confident about the outcome
of the election but your reporter has to say that there were very few
voters around.
Four days and counting.......
Manager Gary Watkins (right above) invited me to have
a look at the new Sainsbury store. It will be opened next Tuesday at
9am when Janet Beddar (left above) will
cut the ribbon and officially open the store.
Janet lives in Chippy and has worked in different stores on the site for
longer than she cares to remember. "I’m really looking forward to
the opening day" she told me. "The only thing I'm
worried about is that every one seems to think Jamie Oliver is coming
and they may be a bit disappointed when they find out its only me" Not a
chance Janet. All your old friends will be there and will be pleased to
see another friendly face alongside all the other Somerfield staff who
have been kept on. There are an additional 28 new jobs compared with
previously - a new total of 78. Quite a few staff are transferring from
the Banbury store because Chippy is more convenient. Gary himself has
been working in Dunstable and this is his first managerial appointment.
Good luck to him!
The store does looks really good already -
even with mostly empty shelves. There's an updated Sainsbury colour
scheme - with a lot of very elegant dark blue. All the fittings are new
and all the chilled and frozen cabinets are in very trendy-looking
stainless steel. Everything is so clean and fresh and the lighting makes
it all feel spacious. Half a million pounds at the very least I would
guess - although nobody was saying. There is an in-store bakery- that
will be the only one in town won't it? The booze shelves are getting
slowly filled and I counted 19 different types of Cider. There will be
four self-scan checkouts. It all looks like a genuine makeover - not
just a paint job!
Best of all I was assured that the prices
in Chippy will be the exactly the same as prices in the Banbury and
Kidlington stores. No marking prices up for smaller rural outlets. A
couple of months ago the manager bought a specific list of items in the
old Chippy Somerfields store to compare with the Sainsbury store at
Banbury. The result - £57 in Chippy Somerfield - £49 in
Sainsbury. ....14% OFF! These are the prices we are now promised
in Chippy.
One of the first things the store will be
doing is nominating a local Charity of the Year. Suggestions are invited
from customers and the final choice will be made by the employees
representatives group (or "colleagues council" as they say in
Sainsbury's). This sounds like something really helpful. The chosen
charity will be allowed to move into the store and make collections
several days a year. The chosen charity will be helped with resources
and supplies for fetes and fund-raising events. Oh and there will be
some cash involved as well.
While I was visiting who should look in
but the chief marketing honcho for the east of England - 120 stores
under his wing. I persuaded him to try out a bit of sales promotion
using chippingnorton.net. He was very prepared to have a go so we
got creative on the spot. Here's the deal. Next Monday we will publish
three questions. You find out the answers by visiting the store (geddit?)
Entries to be submitted by e-mail to chippingnorton.net. Correct entries
are sent to the store and a draw is made by Gary. Each week for three
weeks there will be three winners who will each receive Sainsbury
shopping vouchers for £140. The questions will change each week. That
can't be bad can it? (Sainsbury employees and their families can't enter
but they will have their own separate competition! Sorry about that
Gill!) Why £140? Well haven't you seen the ads yet? This year is
the 140th birthday of Sainsburys - and I reckon it was pretty smart of
them to mark it by opening a store in Chippy.
Its fantastic to have a company like
Sainsbury move into the Market Square. I told Gary that I thought there
would be a really enthusiastic welcome for his new store. He hopes you
will all be there for the ribbon cutting by Janet on Tuesday at 9am.
After
that, the
first customer to cross the threshold of the new store will receive a
beautiful bouquet of flowers. I suggested that there
should be fresh-baked croissants from the bakery to try as well.
Heatwave!
They were already
queuing at the door 45 minutes before opening time … brilliant weather
saw the Dip ‘n Chill season at The Lido get off to a cracking start last
night with nearly 100 young people taking advantage of the free swim
session which is funded by Emma’s Trust and OCC’s Chill Out Fund.
Beware. Card cloners are back!
Blissfield Resident
writes in the Forum today (31st May) :I've just been called by my
bank who have let me know that someone in Tanzania
has been trying to use my card. They also let me know that they've seen
a lot of activity from Chipping Norton specifically in the last day so
it looks like someone has been cloning cards in Chippy and trying to
draw cash using them...quite a few of them from the sound of it. Mine
was declined because they didn't get my PIN correct. They said that the
common place that most people had used there cards was one of the Petrol
Stations in Chippy...i only use one of them so this casts suspicion on
one of them. I can't say 100% it was them so i won't name them, it could
easily have been done at one of the cash points also. I'm going to get
in touch with the Petrol stations corporate HQ and the banks with Cash
points to to let them know. Remember to cover your pin when you type it
in, it seems to have paid off for me in this case...
Andew responds:My wife and I have just had
the same phone call from each of our banks... Hers was for a payment in
Thailand (which she thinks is quite exotic??) and I didn't ask where
mine was done. Apparently there has been a lot of this happening
nationwide this weekend.
Katie writes:Mine apparently was used in Slough and
Westminster whilst it was locked up at home and I was on holiday in
Crete, I only found out about it when I arrived home at 1.30 in the
morning and opened a letter from the bank......... I must say the bank (NatWest)
were on the ball as the letter said they had recognised an unusual
activity on my card and stopped the card after a couple of days.........
a £1 POS payment to a charity called CARE was the first indication of
fraud.......apparently the cloners always try a small amount first to
see if the card works......I don't drive so have no reason to use a
garage and only use my card in the hole in the wall machines in Chippy!!!!!!
Red Lion wins
Fundraising Pub of
the Year Award
Hook Norton Brewery
has rewarded its most outstanding tenants with trophies and a
cheque for £200 for each pub. The Hooky Gold Awards, held at Heythrop
Park Hotel, in Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, saw seven of the company’s
47 pubs recognised for their achievements. Hook Norton managing director
James Clarke said: “As a family brewer, it is important we support the
47 independent businesses running our pubs, which between them generate
hundreds of jobs across the region.
The winner of the award
for Charity Fundraising Pub of the Year (sponsored
by Westons Cider) was Rebecca Ridgway
of he Red Lion, Albion Street, Chipping Norton
Rogue Trader convicted of fraud
A roofer who conned an Oxford man over
work to repair a leak has been fined £500 following a prosecution
brought by Oxfordshire County Council's Trading Standards.Jesse Shepherd,
42, of The Beeches, Chipping
Norton, admitted a charge of fraud by false representation relating to
work carried out at a Headington address in June 2008.
Trading as Right Choice Roofing and
General Building, Shepherd cold called at his victim's home claiming he
had spotted some loose tiles on the roof that needed fixing.After some discussion, the man agreed to some work to fix a leak
in the roof. But before the work was completed, Shepherd claimed to have
discovered a problem
with a layer of felt in the roof,
which he said needed replacing to prevent
further leaks.The man agreed to this being
done instead of some of the work agreed earlier, and at an additional
cost to him of £100.
After paying Shepherd £600, the resident became concerned that not all
the agreed work had been completed and tried to call Mr
Shepherd. When Shepherd ignored his
calls, the man contacted
Oxfordshire County Council's Trading Standards Service. Trading
Standards officers called in a surveyor to examine the work carried out.
The surveyor confirmed there was no felt in the roof of the victim's
home, which meant replacing or repairing it could never have been
necessary. In addition to the £500 fine, Shepherd was ordered to pay
£100 compensation and £400 in legal costs when he appeared at Oxford
Magistrates Court yesterday (Thursday, May 28).
Tackling
doorstep crime
Richard Webb, Oxfordshire County Council's Deputy Head of Trading
Standards, said: "We all place our trust in those who do work for us
around our homes. Almost daily we receive reports of incidents where
that trust is broken and rogue traders exploit their position in order
to gain financially. Tackling doorstep crime is a priority for this
service and the result today shows our determination to ensure this type
of crime doesn't pay."
SWIMMING LESSONS
with Jayne Barringer every Wednesday for 7 weeks
ADULTS Each
class lasts 45 minutes. Bring flippers if you have them.
Name of course
Criteria
Time
Price
SwimFit Award
Swim towards your
personal target and record your success. Style and speed not
required as help with stroke improvement will be given.
7.30pm
£52.50
Stroke improvement /
advanced training
Improve your swimming
skills, gain speed, increase distance
8:15pm
£52.50
JUNIORS
Name of course
Criteria
Time
Price
Ducklings / beginners
With parent/carer in
the water *
4:00pm
£35.00
Ducklings / beginners
With parent/carer in
the water *
4:30pm
£35.00
Improvers 1
Can already swim 5m,
aiming for 10m+
5:00pm
£35.00
Improvers 2
Can already swim 10m,
aiming for 25m+
5:30pm
£35.00
Rainbow Distance
Awards/stroke improvement
Can already swim 25m,
aiming for 100m with good technique
6:00pm
£35.00
* If you prefer not to work alongside your child in the
water, we can provide a Lido helper at an additional cost.
Collect an application form from The Lido or visit
www.chippylido.co.uk
Badges and certificates will incur a small additional charge.
For advice about which course to choose, call in or phone 01608 643188
and ask to speak with our Manager, Marie-Ann Roberts.
The
youngest member of Chippy Bowls
Club is Ryan Benfield aged just 13,
who is seen here during a
recent Westox bowls competition which Chippy narrowly
lost against a strong Woodstock side.Ryan has been playing for some 2 years or more
now and regularly plays in the Oxfordshire Men's
League.He attends Chipping
Norton Senior School and can often be seen practising
at the Bowls Club after school hours.Ryan has entered the Under 25's Oxfordshire
Singles, Pairs and Triples competitions and his
ambition is some day, to represent Oxfordshire in the
U.K. Under 25's. With his obvious determination that
day will not be long coming.
What next for this young man?
Tory
leader David Cameron renewed calls for a General
Election as he faced constituents in Witney
on Friday 22nd May over the
expenses scandal. The
Witney MP said going to the polls was the only way for
the public to be able to judge MPs who had exploited the
system. Mr Cameron also
said he had ordered all Tory MPs to publish future
claims on their second homes on the Internet.
More than 200 residents
and local councillors grilled Mr Cameron over the
scandal at the Corn Exchange yesterday, and the Tory
leader pledged to hold further meetings in the town if
constituents wished. He began by clarifying what he had
claimed for on his second home in Dean –– his main home
being in London –– since becoming an MP in 2001. He
said: “From 2001 to 2007 the only thing I really claimed
for was the interest on my mortgage –– £1,700 a month on
a £350,000 mortgage and quite close to the maximum
allowed. In 2007, I paid off some of the capital myself
and the interest payments dropped to £1,000 a month.
Between 2007 and 2009 I also claimed for straightforward
household bills, for council tax and utilities and
insurance. I only claimed for what I felt was reasonable
– not food, decorations or furniture. I am not whiter
than whiter or better than anyone else. It’s just the
judgement I took.”
As reported earlier in
the month, Mr Cameron said he had voluntarily paid back
£680 he claimed for fixing a leaky roof and removing
wisteria from his chimney. He said: “It was for
maintenance not decoration, but I felt I had to take a
lead and pay back anything questionable.” Answering more
than a dozen questions from the public and press, Mr
Cameron defended the need for MPs to have second homes,
but he said people had the right to feel outraged over
excessive and corrupt claims. He believed it was not
enough for MPs to simply apologise – they must be judged
at the ballot box. He said: “The system was open to
abuse – it was wrong and we have to sort it out. I have
instructed my MPs to only claim for mortgage interest
payments or hotel bills or rent and basic utilities, not
for food or furniture, and every bill they claim for has
got to go on the Internet. We must have total
transparency. If people had known what MPs were claiming
for we would never have got into this mess. The public
are very angry and have every right to be. People want
to be able to pass judgement on their MPs in a General
Election. The country needs it.”
Mr Cameron opposes
scrapping MPs expenses in favour of a pay rise or daily
attendance allowance. He believes “cleaning up” the
current system is the best way forward. However, he said
he would stand by the judgement of Sir Christopher
Kelly, the chairman of the committee on standards in
public life, with respect to how the system is
overhauled.
Dave faces the lynch mob in Witney
Your webmaster attended the Witney meeting but - as
usual -
got a different view of the event from the Oxford Mail.
Picture
from The Daily Telegraph
Lynch mob? Just kidding right? Dave needed to have
a meeting so he could say to the media "I have faced my
own constituents and explained my expenses claims. That
is now what every MP must do". Mind you it needed to be
a nice safe meeting - preferably with the party
faithful. Thats the sort of organisation which Barry
Norton - the local agent - is superb at. A three line
whip went out to the villages. Waitrose must have been
empty. Friday before Bank Holiday was the day Dave chose
to appear and explain his expenses, and tell his
constituents how he was going to save the country from
the appalling constitutional mess which his cheating
parliamentary colleagues have landed us all in. But it
was clear from the beginning that nobody was going to
spoil Dave's holiday weekend! For those of you who may
still not be clear about this, Dave is an out and out
charmer. Its what he does and there was no way that a
meeting with the West Oxfordshire blue-rinse brigade was
going to be anything but a love fest - even on this most
controversial of topics. At the slightest sign of
tension he deftly extracted the poison from any question
and ended up with the questioner eating out of his hand.
For example, one slightly pushy bloke who must have been
a gatecrasher shouted from the balcony "The papers said
yesterday that you and Samantha have got a personal
fortune of £30 million so why do you need a mortgage at
the taxpayers expense?" All around you could see the
grips on waling sticks and zimmer frames tightening.
"Well - laughed Dave - if that was true I only wish
Samantha would tell me what she's done with all the
loot." Hoots of appreciative laughter. Our very own
Hilary had a rant. She has been on doorsteps for the
last month canvassing and all she hears is complaints
about MPs expenses and local councillors like her are
getting tarred with the same brush. She is fed up that
MPs who are caught out can just say "Oh sorry I didn't
realise. It was all a mistake" .....and what is her
party leader going to do about it. "For a start Hilary I
am going to come to your stall in Chipping Norton
tomorrow morning and help with your campaign." Ripples
of delighted applause ran round the room. He made it
sound as if he had just thought of the idea. Lucky
Hilary. One very angry lady insisted that the Speaker
should NOT get a peerage when he left office. Dave told
us that was up to the Prime Minister but then went on
instead to tell us in detail and at length about the
three lovely and much more deserving people he had given
life peerages to. One trendy guy who worked in the music
business complained that he was finding it increasingly
difficult to justify his membership of the Conservative
Party to his workmates. What advice did David have? Dave
simply reminisced and said how well he remembered the
gentleman's visit to his surgery last year when he was
able to help him with some music business issue. And he
wasn't even a member of the party then....surely he
hadn't lost the faith already? And Dave easily got the
audience on his side when a persistent representative of
the National Press kept trying to ask a question and
Dave pointed out that this meeting was for his
constituents - not the Fleet Street pack. Hear hear - we
all thought...except the irrepressible Peter Hitchens
got his chance a short time later when Dave relented.
(And to be honest it wasn't much of a question anyway)
Traditional Tory prejudices were never far away. One
questioner thought that it was all down to bad
influences from Europe. He thought our own true Brit MPs
had been infected and corrupted by the MEPs. One
thought Parliament had lost any moral authority. How on
earth could it criticise the bankers now? This was all
going to let in the nutters like UKIP unless we were
careful. Another lady derided the suggestion that MPs
were feeling hounded and some might even commit suicide
"We would like to see them hanging from lamposts" she
said to deafening applause. The sound of tumbrils
could be heard drawing up outside the hall - parking
next to the satellite TV vans. Dave explained how his
claim for pruning the wisteria wasn't for pruning the
wisteria at all but was actually for fixing security
lights, mending a chimney extractor fan s and mending
some leaks in the roof. Oh well that's OK then. Very
reasonable too. Finstock LibDem councillor Mike Breakell
(a bit of a card as we all know) offered to come round
and prune Dave's wisteria for him next time it needed
attention. The final questioner - a plant if ever I've
seen one - just wanted to reassure Dave that everyone
had followed the discussion carefully and thought
that the fact he was paid back the interest on his
£350,000 mortgage (later £250,000 after Dave managed to
payoff "a little bit") was more than reasonable.
Dave had told us right at the
beginning of the meeting.....“From 2001 to 2007
the only thing I really claimed for was the interest on
my mortgage –– £1,700 a month on a £350,000 mortgage and
quite close to the maximum allowed".
But the thought had been
nagging at me all through the meeting that because he
was claiming for such a whopping mortgage which took him
up to the maximum allowance he couldn't claim for
anything else anyway. Would a younger MP who was only
renting a cheap room in a London flat as his second home
think it was fair that a rich man like Dave was in
effect having a house bought for him by the taxpayer on
which he would eventually make a whopping capital gain.
How is that fair? Isn't it easy to see why the other MP
might turn his mind to finding ways of getting some
extra benefit for himself. The simplest and smartest
move for all MPs of course would have been to simply
take out a £350,000 mortgage just like Dave. No problem.
Lovely Jubbly.
FORGET ABOUT THE
POLITICS-
HILARY HAS WORKED HER SOCKS OFF
FOR THE TOWN!!
Its no secret
that chippingnorton.net has always been a big fan of Hilary
Biles. (Give or take the odd spat when she been angry with us
about something or other) We dipped into our picture archive to
find just a sample of the things which Hilary has been up to as
our County Councillor in the last three or four years. Hilary is
a real mover - into everything. There must be very few people in
the town who have not come into contact with her one way or
another. She deserves to be re-elected. She has worked her socks
off on our behalf. Hilary is one of the very few people in these
parts who can actually get things done. We will certainly do
everything we can to help her back to County Hall.
Left:
Hilary has been very active and successful in sorting out the
Albion Street crossing problem. She will take advice from
anyone! Centre: Hilary persuaded the Chief
Constable to visit the town and took her around personally.
Right: When the climbing wall came to town first up it was
Hilary!
Left:
At the famous Hospital meeting in the Church attended by 1000
people, Hilary let the man from the PCT have it with all guns
blazing Right: Outside she lobbied her Shipton GP
and the Vicar
Hilary has
formed a great team with Chunky Townley - our District
Councillor and Chairman of the Hospital Action Group. Left:
She inspects the hospital plans at the public exhibition.
Right: Hilary and Chunky in Witney on their way to make a
presentation to the WODC Cabinet about the hospital
Left: In
the huge demonstration in the Market Square in 2006 Hilary
played the part of a hospital patient and was wheeled along
Topside in a bed. Right: Hilary visits the Police
Post which was tried out in the Lower Town Hall for three
months. She chats with Lucy - a local PCSO
Left:
Hilary always enjoys turning out on parade in Civic processions.
Here she is alongside John Hannis at the Charter celebrations..
Right: Even in the heat of County Council elections she
finds time for a joke with her labour opponent Rob Evans. A
personal contest revived again this year.
Left:
Hilary got so fed up with the weeds in the flower beds in the
Market Square that she persuaded the County Council to clear
them up and plant some shrubs. In that scorching summer the Town
Council failed to water the plants and they all died. Hilary was
incandescent! Right: Hilary chats with Maureen Shepherd
at a Town Hall Open Day
Left:
Hilary meeting constituents in the Market Square. Right:
Presenting the Sports Club of the Year award to the Chipping
Norton Rugby Club
Getting
alongside the movers and shakers has always been Hilary's style.
Left: Hilary explains to Oliver Herrin back in 2005 why
getting a pedestrian crossing on Albion Street was going to be a
long slog. They finally succeeded this year. Right:
Hilary with Clive Hill Secretary of the Hospital Action Group.
Together they kept up the pressure on the PCT, the OCC and the
Overview and Security Committee for four years. The JCBs finally
moved on to the new hospital site last month.
Left:
Hilary has got deeply involved in Youth and Sport issues in the
town. She has been pushing the need for a new Youth Centre
really hard with the County and has managed to help the Chippy
Swifts access funds to refurbish their changing room. Left:
Hilary is seen with members of the Youth centre trying to
establish just what facilities they are after. Right:
The Sportsman of the Year Award was awarded last year to Tony
Cripps of Chippy Rugby Club. Tony died tragically in an accident
and Hilary is presenting the award to his widow Kay
Left:
Hilary is hoisted up on a cherry picker to help put up the
Christmas trees Right: Having organised a first Freshers
Fair at the School Hilary took the opportunity to carry out some
first hand research among the many hundreds of kids who
attended.
Left:
Hilary shows off a new computer with Ian at the WODC one-stop
shop in the Guildhall. Right: Spending your life sorting
out all these useless men can be a tiring business. You need a
bit of light relief. Hilary likes nothing better than a good
laugh with the girlsl Up at the Youth Centre there were tears in
her eyes.
I didn't get a picture of the
times Hilary went out on call with an ambulance to check that
they could reach the villages within eight minutes. Nor the time
when her campaign to cut down on HGVs through the town involved
her manning a road block on the London Road. Nor her expeditions
to check on our new playground with her granddaughter. Some of
us old timers just can't keep up!
And lastly to
mention the elderly gentleman who lives in Shepherd Way and made
his feelings clear: "I'm voting for Hilary because she is the
only local politician who found a way to come and see us when we
were cut off in the snow earlier this year to make sure we were
all OK. You don't forget things like that!""
Mayor Dixon is installed
At
the inauguration of the new mayor last night (Monday
18th May), Cllr Martin Jarratt stepped down to make way
for Mike Dixon. Praising their
new mayor, Cllr Jo Graves said on behalf of the council: "Mike
is a local boy; Chippy born and bred and so he shows a real
heart for the town and what it stands for. He stands for the
town's traditions, feelings of community spirit and its
independence.Mike isn't a gentleman
to speak volumes but his ability to listen to all sides of an
argument an then form his own opinion has enabled him to bring
about a solution on more than one occasion."
Accepting his robes and mace, Mr Dixon named the Lawrence Home
Nursing Team as his charity of the year and added: "I would like
to thank my fellow councillors for the honour to represent our
town as mayor. I hope to encourage
unity on the council which in turn will benefit the town and we
can look forward to the future."
Cllr Sarah Wilkes was chosen as the mayoress.Mrs Wilkes said: "I would like to thank Mike for asking
me to be his mayoress. I will give him my full backing and I
hope I don't let him down. I intended to serve Chipping Norton
as well as anyone else has done and do all I can for the town."
Former town mayor and councillor John
Grantham, who resigned this year, was presented with a special
gift in appreciation of his long
service.The council also marked the
passing of Graham "Misker" Birks who died earlier this year
Keith Mitchell,
Tory leader of Oxfordshire County
Council, admitted on Monday that schools in
the county should be performing better at GCSEs.
Good to know that OCC are at last waking up
to their responsibilities. Its interesting that Town Councillor
Keith Greenwell recently made exactly the same point about GCSE
performance at Chippy School and was savaged for his
trouble at a Council meeting. Indeed school governor Councillor
Gina Burrows recently quoted Keith's comments as one of her
reasons for not voting for him as Mayor. Its about time the
governors of Chippy School woke up and smelt the coffee. More
than that, perhaps local Tory town councillors (like
newly-elected Deputy Mayor Butterworth) will now show as much
concern about GCSE results as their leader Keith Mitchell does.
Man jailed for
cousin's death
A
FATHER who was left a "broken man" after killing his cousin in
an horrific car accident has been sent to prison.At Oxford Crown Court on Monday, John Biddle, 24, was
sentenced to 15 months in jail for death by careless driving,
driving while disqualified and causing death by driving while
disqualified.The court heard Biddle
had been disqualified from driving just days before the
accident on November 29 last year, which killed his cousin
Leonard Parker of Chipping Norton.Sentencing Biddle, Recorder
John Bate-Williams said: "Driving while disqualified is a very
serious offence... and this time it had terrible, fatal
consequences for Leonard Parker.
"I have to bear in mind this is a case where you were not
driving fast or showing off. Your crime is one of a lack of
care over what must have been a short period of time with
terrible consequences.These consequences included the terrible
grief of a family which has lost a young son, grandson and
brother."Last month, Biddle was
found guilty of causing death by careless driving after losing
control of his Peugeot 306 as he negotiated a bend on the A44.The rear of the car - which did not have a valid MOT -
span outwards, placing the car side-on into the path of a
Vauxhall Astra travelling in the opposite direction.
Biddle and his front seat passenger Simon Parker both had seat
belts on and survived the collision. But 21-year-old Leonard -
known as Lenny - died at the scene. No evidence was found to
show he was wearing a seat belt.
James Reilly, defending, said Biddle had a "poor record of
driving" but had been hit very hard by the death of his
cousin, at one point being placed on suicide watch in prison.
The
Dave
Haigh
fund Celebrating Youth
The Sixth Annual
Award Presentation Evening
Friday 15th of May
1st Prize Joe "Mush" Shepherd
- CN Youth centre
2nd Prize Katie Hickman - CN
School
Other nominationsYasmin Simms CN Youth Centre
Jamie Biles CN SchoolAlistair
Falconer-Hall CN School
Jack Davison CN SchoolRosi Callery CN School
Ryan Souch CN Youth Musical Theatre
Performance by St Marys year 6 dance group
Thanks to
Glyn Watkins for the pictures
SOME WARTIME MEMORIES
For the last six years an article
by local resident and aviation expert David Nickson has been sitting in
our Features Archive. Its a fascinating article and has continued to
attract a lot of interest. Its well worth a look if you haven't read it.
www.chippingnorton.net/Features/chippyskies.htm.
Last week David received an e-mail from Derek Holloway who
lived in Chippy during WWII and now lives in
Toronto, Canada.The article posed the question,
“Does anyone remember the Harvards?” Here is Derek’s response, and some
closely related memories. Thanks
for this vivid firsthand account; the best kind
of history.
“I
certainly do remember Harvards, those "raucous" engines had a sound like
no other flying over the UK at the time. I guess the flying bombs were
the nearest sound in comparison. In the early 1940's, I lived at the
bottom of The Leys, and the Harvard pilots loved to buzz Bliss Mill in
simulated dive-bomber attacks. The night flying was the worst. The sound
was ear-splitting, but in those days there was no Forum to give vent to
your frustration with the noise. Not that it would have done any good
"there's a war on, you know."
Derek
went on to recall another Chippy air crash. “The plane was an
Air-Speed Oxford. It crashed and burned near a farm overlooking the
Common. I can recall clearly my friends and I racing to the crash site
guided by the plume of black smoke. As we ran over the little bridge that
crosses the stream, the firemen were just arriving on the roadway. I
guess we were at the site about ten minutes before they arrived. It
wasn't a pleasant sight, as the Oxford was totally engulfed in flames.
Sitting on the grass with his whining dog at his feet was a very
distressed farm labourer who was crying, ‘I tried to pull him out but his
arm came off.’ As a ten-year-old boy, It was my first experience of the
horrors of war. Others would follow later.”
Derek
also recalled Chipping Norton’s smaller, but still frightening version of
the Blitz. “When Chippy's aerodrome was bombed, I was up early the
following morning and hurried to the site. There was a line of craters in
the grazing field - three if I remember correctly - still smelling of the
explosives. My sister found the largest piece of bomb splinter. It was
nearly a foot long and was marked 1933, so you see Hitler was planning his
war as soon as he gained power. “
The Post Office
situation
is beginning to look worrying!
It seems that
Jenny's lease on the Post Office premises is up and she's
decided that she has had enough. Apparently the lease is
available for renewal but is restricted so you can't run any
other kind of business in there....which most people these days
reckon is necessary to make running a Post Office a viable
proposition (not as though there is much room in the present
shop for a grocery section!) So it looks as if anyone
wanting to bid for the Post Office franchise is going to have to
find some new bigger premises first. Presumably since the
owner of the old Rawlins shop next door is the same person who
owns the Post Office similar restrictions would apply to any
lease on that space as well.
Last week
the Post Office issued the following Press Release which sounds
just a bit desperate....
When the Subpostmistress
who runs Chipping Norton Post Office decided she
couldn’t carry on and tendered her resignation earlier this year
she didn’twant to let her customers
down. She agreed with Post Office Ltd to stay onuntil October in the hope that a replacement can be
found before she needsto close.Post Office Ltd immediately began the search for
a replacement butunfortunately, so
far, despite advertising for an agent and visitingpotential partners in the area no one has shown any
interest in applying toprovide Post
Office services.Post Office Ltd’s,
Dave Shotton who is leading the search for a new agent,said, “We’re keen to keep the Post Office service in
Chipping Norton andit’s very
disappointing that no one has shown any interest.I would be delighted to hear from anyone with
suitable premises who isinterested in
applying to provide the service.”
Jenny tells
us: "As yet noone has stepped
forward.A gentleman in the town did
apply,got to interview stage and then
withdrew. Post Office Ltd have
two subpostmasters looking at taking over the Post Office here
in Chipping Norton,But as yet neither
have been able to find suitable premises".
It is
inconceivable that we could manage without a Post Office so some
premises have to be found urgently. Here's my suggestion....what
about the Ground Floor of the Guildhall at present used by WODC
for their one-stop shop. That could all move upstairs! Other
ideas in the Forum please.
14th May
Hi Gerry, just to update on the post office situation.
We'd be quite happy to site the post office in our premises now
that we have a lot more space to play with and have been in
touch with the Post Office and hopefully they will look at the
feasability of it all but as yet have had nothing back from
them, hopefully that doesn't mean that they
are not actually keen on finding another site.
POLICE
in Chipping Norton will increase their patrols of Back Alley
and the Edward Stone Rise following an increase in complaints
from residents.
Officers have received
complaints of young people gathering in the area and drinking
alcohol. Police hope by increasing patrols it will deter any
antisocial behaviour.
A Visit to
Chipping Norton School Keith
Greenwell writes:
I recently led
a group of “Chippy First” Councillors to visit Chipping Norton
School The group consisted of myself with Gerry Alcock,
Sue Bartholomew and Kristel Withers. We had been invited by the
headmaster to see for ourselves how the school was performing
following comments I had made about the disappointing results
achieved in this years GCSE. The percentage of kids getting 5
GCSEs at level A* - C (including English and Maths) had suddenly
nosedived from 65% in 2007 to 54% in 2008 and nobody seemed to
know why.
We arrived at
the start of the school day. Several of us attended the
School Morning Assembly. We listened to the headmaster's address
and then watched the young entrepreneurs of Chippy School
- calling their company "The Polkadots and Bobs"
receive their award for making the
best presentation in a recent competition
among teams from North Oxfordshire Schools.
The Head Master
then formally welcomed us to the school and gave us some
background information before we left for a tour in individual
groups to see some classes in progress. Speaking for myself the
immediate thing that struck me was the sense of calm in the
school. Maybe in my day things were a little more boisterous. In
Chippy School pupils appeared well ordered and extremely well
behaved.
Sue and I
“dropped in” on a class for Geography who were doing an exercise
on crime, a Physics class, an English class that were working on
aspects of writing advertising copy, a maths class and then a
further science class. We saw a dance class rehearsing for a
performance, we saw examples of work done in textiles and
watched pupils designing and producing a Pasta meal. Gerry
thought the music teaching was inspirational. One group were
revising the "characteristics of house music" and another were
studying composition. The engineering design class had crafted
some quite amazing pieces of furniture. The graphic design class
were using Photoshop to produce professional-standard board
games, while in another IT class Powerpoint presentations were
being being prepared which were quite superb. Then there was a
drama workshop going on in one of the beautifully equipped
studio areas. All in all in just a couple of hours we saw
the most extraordinary range of activities and subjects - and
all of them were being taught with a freshness and enthusiasm
and were deeply involving the students.
The teaching
staff we met and watched were impressive. From my perspective
everyone appeared to be doing a good job, committed to getting
the best out of the kids they were teaching.
All
this is great but it merely added to the puzzle: Why have the
GCSE exam results as measured by 5 A* - C including English and
Maths declined so sharply. A question we pursued again over
coffee with the head and a group of teachers. So could the Head
Master provide some explanation? What we had seen impressed us,
so what was happening? Was there something structurally wrong
with secondary education across Oxfordshire? There were only two
schools in the county that achieved an “outstanding” rating from
Ofsted, Chipping Norton School rated “good” – a middle of the
road grading. Mr Duffy's explanation of the exam results was
that the school had suffered from some kind of marking
aberration - particularly in English where we were told the
school had tried to appeal a large number of the results -
unsuccessfully. Well if papers were incorrectly marked it is
last year’s Chipping Norton children that are the losers. Its
really surprising that the governors haven't been protesting
about this so loudly that everyone in the town and the county
has heard them!
However Mr
Duffy and the Deputy Heads are confident that this year the
results will be back to previous levels so by late Summer we
will know whether 2008 was just an aberration. Likewise there is
a confidence that at the next Ofsted inspection the school will
be assessed as “outstanding”. These two forecasts represent an
impressive confidence in the school's continuing performance and
we wish them success in meeting them.
One last point
about something which did surprise some of us. The school has
excellent grounds and facilities like the MUGA and almost total
use of the ‘Sports Centre’ - but the classroom blocks are
a different matter. There are some recent additions of a very
high standard but we were very unimpressed with the older parts.
They may be nicely painted and maintained but they are a hotch
potch collection that the school has tried to adapt as best it
can. Some years ago Gordon Brown committed this Government to
replacing and rebuilding every secondary school in the country.
It would be great to see that happen here in Chipping Norton. We
should be pressing for a modern integrated school in keeping
with the excellent teaching we saw. Buildings that everyone,
pupils, teachers, governors and the people of Chipping Norton
can be proud of. We were really impressed by the commitment of
all the teaching staff. It would be nice if they worked in
school buildings which were worthy of that commitment. But to be
fair the last word should be with Kristel Withers who went to
the school not so long ago and whose son attends now. "Its a lot
lot better than it was in my day. I was well impressed with
everything"
Many thanks to
the headmaster and his staff for organising such an eye-opening
morning for me and my colleagues.
Keith Greenwell
decides not to stand.
Deputy Mayor
Keith Greenwell (pictured right) had recently announced
his intention of standing as a candidate in the County Council
election. While acknowledging the sterling
efforts which Hilary has made over the last four years - Keith
felt that Chippy was
still not getting a fair deal from the County Council. The
County was making millions out of its land holdings in the town
yet Chippy was still lacking basic amenities like a Youth Centre
and a decent library. Keith found in some early canvassing that
there was a lot of support for his point of view and he felt
confident that he could attract a good level of support.
However, after a lot of soul-searching and advice from his
fellow Chippy First members, Keith decided that the more
successful his campaign was the bigger the danger that he might
end up splitting the Conservative vote and letting Labour in. In
the last analysis Keith couldn't face the prospect of being
responsible
for a such an outcome. So he has decided not to go ahead with
his nomination but to concentrate his energies on town matters
instead. Keith credits most influence on his decision to
Councillor Sue Bartholomew (pictured left) who apparently
sat him down earlier this week and said "Look Keith. I will
support you whatever decision you make, but being brutally
realistic, can you win?" to which Keith replied "Probably not"
"So" said Sue "cut your losses and concentrate on the Chippy
home front where you can really make some difference". Having
sorted Keith out Sue then told Councillor Watkins that he badly
needed a haircut - but then she would say that wouldn't she?
Mayor-elect Dixon confirmed today that he has
quickly made his choice for Mayoress. Cantering to Mike's side as his consort is
everyone's favourite councillor One of the world's natural
diplomats - the lady who told your webmaster he was
talking a load of hot air at a recent council meeting. The
prominent Conservative who dared to flaunt strict party rules by
nominating an Independent in the recent elections and lived to
tell the tale. Step forward Mayoress-elect Sarah Wilkes. At
least the Town Officials won't be boycotting the Boxing Day Meet
of the Heythrop Hunt this Christmas.
Charges at last in "Footsteps in the Snow"
case
Back in
February some break-ins occurred along Albion Street. At the
time the word was that a trail of footprints in the snow led
back from the vet's surgery to a house in Fox Close, which the
local sleuths duly followed. It seems as if this story was
true.....but why has it taken three months to bring charges?
THREE
men have been charged in connection with two burglaries in
Chipping Norton.In the early hours
of February 10 burglaries took place at the Co-op, in High
Street and The Chipping Norton Veterinary Hospital.Anthony Burns, 46, of Fox Close, Chipping Norton, has
been charged with burglary and handling stolen goods.Richard Weston, 23, of Cornish Road, Chipping Norton
has been charged with two counts of burglary.Paul Thomas, 18, of Robins Close, Great Rollright, has
been charged with burglary.The men
have been bailed to attend Banbury Magistrates' Court on May
19.
Chippy's very own dinosaur
FOSSILISED
dinosaur footprints dating back more than 160 million years are
to go on show at the Oxfordshire Museum. The giant footprints
which were uncovered in 1997 in Ardley,
near Bicester,are thought to be from
a Megalosaurus They will go on show in
a new Dinosaur Garden Garden which
will include a life-size replica of a
Megalosaurus — the meat-eating
dinosaur, that was first described scientifically after a
piece of bone was found in Chipping Norton in 1676.The
bone was sent to Robert Plot, who was a professor at Oxford
University, as well as the first curator of the Ashmolean
Museum, who published his
description in his 1677 book, Natural History of Oxfordshire.
Young
entrepreneurs compete
YOUNG
entrepreneurs from schools in the Banbury area gathered to
show off their business acumen.Pupils from schools including
Bloxham School, North Oxfordshire Academy, Chipping Norton
School and the Warriner School, were involved in the North
Oxfordshire Area finals of this year's Young Enterprise
Programme.After a year of running
their own businesses, they set up trade stands and made
presentations at St Mary's Church in Banbury last night.North Oxfordshire Academy's team Roxsolid was the
overall winner and will now go through to the Area Finals to
be judged on May 20.Bloxham
School's team Atom came runner up and also made it in to the
finals.The Polkadots and Bobs
team from Chipping Norton School was praised for making the
best presentation.
Town Council
choose Mike Dixon as the new Mayor and Chris Butterworth
as his Deputy (Chris who?)
Monday night
and another lively session at the Town Council. The Council
decided to ignore the tradition of the Deputy Mayor succeeding
to the Mayor's job and to nominate Mike Dixon as Mayor. During
the discussion there were a number of vicious personal tirades
against the present Deputy Keith Greenwell - particularly from
Eve Coles. Keith understandably decided in the face of all
this antagonism that he wasn't interested in carrying on as
Deputy Mayor so he withdrew. The only other person who had
expressed any interest in being Deputy Mayor was Mr Butterworth
so he was elected.
COAL HOLE UNEARTHED SLAP IN THE
MIDDLE OF THE TOWN HALL STEPS
The Town Hall
has been left to rot for years. Botched jobs have been done all
over the building. But the water leaks from the steps down into
the boiler room below have now become too much of a problem to
be ignored. You can see that the steps are splayed and sliding
apart. You can see that old metal ties between the steps have
actually snapped. You wonder exactly what is bearing the weight
of the columns above. You can see where cracks between steps
have just been filled with cement. Its obvious that something
serious needs doing. Applications for grants to help with
repairs have been successful but the grant bodies are
understandably wanting detailed structural justifications for
some of the cost estimates so a full survey has been
commissioned. The surveyor couldn't see what was holding the
steps up which is why he wanted some of them lifted to
understand just what the structure underneath is. This is how
Otto Hergt and Rick Warner (of PD Clarke Builders) working this
morning with Councillor Keith Greenwell (who has been managing
this project for the Council) discovered that there was a coal
hole dead centre in the steps which had simply been filled with
loose rubble. Its also clear from the presence of modern
brickwork and re-inforced cement ties that substantial repairs
have been carried out underneath these steps before. Now that
the surveyor can actually see what's happening it looks
inevitable that all the steps will have to be lifted and
re-built. Early indications are that the survey will also show
that the roof is in a state of serious disrepair involving
potentially megabucks of expenditure.
All of this
is going to require serious council attention - including
fund-raising. The tragedy is that when tiny Parish Councils were
left with huge listed buildings to maintain there was no revenue
stream or endowment to pay for them. The District and County
made off with the land and the loot and left us with the
liabilities. Faced with what is set to become a serious priority
its a pity that only last night a coalition of Labour supporting
the Conservatives ganged up to humiliate Councillor Greenwell
who has done such a superb job so far in pushing ahead with this
Town Hall re-furbishment project. I suspect this is now the last
we will see of Keith's very knowledgeable involvement. Lets just
hope that the new Deputy Mayor Chris Butterworh is an expert on
listed buildings.
Hilary Biles' working party
produces a really fantastic report on
ambulance response times in West Oxfordshire.
A report that will make a difference!
A series of
recommendations relating to ambulance service provision in West
Oxfordshire have been set out by a working party formed by
District Councillors to investigate “poor” response times in the
area.West Oxfordshire District
Council’s Cabinet has agreed to support the recommendations made
in a Report by the Ambulance Services Working Party.The Report will be given to South Central Ambulance
Service (SCAS), which provides accident and emergency services
across Oxfordshire, Buckinghamshire, Hampshire and Berkshire,
and the commissioning body, Oxfordshire Primary Care Trust
(PCT), as well as several other health-related parties . The
Council requests the Report’s findings and recommendations
should be taken into account in the
development plan currently being worked on by SCAS and the PCT,
and lead to improved response times.
Cllr
Hilary Biles (pictured left),
Chairman of the Ambulance Services Working Party and the
Council’s Cabinet Member for Health, said: “It is essential to
recognise the hard work and professionalism of Ambulance Service
staff, particularly the dedication of their paramedics and
volunteers, and I would like to thank the Service for its
openness in helping us to carry out this Review. The Council has
been concerned about this issue for several years, but our
efforts to get the Service to improve response times in West
Oxfordshire have not worked. I hope that this in-depth report,
which has not left any stone unturned, will mean that the
Service and the PCT take note of the Council’s grave concerns
and that of the public, and act upon them.”
The Working
Party, which consisted of seven District Councillors
(including Chunky Townley from Chipp), focused on
response times to 999 emergency calls in West Oxfordshire.
Response times in the District have traditionally been below
nationally set target times. In September 2008, only 54% of
Category A (life-threatening) call-outs in West Oxfordshire met
the 8-minute response time target - significantly below the 75%
target set by the Government. The Report looks into the reasons
for these poor response times in West Oxfordshire and explores
the clinical need for better response times by ambulances,
particularly in cases of cardiac arrest and stroke.
It
investigates the coverage provided by ambulances in the District
and the impact of SCAS’s use of Fire Service and volunteer
Community First responders.Ambulances
are rarely stationed in locations that can get to areas of the
District within the Category A 8-minute target time and
co-responders are therefore often dispatched. Their response
times are currently included in the overall response times
achieved by SCAS. The Review found that, without this support
service, response time performance in West Oxfordshire would be
even lower than at present. It was felt by the Working Party
that co-responders were not an acceptable alternative to an
ambulance and paramedic, and that SCAS should not include their
response times within their overall achievement figure.
The Report
sets out a range of other findings and makes the following
over-arching recommendations, along with additional specific
recommendations:
The commissioning Primary Care
Trusts (PCTs) should dedicate more regional funding to improve
ambulance services in rural areas of Oxfordshire. In West
Oxfordshire this would be £4.2 million.
The commissioning PCTs and South
Central Ambulance Service (SCAS) should agree minimum targets
of meeting 75% of Category A responses within 8 minutes and
95% of Category B responses within 19 minutes for ambulance
callouts across all of Oxfordshire.
SCAS should ensure that the
social standby points in West Oxfordshire have back up
ambulances in place on a regular basis in order for SCAS to
reach their West Oxfordshire destinations in the target times
set out in Recommendation 2.
SCAS should regularly staff
ambulance standby points at Witney, Chipping Norton and
Carterton to better serve West Oxfordshire.
Paramedics should be based at
Chipping Norton hospital to provide both an Out of Hours
service and a paramedic provision for the area and this will
reduce the demand on the Ambulance Service and acute
hospitals.
Although providing a valuable
service to the community in responding to cardiac arrest,
Community and Fire Responder call outs should not, and must
not be used to calculate and achieve ambulance call out target
times. It is imperative for heart attack and stroke patients
to reach the appropriate hospital within the necessary time
frames in order to be given the necessary interventions to
preserve life and have improved and shorter recovery success.
This is ultimately better for the patient and will in the long
term have beneficial savings for the NHS.
That SCAS be requested to
respond to the recommendations contained in the report within
8 weeks of its publication.
The Working Party found that, in
addition to other factors affecting ambulance service provision,
West Oxfordshire has one of the largest predicted increases of
older people in the population in Oxfordshire and is therefore
likely to have a greater need for ambulance services in the
future. It was also felt that the size of the SCAS area needed
to be reviewed to provide more localised services.Cllr Biles added: “West Oxfordshire is the second most
rural district in the South East. However, we are not isolated.
All residents deserve equity of access to our public services
and that of the Ambulance Service is paramount. In West
Oxfordshire co-responders, although a valuable resource in
certain circumstances, are used because Ambulances cannot
realise the target times. Ambulances are centralised in the
three largest Oxfordshire towns – Oxford (Kidlington and
Headington), Banbury (Adderbury) and Abingdon (Didcot).
Therefore it stands to reason that ambulances cannot meet the
required government call out times for West Oxfordshire. While
we understand funding and government targets are major factors,
it is not right that rural areas should suffer because targets
are able to be met in urban areas. Centralisation may help
budgets, but does not provide essential services.”
New Care Home and Hospital Gets
Underway
Work has begun on a new care
campus development in Chipping Norton. On
Friday 24th April
representatives
from The Orders of St John Care Trust (OSJCT), Oxfordshire
County Council (OCC), Oxfordshire Primary Care Trust (PCT), West
Oxfordshire District Council and the Hospital Users’ Group (HUG)
watched a mechanical digger breaking ground to symbolise the
beginning of the first phase of construction.
A 50 bed registered care home will be developed to replace the
existing Castle View residential home and an NHS Primary Care
Facility will replace the Memorial Hospital. The development is
due to be completed in the autumn of 2010. A formal Foundation
Stone laying ceremony is planned later this autumn.The care home will provide both high dependency nursing
and intermediate care services. The NHS Primary Care Facility
will provide consulting rooms, x-ray facilities and outreach
offices, as well as a state of the art Maternity Unit that will
be operated by the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust.
Nigel Reed,Chief Executive of OSJCT, said: “We
are delighted that we are now in a position to commence work on
this important new facility. This is the culmination of a great
deal of hard work undertaken by all involved parties, who are
committed to seeing a modern, fit for purpose care campus on
this site.”
Cllr Hilary Biles, County & West Oxfordshire District
Councillor for Chipping Norton, said: “This has been a long
drawn out process, however, I am delighted plans for the Care
Home and Hospital have at last come to fruition. This is
excellent news for the residents of Chipping Norton and the
surrounding villages who also use the services of the Hospital.
Rural areas need access to local services and these facilities
will serve residents well in the future.”
Andrea Young, Chief Executive of Oxfordshire PCT, said:
“Today’s ceremony is the result of a great deal of hard work
with partners and the community and we are delighted that work
on the reprovision of services at Chipping Norton has progressed
to this significant step. The new facilities will provide high
quality 21st century care for the people of Chipping Norton and
will enable them to receive many of the services they need
without having to travel further afield to see a specialist.
These facilities will be a tremendous asset to the local
community.”
Death of Chippy man caused by careless
driving
The
driver responsible for a
horrific car crash that claimed the life of his cousin has been
found guilty today (Wednesday) of causing death by careless
driving.Oxford Crown Court heard John
Biddle had lost control of his Peugeot 306 as he negotiated a
bend, placing his car side-on into the path of an oncoming
Vauxhall Astra.Biddle's cousin
Leonard Parker, 21, of Chipping Norton, one of his
passengers, died at the scene of the collision, which took place
on the A44 on November 29 last yearBiddle was taken to the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford,
where he was arrested days later.At
the time of the accident, Biddle of Havant in Hampshire was
disqualified from driving and the car did not have an MOT,
though mechancial defects were not blamed for causing him to
lose control of the car.Biddle
had admitted causing death by driving while disqualified but
denied the more serious charge of causing death by careless
driving, for which he was convicted by a jury at Oxford Crown
Court today.He will be sentenced on
May 18.
LIDO GEARS
UP FOR 2009 SEASON
Chipping Norton Lido is
getting ready to re-open for the 2009 season next week.Volunteers from the Chipping Norton and Stow-on-the-Wold
branches of Barclays Bank were joined at the weekend by young
people who participate in The Lido’s Dip ‘n Chill nights and
other local helpers in a major team effort to scrub out the pool
and clean the changing rooms.On Thursday 30 April the pool will
re-open to the public, having had a full behind-the-scenes refit
over recent weeks. A brand new, energy-efficient plant room has
been installed using skilled volunteer labour and includes new
ultra violet water treatment equipment which will dramatically
reduce the amount of chlorine used in the pool.The water treatment equipment was part-funded by a grant
from West Oxfordshire District Council while other costs were
met from The Lido’s capital fund which the charity has been
building over the past two years.In
addition, WODC supported the installation of a new domestic hot
water system, showers and central heating which will replace the
elderly, unreliable and outdated system previously in place.
These elements of the works programme also benefited from
funding from Oxfordshire County Council’s Chill Out Fund and the
Youth Opportunity Fund.
A full programme of public
swimming, lessons and special events is planned for 2009.
Successful initiatives such as Dip ‘n Chill nights for young
people and free sessions for the Over 60s are set to continue,
despite the loss of a major commercial sponsor. Local insurance
firm CETA and a private donor came to the rescue to ensure that
the very popular Over 60s swim could continue throughout the
summer.Claire Jarvis, trustee,
commented, “We’re delighted to welcome everyone back to The Lido
this year. The pool is looking better than ever this year and we
are all looking forward to a successful summer season.”This will be The Lido’s fifth year of independent
operation since West Oxfordshire District Council withdrew their
funding at the end of 2004. The Lido is now managed on behalf
of the local community by Chipping Norton Lido Ltd, a registered
charity.For more information about
Chipping Norton Lido, timetables and 2009 events, including the
annual Fun Run and Auction of Promises, visit
www.chippylido.co.uk
Left: Lia
Norman and Vicki Gibbons Right: Eve Norman
Left: Gary and Joe: Centre:
Lewis and friends: Right: Barclays staff
BREAKING GROUND ON THE HOSPITAL SITE
Its really
started. Really Really. We have the site manager's promise that
work now goes on until the place is finished! Dave Hawtin (above
right) of the Hospital Action Group was up at London Road
today watching the diggers get stuck into the stony soil. He
swapped stories with a team of guys from Steve Hill Construction
who are doing the groundworks. This phase goes on until June
when work on the building proper starts. Dave told them how this
field used to be the home of Chipping Norton Town Football Club
before they moved to Walterbushe Rd. And over there (said Dave
pointing into the far distance towards the Banbury Road) was the
town baseball ground. This really sparked the interest of one of
the builders who lives in Great Rollright. His dad apparently
played for the Chippy baseball team and he appears in a team
photo in the museum. As we were talking more equipment arrived -
including a huge dumper truck. The first job is to create a site
entrance which will be opposite Trinity Road and squeezed in
between two Horse Chestnut trees. But the next real excitement
is this Friday when there will be a "Breaking Ground" ceremony
performed by (you've guessed it) Dave Cameron. (Mind you this is
only what the builders think. Hilary Biles told us later at the
Town Council meeting that there is no truth in the story. On
Friday apparently there will just be a low-key occasion
involving the PCT, OSJ and the OCC in a marquee) Anyway just in
case Dave comes after all, we promised to
keep quiet about the fact that the ground was really broken on
Monday 20th April and only Dave Hawtin and I were there to quietly
witness it. We were both delighted that five years campaigning
seemed to have at last paid off.
So its goodnight
from him....
Mayor decides that a year is long enough after all.
Patience dear
reader. This latest instalment of our new soap "Life and Times
of His Worship the Mayor of Chippy" may just push you over the
edge.
The story so far: Remember last month that the
members of Chippy First attempted to get the election of a new
Mayor delayed until after the election - following a council
decision in 2007 to adopt this procedure in future - allowing
newly-elected councillors to participate in the election of
their Leader. The idea of postponement was loudly resisted
by all the usual suspects on the basis that any delay would not
allow time for invitations to be sent out for the Mayor Making
ceremony in mid-May. Two months necessary to sort out 150
invites!! Pull the other one. A blind man on a galloping horse
(as my old mum used to say) could see that the real reason for
objecting to a delay was that there was a possibility that
Chippy First might win more seats in the forthcoming election
and such a result would seriously change the arithmetic of
electing a Mayor. Best get the whole thing out of the way while
the going was good. An enormous row ensued because contrary to
allegations, Chippy First really do feel strongly about
encouraging new members to feel involved. One Tory lady went so
far as to say that new members wouldn't know enough to express a
view about who should be Mayor anyway (and by the way let them
eat cake). Unfortunately in all the confusion the question of
electing a Deputy Mayor was overlooked so the whole matter had
to come up again at this month's Town Council Meeting after all.
Last night
(20th April) : With sighs of relief we staggered last
night to the last item on the agenda. Election of
Deputy Mayor. This should be quick. The pub was beckoning.
But wait....shock horror. Before we could even say "I propose
Councillor Greenwell" the Mayor announced that despite all the
fuss and brouhaha and acrimony which had been provoked at the
last meeting he had decided after all that he didn't want to be
Mayor for a second term. People fell off their chairs
around the table. So a month later what had changed? The Mayor
didn't really explain. Perhaps he had been hoping that Chippy
First would be annihilated in the election so life would get a
bit easier. But in fact, Chippy First had won two more seats and
were now the largest group on the Council so things would
probably get more stressful. Perhaps he had just had enough.
Perhaps - like with all of us - he was feeling his advancing
years! Councillor Burrows made her usual speech about how
everyone should be ashamed for having kept the Mayor awake at
night worrying about his decision and Councillor Butterworth
confidently placed the responsibility for the Mayor's decision
where it belonged...which was in the same place as it
belonged when Councillor Grantham resigned. Where was that then?
Councillor Butterworth never elaborated. It has looked for
some time as if Councillor Butterworth is preparing his own bid
for power which is the only explanation why such a true blue
Tory is building such a cosy coalition by snuggling up so
closely across the party divide with influential ex-Mayors Rob
and Gina. The fact that Councillor Butterworth is
completely unknown in the town outside of High Tory committee
circles doesn't seem to worry him. Seems a bit of a blocker to
me. My advice is that he needs to get out a bit more to
check how his ex-Public School Housemaster style goes down with
a wider range of Chippy's social groups before biting off more
than he can chew. Councillor Coles said she was very sad because
the Mayor had never blown his own trumpet. In fact just about
everyone was very sad. However, some of us were left wondering
why on earth people volunteered for these jobs if they couldn't
take a bit of heat now and again. As our County Councillor
memorably commented to me the morning after..."For goodness
sake. We're talking about the Chipping Norton Town Council here
not the General Assembly of the European Union" And so its
back to finding a Mayor - with even less time now to make
the sausage rolls for the Mayor Making ceremony than we had in
2007. All hands to the rolling pins will be necessary. One of
the Hilarys will surely be able to organise things. An
Extraordinary Meeting of the Council has been scheduled for next
Monday 27th by which time the political cabals all round town
will have tried to come up with a Unity candidate. Somebody who
can bind together the wounds of the last six months, build
bridges across the political divide and take us back to the
harmony that existed before the Headmaster and the New Street
Gang circulated that defamatory letter about Chippy First
councillors to the local Press. Somebody who can lead the
Council forward into the sunlit uplands of a prosperous future
and not blow their own trumpet while doing it. Hmmm. Good luck
with all that. Me I reckon there's only one person for the job
and that's the one who wants it most.
Play Rangers are in town again this summer
On the left Play Ranger
Helen Morrison having fun with children in Chipping Norton.
on the right local
Chippy girl Courtney Carter playing at a Play
Rangers session at the Recreation Ground.
With
the lighter evenings and warmer weather on its way, children in
Chippy now have more opportunities to
meet the district’s ‘Play Rangers’ and get active outdoors.The project, which aims to encourage children and young
people to play outdoors and make the most of their local parks,
is celebrating its first anniversary this month (April)
Equipped with bucket loads of fun items, from face paints to
footballs, Play Rangers Helen Morrison and Mark Excell visit New
Street Recreation Ground every Thursday
between 3.30pm and 6pm to hold sessions for 5 to 16-year-olds:
Cllr Hilary Biles, West
Oxfordshire District Council’s Cabinet Member for Leisure,
Tourism and Health, said: “ The
project gives children a chance to explore new activities.
It is a great way of having fun and I would like to encourage
children and young people to go along and give it a try.”All sessions are free and children can come and go as
they please. Children under 5 must be accompanied by an adult.
Parents should be aware that the Play Rangers are not
responsible for children who attend, but are there to help them
use their own imagination and have fun creating activities.
Man
held over Churchill Road burglary
A
35-year-old man has been remanded in custody charged with
breaking into a house in Chipping Norton. Matthew
Pratley, 35 appeared at Bicester Magistrates’ Court today,
charged with a burglary at Churchill Road on Saturday. He was
remanded in custody to enter a plea at Bicester Magistrates’
Court on May 27.
HOARD OF CHIPPY GOLD COINS
UP FOR AUCTION
A
hoard
of historic gold coins found by a builder in the cellar of a
block of flats he was renovating in Chippy
has been valued at £50,000. The 400 year old gold
"unites" - minted after James VI of Scotland became the first
Stuart king of England in 1603 - were found while digging the
foundations for a block of flats in Chipping Norton,
Oxfordshire.He gave the 59 coins to
his ten year old grandson - and for many years they stayed in a
shoe box with his others treasures of seashells, marbles and
stamps.
Now aged 39 and married with two children - and following a
lengthy treasure trove case - he has been given permission to
sell 57 of the coins at auction. Two of the rarest have been
bought by the British Museum but the rest are expected to fetch
about £50, 000 at Morton and Eden in London on June 9.Auctioneer
James Morton said yesterday the coins - also known as "jacobuses"
- were all different and were minted in Scotland for circulation
there. "Whoever hid these coins for safekeeping deliberately
chose them as the most reliable store of wealth. Their first
owner would have been a substantial, well-moneyed person,
possibly a merchant or land owner."
The anonymous lucky owner said: "I was gobsmacked when I
learned they were gold and worth so much money."The treasure was
unearthed 30 years ago when the ground collapsed during digging
to reveal the hidden cellar. The coins were found in a space
behind a large stone in the wall of the cellar, which was later
demolished.
Does anyone know
which block of flats this was? ED
WODC invest in the property market.
Fresh from their financial
adventures in Iceland, the District Council have now found
another risky place to put our money. The Royal
Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) has predicted that
capital values in the commercial property market will fall by at
least 16% in 2009, and continue to fall in 2010 by up to 10%.
West
Oxfordshire District Council plans to take advantage of the
property market slump by investing a further £8m in commercial
premises. Councillors have backed plans to set aside the money as part
of the district’s capital programme.
Council leader Barry Norton said due to the current economic
climate, property now offered the best returns on investments. He said: “Now is a good time to buy if you have the money to
do so and by investing wisely at this time we hope to make some
good returns. By earmarking that £8m ahead of time, it means that we don’t
have to call a full cabinet meeting whenever we want to invest. We have lost out on one or two decent properties in the past
because it’s taken too long to call all 49 members of the
council together. Ideally the properties will be in Oxfordshire and West
Oxfordshire. But if it’s the right investment and it offers a good return
then we would look further afield.”
Chippy First
lead the way
3
April 2009 CHIPPY First has
become the largest party on Chipping Norton Town Council
following yesterday's (Thursday)elections.An election was held to fill three seats following the
resignations of Pat Lake and John Grantham and the death of
Graham "Misker" Birks.Ten
candidates put themselves forward to fill the vacancies and
Honor Stobart (Con), Sue Bartholomew (Chippy First) and
Floogie Smart (Chippy First) were elected.
It brings the number of Chippy First councillors on the
council to six of a possible 16 seats.
Chunky Townley (Conservative) says
good luck to Sue Bartholomew (Chippy First) on the Town Hall
steps
When he was asked by Tory party headquarters to explain this
cross-party indiscipline Chunky replied "But Sue is my favourite
hairdresser!" Anyway the best wishes paid off and Sue was
duly elected.
RESULTS
1404 turnout. 28.1%
HonorSTOBART
669
ELECTED
SueBARTHOLOMEW
516
ELECTED
FloogieSMART
503
ELECTED
Hasan
JUNED
494
AnnieROY-BARKER
483
AlexCORFIELD
394
CharlesWATSON
353
OliverHERRIN
298
The new face of Chippy Town
Councillors - young, attractive, feminine and cheerful. Move
over the old brigade!
Above: Councillors Kristel Withers
(left) and Sue Bartholomew enjoying the sunshine outside the
Town Hall today. Sue was elected to the council for Chippy First
at her first attempt - just like Kristel two years ago.
Below: Councillor Kristel
Withers (left) joins newly-elected Tory Councillor Honor
Stobart (centre) and Councillor Hilary Williams on the Town Hall
steps.
Rogue trader
sent to jail
A
rogue trader who conned an elderly pensioner out of £1,200 by
pretending to fix a leaking roof was last night behind bars.
Hughie Fury of Old London Road, Chipping Norton,did work “of no value whatsoever” to the roof of
86-year-old Olive Cutler’s bungalow in Wheatley — but charged
her £1,200. The 51-year-old was called to Mrs Cutler’s home in
July 2007 after she reported problems with her roof. Robert
Horner, prosecuting at Oxford Crown Court, said Mrs Cutler’s son
was concerned about the quality of the work and called trading
standards officials.
An expert examined the roof
and concluded Furyhad just repainted
it and thrown some gravel on the top. Mr Horner said: “He said
it was of no value whatsoever. If it had been done properly it
would have cost about £700.” Fury admitted one charge of fraud
on the day his trial was due to begin earlier this month.
The court heard he was
convicted of affray and jailed for three years in 2005 after an
incident at a wedding reception at the Holiday Inn at Pear Tree,
Oxford, in which a 28-year-old man died. Anthony Bell,
defending, said: “The amounts concerned are comparatively small
when one compares them to other offences of this kind.”
Jailing Fury for 40 weeks and
ordering him to pay £1,200 compensation and £2,000 costs, Mr
Recorder Malek said: “The whole thing was nothing but a scam on
an old and vulnerable person.” Speaking outside court, Graham
Hill, group manager of Oxfordshire County Council Trading
Standards, said: “We are satisfied with the result. He targeted
an elderly victim. The loss was considerable.”
Minister
visits The Phone Co-op
on digital fact-finding tour
Left
to right: Hilary Benn, Vivian Woodell and Dr Stuart
Burgess (Chairman of the CRC)
Hilary Benn, Secretary of
State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, met with telecoms
industry representatives and representatives of community-owned
high-speed broadband projects at The Phone Co-op in Chipping
Norton yesterday to discuss the role of digital technology in
transforming rural economies and lifestyles.The tour, arranged by the Commission for Rural
Communities (CRC), was the latest in a series of successful
Rural Experience visits designed to give ministers and other
senior players a unique insight into issues affecting rural
communities.The delegates heard the
hopes and concerns of rural businesses as the Government pursues
its commitment to provide universal access to broadband by 2012.
They first visited The Phone Co-op in Chipping Norton, the UK’s
only telecommunications co-operative, to discuss regulatory
issues. Vivian Woodell, chief executive of The Phone Co-op,
opened discussions by highlighting the problems faced by many
rural businesses and consumers in accessing fast, reliable
broadband and called for greater support for local,
community-led initiatives to encourage more investment in
infrastructure.Hilary Benn said:
“Technology has helped rural entrepreneurship to grow, and
broadband is transforming lives, communities and jobs. I know
that broadband is essential for rural communities and
businesses. I will make sure that access for rural areas is a
central part of government plans for the future of broadband.”Subsequently the tour moved on to Everyclick in Moreton-in-Marsh,
a search engine which enables online charitable giving.
Delegates also visited Oasis, a specialist tent hire company who
have relocated to take advantage of a faster, more reliable
internet connection.
Recent news items.....
SHE
may not have a driving licence, but 16-year-old Alice Powell is
getting ready to race into the record books. Alice, from
Chipping Norton, will become the youngest driver to compete in
the Michelin Formula Renault UK Championship next month. Racing
for the Manor Competition team — who helped launch the careers
of Formula 1 champions Lewis Hamilton and Kimi Raikkonen — her
first race will be at the famous Brands Hatch circuit in Kent on
Sunday, April 5. As she prepared to roar around the track at
speeds of up to 150mph, she admitted it was a big step up from
the karting and touring cars she was used to. She said: “This
first season is going to be a learning experience for me. I’m a
little nervous, but I’m confident that I can do well. “My main
aim is to be the top rookie of the season and at least finish in
the top 10 of the driver’s championship. I really want to get on
the podium and get some top three finishes.” But with 26 other
teams competing over the ten-race season, there will be plenty
of competition from the other drivers. However, Alice is no
newcomer to the world of motorsports — despite the fact she only
got her licence to race in this championship in January when she
turned 16. She said: “My granddad started taking me to Formula 1
races and then he took me to the karting track when I was eight.
From that I went on to race saloon cars and I got four podium
finishes last season, so I guess he’s the reason I am here now.
He told me that if I ever make lots of money racing in Formula
1, I have to buy him a Ferrari.” The Michelin Formula Renault UK
Championship is considered to be a stepping stone to Formula 1,
with the 2,000cc cars capable of going from 0 to 60 in a little
over three seconds. Alice said her dream is to one day drive in
Formula 1, following in the footsteps of her favourite driver
Lewis Hamilton and hopefully inspiring other girls to get
involved. She said: “Being on the same team that Lewis Hamilton
raced with is a massive inspiration and knowing that he won the
championship here really spurs me on. There are a few people out
there that think women cannot hack it in motorsport. A few women
have made it into Formula 1, but no one has made a real impact —
that’s my ambition. I think the time is right – if a girl is out
there doing well then more women would watch Formula 1 and it
would definitely make it more exciting.”
CHIPPING
Norton residents would be too scared to walk in the town if its
street lights were switched off at night to help save the
environment, a meeting heard. The Chipping Norton Town Council
meeting opposed Oxfordshire County Council’s proposal to switch
street lights off between 12.30am and 5am daily to save energy.
Coun Keith Greenwell said switching the lights off would
exacerbate the town’s hooliganism and vandalism problems. Coun
Gerry Alcock said people would feel insecure if the lights were
turned off because there was a lot of petty burglaries in the
town. He said: “Some people are frightened walking through the
town. The pubs stay open until 2am. If you talk about West
Street, when the lights go out, it’s very scary. I can
understand doing this in the rural areas but to do it in
residential streets is crazy. If you want to help the planet,
let’s ban traffic from the town altogether; that would be more
helpful than turning the lights off. Individuals will start
rigging up their own lights, which will more than compensate for
the loss of street lights.” Coun Rob Evans said the county
council must consult the public before switching the lights off.
He said: “There would be a tremendous public disquiet over
this.” Coun Krystal Withers said: “Places need extra street
lighting rather than less.” The town’s Mayor, Coun Martin
Jarratt, said: “We’re not in favour of turning the lights off.
It’s inappropriate for our urban area.”
TWO
men have appeared before a judge charged with a car blaze in
Evesham. Jack Pedel, aged 22, of Coronation Street, Evesham, and
24-year-old Nicholas Tuckey, of Cotswold Crescent, Chipping
Norton, are accused of arson of an £8,000 Renault Megane on
March 14 with intent to endanger life. The case was adjourned at
Worcester Crown Court until June 15 for pleas to be taken. Pedel
was remanded in custody by Judge John Cavell. He granted Tuckey
bail.
Chipping
Norton School in Burford Road has been putting the spark back
into science and has been awarded its
second specialist status. The news proved a hit with students
who enjoy the hands-on experiments laid on by their teachers so
much they have voted it their favourite subject in a recent
poll. Some of the exciting tasks students look forward to in
their lessons include fire juggling with methane gas, as
demonstrated by teacher Rebecca Sharrocks, and the chance to
dissect a real heart. Miss Sharrocks gives the hands-on lesson
to Year Eight students. Head of science Vanessa Wiltshire said
the lessons worked because teachers were passionate about what
they did. She said: “This enthusiasm clearly rubs off on the
students they teach.” The school is now planning to build a £4m
science block to house 10 laboratories, three preparation rooms
and storage and technical facilities. The school already has
specialist status — which affords schools extra Government
funding for their best subjects — for performing arts.
Three
men arrested on suspicion of burglary after police followed
footsteps left in the snow have been bailed pending further
inquiries. Burglars in Chipping Norton stole charity boxes and
alcohol from The Co-op store, and broke into florists Flowers
Etcetera and Chipping Norton Veterinary Hospital on February 10.
Police arrested three men aged 18, 19 and 23-years-old on
suspicion of burglary at a nearby house. They were all released
on bail again today until April 7.
Chippy
band Relayfirst on stage at the
Cornbury Festival
Chipping Norton rock/indie three-piece Relay
have won the right to be first on
stage at the Cornbury Festival near Charlbury in July.They fended off the competition in a battle of the bands
contest in January but the prize feels all the more real now
that the full line-up has been announced with their name in
lights alongside the likes of rock behemoths The Pretenders and
pop juggernauts Sugababes.
"We're particularly looking forward to
meeting Sugababes," said Relay's 17-year-old singer and lead
guitarist Jamie Biles."We've
obviously known since the competition that this was going to
happen but it really feels real now.
We've been nervous ever since it came about, but we'll just have
to channel it and hopefully give a good performance. We feel
unbelievably lucky."Drummer Andy
Thomas, 16, added: "I hope things get big for us after this and
hopefully a few people will get out there when we play and see
what we are like.We're just three
guys from a little town in Oxfordshire so it's weird to think
we'll be up there on stage with those kind of bands."
The trio, all Chipping Norton School pupils, have been working
on new material for the set and will be practising hard in the
run-up to the big day. Bassist Sam Griffiths hopes it will
kickstart a music career for him.
"Hopefully it will put us on the road to success," he said. "I'm
studying music at university when I finish sixth form so I hope
it goes far, it's definitely what I want to do."
Chipping
Norton Town Partnership could be scrapped
CHIPPING
Norton Town Partnership could be scrapped unless it succeeds in
its objective to create business and jobs, a meeting heard. The
Chipping Norton Town Council meeting was discussing a report
about the partnership. Funded by Chipping Norton town, West
Oxfordshire district and Oxfordshire County councils, the
partnership launched five years ago after the town’s biggest
employer, the Parker Knoll furniture company, closed with the
loss of more than 500 jobs. The partnership’s purpose is to
raise funds for the construction of an enterprise centre on
Parker Knoll’s former London Road site, to create new jobs. Coun
Jo Graves said the town council was to have dominated the
partnership but other local organisations were to be involved.
She said the town council was to have initiated projects that
the partnership would take forward.
“I feel it has almost run its course, which is
very sad,” said Councillor Graves,
town council representative on the partnership. “The town
council doesn’t seem to have supported it.” Councillor
Gina Burrows said one of the reasons the partnership was formed
was to get the town funding only available through such an
organisation.
Saying he opposed the partnership, Councillor
Keith Greenwell said: “Nowhere have I ever read anything saying
that this is about delivering jobs to Chipping Norton.” Councillor
Gerry Alcock said the partnership had failed to utilize the
£400,000 the county council allocated to Chipping Norton to
generate employment. He said: “If they haven’t got a purpose
then it would be simple to wind the partnership up.”
Planning blueprint
ignores
job creation in Chipping Norton
by Simon
Crump
THE
document that will dictate West Oxfordshire planning policy over
the next 25 years does not include proposals for creating jobs
in Chipping Norton, a meeting heard. The Chipping Norton Town
Council meeting was considering its response to the Local
Development Framework (LDF) Core Strategy, which will set out
spatial planning strategy, policies and proposals until 2026. It
must submit its response to West Oxfordshire District Council,
which is devising the LDF, by April 6.
The meeting agreed the 850 houses the LDF says
must be built in Chipping Norton, by 2026, was reasonable but
expressed concern about its failure to identify infrastructure
and employment land. Chipping Norton lost hundreds of jobs when
its largest employer, Parker Knoll, closed in 2004. Councillor
Gerry Alcock said creating employment was a key element of the
town council’s representation to the district council about the
LDF. Councillor Alcock said: “This is
an incredibly important document. “By far and away the most
important aspect of this is there’s not a single reference in
any of it to increase employment in the town. We’re just going
to be a commuter town.”
He said nearly every site identified for
residential use in the LDF was owned by Oxfordshire County
Council, which would earn “huge profit” by selling them for
housing development. “We don’t just want the land being sold off
by the county and developed by the district,” said Councillor
Alcock. “It’s all too cosy.”
Councillor Keith
Greenwell said residential development had been informally
identified for sites at Castle View and Chestnuts in Chipping
Norton, as well as for the town’s former ambulance station site.
Saying the town council could argue these sites were ideal for
industrial development, he added: “Some deal seems to have been
done, between West Oxfordshire District Council and Oxfordshire
County Council, to turn them into residential sites.”
Tensions boil over at the Town
Council
TENSIONS
boiled over at Chipping Norton Town Council as a furious row
broke out over the election of the new mayor.At Monday's meeting, a divide appeared to form between
the Chippy First party and other councillors as they argued
over suggestions for the new mayor.
Members of the Chippy First party, led by Cllr Gerry Alcock,
felt discussions should be put on hold until the April meeting
so the three newly elected councillors could have some input
However numerous councillors felt this would
be breaking routine.Referring to
current Mayor Martin Jarratt, who had been proposed as the mayor
elect, Cllr Alcock said: "I don't want to have a battle now
between Martin and someone else, I just want it to be postponed
to the next meeting. It is unfair for people to come onto this
council and find it has all been arranged."Cllr Alcock's suggestion to delay proposing the new mayor
was met with annoyance by other councillors, including Cllr
Sarah Wilkes who accused
Mr Alcock of "blowing a lot of hot air".
Cllr Hilary Williams said: "As a new councillor when you come
onto the town council and vote for a mayor for the first time it
is a very daunting thing.I can
see both sides of it in that we could wait for the councillors
who are coming on and will be a part of the council for the
coming year. But equally, we are the councillors who have seen
the work which has gone on during the past year and people's
strengths and weaknesses. So do
those people who are coming on have a better knowledge or
understanding about who we should carry forward?"
Members of the mayoral select committee had proposed Mr Jarratt
to return as mayor for a second term, being officially
inaugurated at the mayor making ceremony in May.However it emerged Cllr Glyn Watkins, a fellow Chippy
First councillor, had abstained from passing a vote of support,
and said he could not give Mr Jarratt his "full support".Mr Jarratt sharply replied: "Thank you very much. I now
know whose support I have got."It
leaves me cold the way this council has been brought into
disrepute."Trying to calm the
situation, Chippy First councillor Kristel Withers said to Mr
Jarratt: "We all have an opinion and I don't think you should
feel slighted. No-one meant to cause you any offence."
CHUNKY & HILARY FIGHT FOR A BETTER AMBULANCE SERVICE
John Nichols (Head of
the Oxfordshire Ambulance Service) has said..."We
acknowledge that our performance in rural Oxfordshire remains
below an acceptable level"
The Ambulance Service made a presentation to the
Joint Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee
last week in Witney. Chunky Townley
addressed the
committee at the beginning of their proceedings. Here is a
shortened version of what he told them.....
Since 2002 attempts have
been made to get the Ambulance Service to improve coverage in
West Oxfordshire especially in the rural areas in the North of
the District. You may be aware that a Working Party has been set
up by WODC to carry out a Review of the Ambulance Service -
which will report next month. The consultations taking place as
part of this Review have flagged up significant shortcomings in
the performance of the Ambulance Service in our area. The claimed
improvements have not been evident. Some of the response times
have worsened rather than improved in the more rural areas -
especially in and around Chipping Norton.
The national targets for
reaching Category A calls (life threatening) within 8 mins is
75%. In Chipping Norton the figures show an average of 50%. Last
December they actually dropped to 40%! The national target for
category B calls - reaching the scene within 19 mins is 95%. In
Chippy the performance is 60% These figures show the
response times for Chipping Norton are more than 33% BELOW
national targets.
These performance figures
cover co-responders (including the Fire Service). In many cases
it is they who arrive first at 999 calls. Without their
contribution it is difficult to imagine how bad the performance
tables would look. Often the fire engine with 4 or 5 firemen,
then a co-responder, then an ambulance arrive to answer the same
call. Surely the cost of all these resources would be better
spent on buying additional ambulances.
Until a few years ago when
it closed Chipping Norton had an Ambulance Station
equipped with two ambulances and paramedics. I find it difficult
to see how South Central Ambulance Service think they can
convince people living and around Chipping Norton that the
service is improving in their area. Surely the very least we
should expect is for an ambulance to be manned and on standby
24/7 at the new hospital when it is completed.
At the moment Chippy is served
mainly from Adderbury Resource Centre. It takes 15 mins to
travel from that station to Chippy by car - and a further 5-10
minutes for an Ambulance. Clearly it could never be done in 8
minutes - but it is also unlikely it could be done in 19 mins
even if the driving conditions were excellent.
The Ambulance Service say
there have been increases in ambulances and trained paramedics.
This may be true but we have seen no evidence of it in our area,
We all pay the same taxes so why shouldn't people in West
Oxfordshire expect the same level of service as other places in
the region?
The Ambulance Service say that
an ambulance stationed at Chipping Norton would not receive
enough calls to justify it. We don't agree. As I have already
said, we used to have our own station with two ambulances
full-time. Standy points for ambulances have been created around
the area -including one at Chippy Fire Station. It is
hardly ever used and performance figures haven't improved. It is
obvious there is a need for more ambulances - with additional
funding dedicated to Oxfordshire and specifically rural areas.
It is also obvious that the South Central Ambulance Service Area
is too big and covers too large an area. Big is not always
better.
Hilary
Biles (left) also spoke at the meeting and wrote to us
afterwards: "The Joint Health
Overview and ScrutinyCommittee strongly
came out in support of the representations
made by Chunky and I and have asked for the
Ambulance Trust to go back and get a
business plan together to bring back to the next meeting on 15
May. I am also taking one of their Directors on a tour of the
area so they know first hand what the area is like. An absolute
necessity as they are based in Winchester. It is so good after
all the battles to see a glimmer of hope.
They were told that should they not conform to what the
Committee asked they would be referred to the Secretary of
State.
Scrutiny committee
chairman Peter Skolar later met senior
trust representatives to demand improvements. He said: “We are
looking for extra ambulances, extra staff and more money. The
problem is that outside Oxford’s ring road the service is not
able to hit the eight-minute target as required. I cannot see
how things can get better without a great deal of extra
resources from the Oxfordshire Primary Care Trust, and
ultimately from the strategic health authority.”
Well done
to Chunky and Hilary. keep up the good work. We are depending on
you!
Mystery surrounds Partnership Resignation
As everybody knows
chippingnorton.net thinks the Town Partnership is a useless
body. It has wasted a lot of taxpayers money so far and has
achieved absolutely nothing. Its latest non-success is its total
failure to find any operator interested in accepting a handout
of a quarter of a million pounds to run an Enterprise Centre -
despite having told us only a couple of months ago that several
high-quality applications were anticipated. This would be all be
a joke if it weren't so serious. The Partnership was set up when
Parker Knoll was shut down with the specific and narrow remit of
trying to attract business and jobs to the town. It employed a
manager for two years at £20,000 pa for two days work a
week. Her job was to find funding sources. Nothing. The
Partnership has a website which hasn't been updated for months.
And for the last five years there has been £400,000
sitting in a bank account at the County Council just waiting for
some proposals from the Partnership as to how the money (which
has been pledged to the town) could be used for job creation.
Use it or we lose it. Five years and still no proposals from the
Partnership!
So I was not surprised when
I heard on my very authoritative grapevine that at last week's Partnership Meeting
the Chairman (Simon Duffy)
resigned. I decided to check the story out immediately with
Senior Partnership member Hilary Biles who gave me one of her
inimitable handbaggings. Don't be silly she said. Thats not
true. So picking myself up and thinking that perhaps
Hilary was teasing me I
sought out newly-elected Partnership member (and straight as a
die) Mike Dixon who I knew had been at the meeting. He would
tell me. Yes said Mike. He did resign. But Hilary said he
didn't. Hilary was late for the meeting and wasn't there when
the headmaster made his announcement said Mike. The Partnership
hasn't done anything useful like issue any minutes yet so who
knows what the situation is? But it looks like an election
for a new Chair may be imminent. The smart money is on Joe
Graves (even though she has only been a member of the
partnership for a few weeks) or Rob Evans who started the whole
thing off five years ago. But then maybe Hilary will have
other ideas. Watch for a compromise candidate. Step forward
Patrick MacHugh. Your moment may have arrived. Its an
appointment that somehow feels right!
Lido
wins yet another Award!
Chipping Norton Lido has
received West Oxfordshire District Council’s Chairman’s Award
for 2009 for Outstanding Achievement. Claire Jarvis and fellow
trustees received the Award from the Council’s Vice Chairman,
Cllr Derek Cotterill, at an Awards Evening on Friday (March 6th).
The Lido, which first opened in 1970 and has been run by
community-founded Chipping Norton Lido Limited since 2004, was
not only recognised for its Outstanding Achievement in providing
leisure opportunities to residents of Chipping Norton and
surrounding villages, but also for the innovation used in their
new water treatment plant, the use of a ground source heat pump
and boring their own water hole.
Presenting the Award, Cllr
Cotterill said he was proud to give the award to The Lido on
behalf of Council Chairman Cllr Roger Curry. He added: “The
winners of this award have shown real determination. They have
made an improvement to the community they live in and are
providing a facility that is enjoyed by many.”Mrs Jarvis said: “It’s been an exciting, eventful four to
five year for us now. We have had a huge amount of support, not
only from the community but on many other levels as well. First
and foremost, West Oxfordshire District Council has helped us
enormously; we have received a great deal of support from
members of staff, district and county councillors including Cllr
Hilary Biles, our Cabinet Member who is also our county
councillor. Our Town councillors in Chipping Norton have
supported us all the way. There’s been an enormous contribution
by our staff and the pool committee, and this award is
gratefully received on their behalf.”
A cosy place where
the food
is cooked to perfection says The Oxford
Mail
WILD THYME, NEW STREET,
CHIPPING NORTON 01608 645060 Angela Swann can’t wait to revisit a
cosy place where the food is cooked to perfection.
ATTENTION
all foodies! Hitch up your
wagons and head west – to West Oxfordshire that is, and the busy
market town of Chipping Norton. For there you’ll find, tucked in
between the antique shops and estate agents, a cosy little
eaterie offering top notch modern British food that’s beginning
to make a big name for itself since opening in December.
Cocking a snook at the credit crunch and
waving talk of recession away with a jus-soaked spatula, chef
Nick Pullen and partner Sally Daniel upped sticks from
Portsmouth and opened Wild Thyme, a ‘restaurant with rooms’,
cleverly spotting a gap in the market in Chippy for high-end
nosh. We arrived to check it out after a flurry of posts on the
chippingnorton.net forum and were immediately impressed by the
cosy, but stylish, interior.
Despite being a chilly Saturday evening, we
were shown to the last free table in the place. Or so we thought
... half an hour later we were amazed to see a party of 10
troop, in Tardis-like fashion, through to a second room in the
rear. Offering a select range of dishes with locally-sourced
ingredients – all homemade from the delicious sun-dried tomato
bread to the chocolate truffles handed out with the bill – Wild
Thyme’s seasonal menu is well thought out and makes
mouth-watering reading.
SO WHAT DID YOU HAVE?
For starters, I had the seared Cornish
scallops and parmesan with cauliflower puree and crispy
pancetta. The scallops were cooked to perfection, lightly golden
on the outside and juicy inside, while the cauliflower puree
tasted so good I had to stop myself licking the plate. My
vegetarian husband spent a few minutes torn between the wild
mushroom and sherry soup and the Rollright goat’s cheese tartlet
before plumping for the latter. He was more than happy with his
choice, particularly the tangy filling and the accompanying
caramelised beetroot, hazelnuts and lambs lettuce.
For mains, he enjoyed the multitude of
flavours in his butternut squash and Crudge’s cream cheese
ravioli with spinach, walnuts and parmesan, while I tucked into
whole roasted Ducklington partridge, braised red cabbage, roast
chestnuts and chipped Jerusalem artichokes – a beautifully
wintry dish with a rich depth, which I savoured like a fine
vintage wine.
With just the right amount of time to relax
between the courses, we contemplated the sweet menu, noting some
intriguing combinations such as beetroot and chocolate fudge
brownie. In the end, I had the chocolate and hazelnut creme
brulee, which consisted of whole soft hazelnuts in a light
creamy, chocolately crème under a crispy topping – it has to be
tasted to be believed. Obviously deciding he hadn't already had
enough cheese, he ordered the local cheeses, which included a
couple by local popstar-turned-farmer Alex James and Kingham
cheesemeister Roger Crudge, accompanied by quince chutney and
homemade biscuits.
WHAT ABOUT THE SERVICE?
Discreet and friendly, Sally is on hand with
knowledgeable advice about which wines to choose – she picked
Penny’s Hill McLaren Vale Vintage Fortified Chiraz from
Australia to accompany the cheese board, which sent Himself home
with a crimson-lipped grin of satisfaction spread across his
face.
AND THE PRICES?
Not particularly cheap; the mains are priced
around £10.50 to £18.50 with slightly less expensive items on
the lunch menu, but we both agreed you certainly get what you
pay for, if not more.
VERDICT: A
wonderful way to spend an evening – truly fine dining in the
intimate atmosphere of a lovely Grade II listed building, albeit
easy to miss,
occupying
a thin sliver of space in a terrace of shops and offices.
Perhaps we could persuade someone to rig up a giant red arrow in
the sky, because believe me, you really DON'T want to miss
it....
Local Solicitor legs it up
north!
Local
solicitor, Geoff Gafford, is facing the challenge of a lifetime
as he gears up to walk from Land’s End to John o’Groats. On 5th
April he will be heading down to Cornwall to start walking to
the far north-east corner of Scotland, some 1,075 miles, to
raise money for MS Research and Relief Fund, which aims to
provide good quality information and a range of services to help
people whose lives have been affected by multiple sclerosis to
understand and cope with the condition. “This walk has been
planned for the last eighteen months and now, suddenly, it’s
almost time to go,” says Geoff. “I shall be camping most nights.
My route is all planned and I’m really looking forward to it.
Hopefully, blisters won’t be too much of a problem and maybe it
won’t rain too much! I’m hoping that friends will join me for
the odd day or more. My closest point to home will be Chipping
Campden or thereabouts and Stratford-upon-Avon.”
The hard work will all be worthwhile for Geoff if he succeeds in
raising £2,000 for MS Research and Relief Fund. His brother’s
wife was diagnosed with MS some years ago. You can sponsor Geoff
by visiting his online fundraising page on
www.justgiving.com/geoffgafford.
You can pay by credit or debit card, and the money will go
directly to
MS Research and Relief Fund.
Where supporters are UK taxpayers, the charity will
automatically receive 28% extra in Gift Aid, which makes
Justgiving the most efficient way of sponsoring Geoff.
Alternatively, a sponsor form is available at Dyakowski Gafford,
Solicitors, 2 New Street, Chipping Norton. Geoff will be
posting daily updates of the walk to his blog at
http://litehikersblog.blogspot.com His route and schedule
can be found on the blog.
THE MUDLARKS
It will take more than a bit
of mud to keep the town's young people away from the new
Supernova - one of the attractions on the refurbished
playground. When's the official opening then? Meet
from the left ....merlin . max . kirsty . jade
and caleb
Martin gets very close!
On Saturday 14th. February one
of Chipping Norton Bowls Club's Indoor
Club members, Martin Shepherd, 36, reached the Area Final of
the National Singles Competition. This was a great
achievement by a Chippy local and had he won would have
entitled him to represent the County during the forthcoming
E.I.B.A. National Finals. This year, however, it was not to
be and although his opponent. Mark Sykes from Banbury
eventually won 21 - 13 it was a close game throughout.
Martin was introduced to bowls by his parents, Alex and
Brenda, when he was sixteen and he regularly represents the
Chipping Norton Bowls Club in the Wessex League which
stretches from Cornwall to the Midlands.Having won the
Club's Indoor Men's Singles for the last two years he is
going for his hat-trick and hopes to win the competition for
the third year in succession.His
other hobbies include cricket, outdoor bowls and in his
spare time, golf
Well done Martin.
Holly tells the Legion about Life in
Afghanistan
Holly
Drafahlwas brought up in
Chipping Norton and is a former
pupil of Chipping Norton.Last
year Holly joined the Army Air Corps and after completing
her initial training she was
assigned to Afghanistan. She has
just returned after her
initial assignment lasting 4 months. During
that time Holly and her colleagues (60
men!) were arming, refuelling and
loading communication systems to a range of helicopters, but
principally Chinooks, Apaches and Lynx helicopters.
(A Chinook is shown above)
Last Tuesday evening, despite
atrocious weather conditions approximately 27 members of the
Mens' and Ladies Sections of the British
Legion plus friends and family, slithered their
way to Highlands on Burford Road,to a social evening
during which Holly gave a fascinating
presentation. It was clear that hers isa very exacting job, made more
challenging with temperatures ranging from very hot in the day
to freezing cold at night. It was especially challenging when
they experienced the trauma of
seeing the return of casualties from "the Front".
Holly is now back in the UK with the 4th
Regiment Army Air Corps for more
studying to take on more responsibility. She is also looking
forward to attending a Sky Diving Course later in the year
as part of being a member of the Army Air Corps.
We all really appreciated Holly taking the time to come and
talk to us - she is a real credit to her Chipping
Norton family and Chipping Norton School.
Holly
is shown above standing between members of the Chipping
Norton Royal British Legion - l to r
Mike Howes, Neville Edwards Branch President and Alex Shepherd
Branch Chairman.
Anyone who would
like to consider joining the local branch of the Royal British
Legion and/or be advised of future local events, please contact
The Secretary, Mike Dixon on 01608 643755.
Delight at
grant for
Town Hall
A
GRANT of nearly £98,500 has been awarded to help fund Chipping
Norton Town Hall’s refurbishment. West Oxfordshire District
Council has awarded the funding, from its Village and Community
Halls Major Grant Scheme, to Chipping Norton Town Council. The
hall will be refurbished for a total cost of £172,798.
The town council has pledged
£33,843 and applied to the Trust for Oxfordshire’s Environment
for a £40,460 grant that will also go towards the refurbishment.
The district council’s grant will help fund the replacement of
the Upper Hall’s floor, which is used for dancing and exercising
but has become unsafe. Major work will be carried out to the
front entrance steps, which have deteriorated and are allowing
rain water into the building’s fabric. These leaks have affected
the boilers and mechanical plant.
A bar and kitchen will be
installed for the hall and enable caterers, who have previously
been unable to access the building, to provide services there.
It is hoped the kitchen and bar will make the venue more
attractive for conferences, exhibitions, ceremonies and social
functions. The layout of the hall’s disabled toilets will also
be improved.
Cllr
Hilary Biles, the district council’s leisure, tourism and health
cabinet member, (pictured right with
Deputy Mayor Keith Greenwell) said: “The Town Hall is
used by many community groups and is considered to be the hub of
Chipping Norton. This work will enable continued use by these
groups, as well as allowing for the building to be used as an
exhibition and conference venue, which will add to the vitality
of the town. I am delighted West Oxfordshire District Council
can support Chipping Norton Town Council and the people of
Chipping Norton in this way.”
Chipping Norton’s Deputy Mayor,
Cllr Keith Greenwell, said: “I would like to thank West
Oxfordshire District Council for its support of Chipping Norton.
We are extremely grateful.”
There was some good news, some bad news and
some promising news at the Town Council this week. Which do you
want to hear first?
Start with the bad news. The
start to building the new Care Home and Hospital has been put
back yet again. Originally promised for last September, then
November, then January - we were told on Monday that the latest
plan is for the diggers to move in during March. No convincing
reason has been given for the delay and you can't help thinking
back to meetings several years ago when we were told that
decisions had to be made immediately because the project was so
urgent and that Castleview had to be closed quickly because it
was no longer of an acceptable standard. I thought I had read
that public works projects were being brought forward to help
fight the recession. Not our hospital it seems. Just what is
happening? Can we believe anyone any more?
The good news is that after
some very crunchy accounting and cost saving the Finance
Committee has succeeded in keeping next year's budgeted
expenditure very close to this year's - while still maintaining
the plan for vital maintenance work on the Town Hall. The Town
Council decided to absorb any extra budget required from
reserves so that no increase in the precept would be requested.
This means that the share of Council Tax attributable to the
Town Council will NOT be increased next year - something which
local taxpayers will surely be grateful for. Lets hope the
District, the County and the Police are able to achieve a
similar outcome! The Town Council deserves some thanks for
trying to keep residents' costs down in these difficult times.
The promising news came in
a report back from a meeting last week (chaired by Hilary Biles)
with representatives of the Oxfordshire County Council to
discuss the provision of a new Youth Centre in Chippy. The
atmosphere was extremely positive and the town's representatives
came away convinced that things were now really moving forward.
Deputy Mayor Greenwell said that he felt things had progressed
at that meeting more than they had done in the previous ten
years. Problems had previously centered around finding a site
for a new Youth Centre. The Town Council had reviewed every
possible option in the Town. They spent ages exploring the
feasibility of the old Hospital site before agreeing that it
just wasn't practical. Then a possible site down on the Common
was rejected by the Field Reeves who thought such a development
would be inappropriate there. Eager to push things forward, the
Town then offered to contribute its own property at
Greystones House as the best available site. Although there
might be planning issues involved, the offer was welcomed by the
County who said that - in the event that the land and bulding
was contributed by the Town - the cost of refurbishment and
ongoing maintenance would be covered by them. They wanted to
keep an alternative under review so they would also pursue the
Old Tennis Courts next to the Leisure Centre (on County Council
land) as a possible location. There was confidence that funding
would be available - including money from a new government
funding stream. The next stage would be a feasibilty study of
both sites by County officers and the preparation of a draft
planning application. (The County also undertook to do a final
check on the plans for a number of other sites in its ownership
like Chestnuts, the Ambulance Station and the old Council Depot
to see if any of them had a role) There would be a follow-up
meeting in early February when further consultation could begin
on the basis of a better understanding of practicalities and
costs. Everyone was grateful to Hilary Biles for having arranged
the meeting, and to Louise Chapman (Cabinet Member for Young
People) and Melinda Tilley (Cabinet member for
Place) for their enthusiastic involvement and commitment
to progressing the project. It really does look as if things are
on the way now.
WOW - The District is going to give us
£100,000
to repair the Town Hall
Our sincere thanks to WODC and our
congratulations and thanks to Deputy Mayor Keith Greenwell and
the Town Clerk Vanessa who prepared our grant application and
to County & District Councillor Hilary Biles who fought it
through Witney. They all played a blinder.
Its pretty
obvious that our lovely town hall is in need of some serious
TLC. Keith Greenwell spent ages getting all the necessary
surveys, quotes and filling out the piles of forms. His proposal
covers the following main points:
The Upper Hall is the venue for
a number of dance and exercise activities. The currentfloor has reached the end of its serviceable life, and
will soon be condemned as unsafefor
dance and active use.
The front entrance steps have
deteriorated, and are allowing rain water into the fabricof the building. The water ingress has affected boilers
and mechanical plant. Attemptshave
been made to repair the leaks but expert advice is that to
prevent damage to thebuilding
fabric major work is required.
Catering and hospitality are
key requirements for daytime users. The location of thebuilding prevents external caterers from providing
‘mobile’ catering facilities. The
proposal includes the installation of bar and kitchen
facilities to service the hall. Thesefacilities will attract higher usage through
conference, exhibition, ceremonial and partyfunctions.
Improvements will be made to
the layout of the disabled toilet facilities, improvingaccessibility to disabled users
The total project cost is
£172,798.00; The Town Council
have already agreed to find £33,843.00
We have made an application to the Trust for
Oxfordshire’s Environment for
£40,460.00 And we asked WODC
at their Cabinet meeting today (Wednesday)
for £98,495.00 And the fantastic news
is that they said yes - allocating us the money from the
Village andCommunity Halls Major
Scheme Grant. This has
taken one helluva lobbying campaign in Witney which Hilary has
masterminded. We owe her and our District Councillors a huge
vote of thanks. What with £100,000 for the playground and a MUGA,
now this grant for the Town Hall and a few hundred thousand
coming our way soon for a Youth Centre (fingers crossed) - you
have the feeling that the town is at last getting some of the
attention and investment it has always deserved.
Keith has
written to Hilary this evening : "I
was absolutely delighted to see that your
tremendous efforts at WODC have borne fruit, and that our
application for a grant for the Town Hall has succeeded. Well
done! Chipping Norton owes you a very public "THANK YOU FOR YOUR
HARD WORK". On a personal level many, many thanks for your
effort and support. Will you also pass on my appreciation and
thanks to the other members of WODC Cabinet for their support of
Chipping Norton".
In a Press Release from WODC :
Cllr Hilary Biles, Cabinet Member
for Leisure, Tourism and Health at West Oxfordshire District
Council, said: “The Town Hall is used by many community groups
and is considered to be the hub of Chipping Norton. This work
will enable continued use by these groups, as well as allowing
for the building to be used as an exhibition and conference
venue, which will add to the vitality of the town. I am
delighted West Oxfordshire District Council can support Chipping
Norton Town Council and the people of Chipping Norton in this
way.”
Chipping Norton’s Deputy
Mayor, Cllr Keith Greenwell, said: “I would like to thank West
Oxfordshire District Council for its support of Chipping Norton.
We are extremely grateful.”
Chippy
Sports Award Winners.
Graham Beacham
writes:November saw the presentationby Mayor Martin Jarrett of the first
Town Sports Awards,organised by the
TownCouncil.It his hoped, these
will become an annual event.
The Under 11 Young Sportsperson of the Year
2008 was Harry Mincer (top).Harry is the Chippy Swifts Under 10 Football team
Captain.He leads by example and
always keeps a happy demeanour.He
attends Holy Trinity School. The judges
hope this award will encourage primary school children to get
involved in sport.
The 11-17 Young Sportsperson of the Year 2008 was Ben Chapman
(bottom left). Ben was on a PE trip
on presentation night.Ben swims for
the Four Shires Swimming Club and Oxford City ,He attends
Chipping Norton School.The judges
were impressed with all the hard work he has to put into
training.He was South East Regional
Champion at 800 and 1500m freestyle eventsand also took part in the National Championships for
the first time.
The Over 18 Sportsperson of the Year 2008 was Katie Wood (Bottom
right) Katiewas away at
university presentation night.She formerly attended
Chipping Norton Schooland Banbury
The judges were impressed with her voluntary work coaching
youngsters in kayakingand canoeing.
SUMMER BAY COMES TO THE KINGS
One young lady - who should
know better - was telling me last night that these days she
always goes drinking in the Kings Arms because of a
heart-fluttering addition to the bar staff there. Who could have
known four years ago when Max Sutherland walked out of Home and
Away in episode 3808 "to go to boarding school" that he would
eventually fetch up in The Kings Arms. According to my informant
that's where you will find 19
year old Aussie actor Sebastian
Elmaloglou who played
Max in the soap for several years. He seems to have arrived in
the UK via visits to South Africa and Vietnam (where he is
pictured above). Presumably he is just passing through in that
delightful way that our friends from OZ have. We hope he enjoys
his stay. Read more about him on his myspace page:
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=42326913
Sebastian has worked with the
Sydney Theatre company in 4 productions, as well as the
Australian Opera. His brothers, Peter & Dominic Elmaloglou, also
appeared on Home and Away as did his his sister, Rebekah
Elmaloglou - well-known for portraying the role of Sophie
Simpson from 1989-1993. Sebastian's father is of Greek
descent and his
mother (who is a cousin of Dame Judi Dench)
is English. "As a child I was
made to listen to music, and hated every bit.
My Dad was head cello in the
Sydney Symphony
Orchestra
for 44 years, so every wednesday of my life i was made to go to
a concert. Now I am listening to some
great stuff, music for the ears".
The British Legion Parade on its way to
the Remembrance Service at St Mary's
(Thanks to Patricia Sumners for the photograph)
CHARLBURY BEATS
CHIPPY
in the Loo of the Year awards
But
we get a Plaque as a Consolation Prize!
Five West Oxfordshire’s
toilets have received recognition for their high standards in
this year’s national Loo of the Year competition. The annual
awards, carried out by the British Toilet Association are to
find the best place ‘to go’ when away from home. Toilets visited
are rated on a ‘star’ basis – one star is poor and 5 stars are
excellent.The toilets at the Spendlove Centre car park in
Charlbury gained an impressive 5 star excellent rating. The
other four that were inspected received a four star rating and
they are based at: Chipping Norton Town Hall, Bampton Town Hall,
Carterton, and Woodstock.They
were judged using a checklist of over 100 different criteria for
assessing male, female, accessible and baby change facilities.
West Oxfordshire District Council will now receive award grading
certificates and a plaque for each site.
COUNTY PLANNING A YOUTH CENTRE?
Also tucked away in the
Station Mill Planning Report is an interesting item about a
Youth Centre. It's in an itemised list of requests from the
County Council asking for developer contributions towards
infrastructure costs which total a measly £20,855 for this whole
development which will sell for close to £3m.
"Existing Youth
Facilities need to be extended or relocated in Chipping Norton
to provide for anexpanding population
including that caused by new development. The cost of a new
youth centre isestimated to be
£550,000.This
would provide for 1108 11-17 year olds in Chipping Norton.This is the equivalent of £496.39 per youth.
On this basis and the dwelling mix proposed, a sum of £492 is
neededtowards Youth Centre
Infrastructure serving Chipping Norton".
It seems that there will be just one youth in these fourteen
flats.
The interesting new
information is that the County seem to have costed a Youth
Centre and are now collecting money towards it, Perhaps its time
for them to start talking to the town about their plans because
we are still in the dark about it!
DEPUTY MAYOR
DOWNS A PINT OF GINGER TOSSER !
Deputy Mayor Keith Greenwell
opens the Chippy Beer Festival and wishes the organiser Mike
Dixon every success for the day and drinks his health with a
pint of Ginger Tosser - He could have chosen Pot Wallop or
Old Moggy or Old Knobbly or Jail Ale or any other of the
12 West Country real ales on sale. There was a steady stream of
knowledgeable visitors throughout the day until late evening -
and a lot of compliments about the range of ales which Mike
Dixon had managed to arrange. With the help of a dozen sponsors
Mike is confident he will be turning in a small profit which
will go towards the refurbishment of town playgrounds.
Air Quality
action plan approved
West Oxfordshire District
Council’s Cabinet has endorsed a plan to improve air quality in
Chipping Norton. The plan will involve seeking approval to
de-trunk parts of the A44 so that heavy goods vehicles are
re-routed away from the town.The area
around Horsefair in Chipping Norton was declared an Air Quality
Management Area in 2005 because of the high levels of nitrogen
dioxide pollution caused largely by traffic and, in particular,
heavy goods vehicles. Further investigations followed and a
draft action plan was published outlining a number of options.
The Plan took into account any adverse impact each option might
have, such as transfer of pollution to other areas, increases in
noise or congestion or harm to the environment such as the
destruction of ecologically sensitive areas and habitats.
Earlier this year the public
gave their views on the options and a traffic management
proposal was produced by Oxfordshire County Council as the
Highways authority. The re-routing proposal includes changing
road signs and imposing vehicle weight limit restrictions on
traffic coming into Chipping Norton. Approval for this measure
is dependent on consultation with neighbouring authorities, as
the A44 signage crosses county boundaries and will impact on
several local authorities.Oxfordshire
County Council will also investigate whether introducing a low
emission zone in Chipping Norton will allow for better
enforcement of the restrictions.
Cllr David Harvey, Cabinet
Member for Environment said, “People living in Chipping Norton
have had to put up with the effects of heavy traffic for many
years and so we are pleased to be supporting this proposal.
We are concerned that in the long term it may not solve the air
quality problem. Because of this we are asking Oxfordshire
County Council to seek regional funding for a more significant
scheme. In the meantime we will continue to monitor air quality
levels.”
"Councils
should never
have put that money at risk"
West Oxfordshire District Council has £9m of
our money - probably lost - in Icelandic banks.
Barry Norton, the leader of West Oxfordshire District
Council, said yesterday : "As far as
the everyday running of the council is concerned, it's business
as usual. This is damned annoying — and if we have to take it on
the chin, we will." What!! Just lose 9m with
no more questions. He has to be kidding. We agree with this
article in Monday's Independent by James Daley:
If any proof were needed that incompetence and complacency are
endemic within Britain's local authorities, the potential loss
of almost £1bn of council tax payers' funds to the Icelandic
banking crisis must surely put it beyond doubt.
How can it possibly be that while private individuals were
questioning the stability of the likes of Icesave, Kaupthing and
Heritable, the professional finance directors of dozens of
councils around the country did absolutely nothing, leaving
their money in these precarious institutions with no protection?
While the authorities in question were quick
to get in their excuses – saying there was no reason to doubt
the strength of these banks when they made their savings
decisions several months ago – there can be no excuse for them
not taking steps to move their money over the past few weeks.
The writing has been on the wall for the
Icelandic banks ever since the nationalisation of Glitnir –
Iceland's third-largest bank – two weeks ago. The Icelandic
government then suspended the shares of all the banks on Monday
morning. Even then, at that late stage, local authorities could
have still withdrawn their money but instead decided to sit
tight.
By Tuesday morning, however, the banks were
put into receivership. And while Gordon Brown might claim he is
doing everything he can to recover these funds, don't be
surprised if none of the councils ever see them again.
What's most remarkable about this tale is that
thousands of private savers managed to get their money. And even
those who didn't knew that they'd be covered by the Financial
Services Compensation Scheme. Unfortunately, no such protection
is offered to our local authorities, who must now stand in the
queue behind all of the banks' other creditors to see whether
they will get a penny back.
It's understandable that councils wanted the
best return for their deposits. But the Icelandic banks were
offering just a little more than some of Britain's oldest banks,
which have implicitly had the full backing of the Government
since Northern Rock collapsed more than a year ago.
While the councils are pressurising the Government to dig them
out of their predicament, some of the local authority treasurers
surely need to be held account for their incompetence.
Ultimately, public services will be made to suffer if this money
is not returned. The councils should never have put that money
at risk.
TONY CRIPPS - INQUEST RETURNS VERDICT
Tony's widow Kaye has asked
me to reprint this account from today's
Gloucestershire Echo. She hopes that it will answer everyone's
questions. Kaye has found the inquest a very difficult experience
and she writes: "I know a lot of
people are interested in the outcome and instead of people keep
asking me I thought it better to ask you to put
something on the website as I don't really want to keep
going over it with people, it is too upsetting".
Our sympathy and best wishes go out to Kaye at this time. We all
share fondest memories of Tony. He is badly missed.
Thursday, October 09, 2008, 14:06
A MARKET gardener who plummeted to his death as
he rode in a digger with an unqualified driver at an upmarket
organic farm died accidentally, an inquest jury ruled today.Anthony Cripps, 57, was perched in the JCB bucket at the
Gloucestershire farm owned by JCB chairman Sir Anthony Bamford's
wife when he tumbled beneath the wheels.
The former pub landlord, from Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, was
pronounced dead at the scene on June 5 last year.An inquest jury returned a verdict of
accidental death with a brief narrative*
at Gloucester's Shire Hall today.
Driver Gareth Trueman, 22, told the inquest
yesterday he had not received any training to operate the
seven-ton machine.Mr Cripps was on his
way to pick elderflower at Daylesford Farm, in Daylesford, owned
by Lady Carole Bamford, the jury heard.
The vehicle, inscribed with the initials of the company's founder
Joseph Cyril Bamford, Sir Anthony's father, bore a sign which
forbade people riding in the bucket.But
Mr Cripps, from Chipping Norton, Oxfordshire, and colleague
Michael Turner, 50, were perched up to 10ft above the ground when
the vehicle hit a bump.
A post-mortem examination revealed that Mr
Cripps died as a result of head and chest injuries.Returning an accidental death with a narrative verdict, the
jury foreman told Gloucestershire coroner Alan Crickmore: "The
time of death was at approximately 1pm on June 5 at Daylesford
Farm, Daylesford, Gloucestershire.The death was caused by the
deceased being transported as a passenger in the grain bucket
attached to a JCB and falling backwards, after the JCB went over
uneven ground and falling under the offside front wheel and
sustained the injuries as outlined, which resulted in his death."
Yesterday, the jury heard Mr Cripps was employed
at the Daylesford Organic Farm for less than four months before
his death.He and Mr Turner were in the bucket of the JCB Loadall
being driven by Mr Trueman, when Mr Cripps fell into its path.Mr Trueman admitted to the jury he needed special training
to drive the JCB, adding that three of his seniors, including farm
manager Richard Smith, allowed him to operate it anyway.The coroner asked: "What made you think it was a sensible
idea to transport people in a bucket over a 50-yard distance?Mr Trueman replied: "That's how it happened."He confirmed Mr Cripps fell from the bucket as he drove
over the undulating land at an estimated speed of five miles per
hour.He said: "I knew there was a bump
there somewhere. I didn't quite know where it was. I slowed up
quite a bit."Yesterday, Detective
Inspector Jan Blomfield, of Gloucestershire Police, told the jury
he arrived at Daylesford Estate in the mid-afternoon and found
dairy buildings and polytunnels in operation.
The JCB was near to a chicken house, with Mr
Cripps sprawled in front of it. A lens in Mr Cripps's glasses was
covered in dried blood.Mr Trueman was
arrested but it was decided that there was insufficient evidence
to charge him with negligent manslaughter.
Mr Cripps is survived by his wife, a housewife,
and three adult children – son Thomas, and stepdaughters Tasha and
Saffryn.Farm manager Mr Smith said at
the time of his death that Mr Cripps was a "popular member of the
team".He worked at a nearby furniture
factory for 33 years before taking over The Plough, in Kingham,
Oxfordshire, which he ran for three years.After retiring from the licensing trade in January last
year, Mr Cripps joined the market garden staff at Daylesford.
*A coroner may
instruct a jury to return a narrative verdict, particularly in
complicated cases where there are conflicts of fact, instead of
recording a "short form" verdict, such as accidental death or
natural causes. A narrative verdict, introduced in 2004, is a
factual record of how, and in what circumstances,somebody
died.
TOWN COUNCIL
0 WODC PLANNERS 4
Every month
members of the Town Council conscientiously discuss planning
applications and make their considered comments. Every month
these are routinely ignored by the Planners who simply overrule
us locals. This month is a bit unusual - even by WODC standards.
There are four applications going to the full committee. The
planning officer's recommendation on every single one of them is
opposed to what the Town Council wanted.
The amazing
precedent of 1, Churchill Road rumbles on and on. Originally
permission was granted in 2005 for four houses. This has been
progressively increased as new owners have tried to
extract more profit from the site. Work has already started on
the basis of the last approval in August 2008 which was for
eleven flats. Now just a couple of months later there is a new
application for 14 flats. The Town Council thought "enough is
enough" - restated their concerns about overdevelopment, parking
and congestion - and said they didn't like being asked to
comment on plans which had already been started on. The Planners
don't think the new application changes much about the way the
new building looks. The Town Council argued for rejection of
the application. The Planning Officer recommends approval
anyway.
The Co-Op
want to put up some signs in their Car park showing people where
to go. No problem says the Town Council. The planning officer
says "The proposed
signage will change from a blue to a lime green colour. The
colour is not onecommonly found
within the Conservation Area and makes the signage more
prominent from thestreet scene. In
your officers opinion the green signage is not in keeping with
the character andappearance of the
Conservation Area" This from the same
council who allow an illuminated kebab van to park every evening
slap in the middle of our beautiful market square - a sight not
commonly found within a Conservation Area!. The Town Council
thought the application was OK. The Planning
Officer recommends refusal.
Now down to
the Station Mill Antiques Centre. There is a local policy
which opposes the switch of industrial sites to housing (don't
ask about Parker Knoll - that's another story!) But that policy
does not apply to a switch from retail use. So here's a tip - if
you've got an old industrial building that's still in use and
you want to turn it into flats - make it a shop first. Easy!
Back in 1998, permission was granted for the conversion of this
industrial building into an antiques retail centre. On to Stage
2. In 2005 there was an application to demolish the Mill
altogether and turn it into flats. According to the law this is
not covered by "loss of employment " provisions. Crazy! So an
"outline" application was approved - despite loud protests from
the Town. This permission lapsed after three years. Now there's
a new application for fourteen flats. (although there seems to
be some confusion about the exact number since neighbours say
they have received notices talking about nine flats. And the
Planning Officers report for next week's meeting says they won
an appeal for 24 flats earlier this year) The Town Council took
its chance to say that the loss of a business/employment site is
even more undesirable now than it was in 2005, there are enough
flats being built in the town and by the way the Station Mill
Antiques Centre is always busy at the weekends and is one of the
very few attractions for visitors. There would be a
significant loss of jobs. The Town Council argued for
rejection of the application. The Planning Officer recommends
approval anyway.
But hey this
is unfair. The fourth application which the Town Council thought
was OK is rejected by the Planners because of "loss of
employment". Miss Buckingham of Witney wants to open a Ladies
Gym in one of the units on the Elmsfield Industrial Estate. No
problems about the amount of parking. No impact on the
surroundings. But say the Planners - "The
use of the building as a gym would not involve theemployment of the numbers of people that the current
B1/B8 use class would and therefore
officers consider that the proposals would be considered as a
loss of an employment site".
No numbers are quoted but we do wonder whether Dawn Brodie - the
Planning Officer has actually visited a Ladies Gym - we are
reliably informed that there are usually swarms of attendants in
them - not to mention the manicurists and beauticians. Beats
another storage warehouse any day and could bring in a few
visitors. The Town Council thought the application was OK.
The Planning Officer recommends
refusal.
EMMAS DAY IN FULL SWING
The
centre of Chipping Norton was ablaze with colour, music,
noise, dancing, games and laughter as the town celebrated the
life of teenager Emma Curtis-Smith on Sunday. Emma's
stepfather Gary Creese, who chairs the trust, said: "It has
been good to see lots of people we have helped come here today
to help boost the funds so we can help other young people.
This Emma's Day has had two prongs — to raise money and to
showcase what we have done with the money given to us."
On Sunday, events were
held across Chipping Norton. In the theatre, Emily Archer from
Chipping Norton School of Dance, put on a show to say thank
you for the way the fund had helped with buying costumes.
During the day, which was attended by hundreds of people
moving between the different venues, there was a five-a-side
football tournament, children's workshops in craft and dance
and the Women's Institute laid on teas and refreshments.
Everything, except for a £30-a-head evening concert in the
theatre, was free. The concert was hosted by I'm A Celebrity
Get Me Out of Here star and comedian Rhona Cameron.
Amy Southeard, who
organised this year's festival, said: "The atmosphere is great
— it’s a real community and family event run by people who
were friends of Emma."
IT DEFIES BELIEF! BOOKSHOP LEAD
IS STRIPPED AGAIN
Last week Patrick Neale
finally finished the job of repairing and replacing the lead
which was stolen from his roof and shop fascia a couple of
months ago. The church was vandalised around the same time and a
teenager from Stonesfield was arrested and jailed. But last
Sunday thieves came back to the Bookshop and helped themselves
again. Somebody saw the lead being unloaded from a wheelie bin
into a car in the New Street Car Park and rang the Police. The
Police badly want to talk to that person again to get any
details which could help with identification. Would they please
get in touch by ringing
0845 8 505 505 If anyone else saw anything their help
would be invaluable. We have to show these yobs that Chipping
Norton is not simply defenceless at night so that anyone can
come into town and just take what they feel like. This concerns
us all. We need to press again for police patrols at night and
the sooner we sign up for CCTV the better!
Matt
Wilkinson tells the story in the Oxford Mail: Thieves
stripped lead from the roof of a listed building — just days
after the owner had repaired the holes left behind from a
previous theft. Patrick Neale, of Jaffe & Neale Bookshop and
Cafe, in Chipping Norton, fears thieves are watching buildings
in the town on the lookout for easy pickings.
The
43-year-old paid £3,000 for new lead flashing earlier this month
after his was stolen in May. But just five days later thieves
returned and stripped the roof of the replacement lead. Mr Neale
said: "I am not going to put up any more lead any more. I'm not
prepared to be laughed at a third time. The cost is irritating,
but so is the time it takes to replace the lead because it
distracts me from running the business. I should be selling
books, not having to repair a perfectly good roof. We are
talking to the listed building people, who are very
understanding, because one of the conditions on the building is
to have lead on the roof. But we can't keep putting lead up
again and again for the thieves to steal."
His roof theft was one of
three in Chipping Norton over one weekend. Thieves also
attempted to steal lead from the roof of the adjacent Bitter &
Twisted public house. Two men were spotted unloading lead from a
wheelie bin into a car at the New Street car park the next
morning. Pc Steve Thompson, of Chipping Norton police, said: "It
would be really helpful if anyone with information came forward
and got in touch." Lead and metal thefts have soared in the past
year as the price of scrap has more than doubled in the past 18
months.
On
Monday 15th September the Town Council in their wisdom rejected
the offer from WODC to have closed circuit cameras installed in
Chippy Town Centre and linked to a monitoring centre in Witney.
They were not going to cost anything. But then the Town Council
have never cared much about shopkeepers in the Town Centre!
FIVE YEARS ON AND NOTHING TO SHOW
ON AIR QUALITY. NOT A DICKY BIRD!
A report on Air Quality in Chipping Norton
was presented on 4th September 2008 to the Oxfordshire County
Council Cabinet Member for Transport.
The
traffic in our town is horrendous and getting worse. The Air
Quality in the Town Centre is way below government standards. Five
years ago the Town Council proposed in a submission to the
Oxfordshire Transport Review that a weight limit should be
introduced through the town - to drastically reduce the number of
HGVs. (I know all about this because I wrote the submission). It
included the following statement:
"Chipping Norton Council are convinced that a
weight restriction plus an alternative lorry route around the town
remains the only viable answer".
Our proposal was not accepted because it was
claimed there was too much "local" traffic (exempt from a weight
limit) which would make policing impossible. The County's
consultants Halcrow (paid millions to carry out the review)
decided that we should rely instead on a signposting scheme
directing heavy goods traffic from Evesham to Oxford along an
alternative route via Northleach. The problem of the increasing
traffic on the A361 (Swindon to Banbury) was never addressed.
Gloucestershire County Council to their credit introduced this
signposting scheme. Oxfordshire said they hadn't got the money and
to this day have done nothing. In 2005 the area of Horsefair, High
Street and West Street was declared an AQMA (Air Quality
Management Area). Among other things this means that the County
and the District together have to come up with an Action Plan
telling the government how pollution levels are to be reduced to
meet the required limits. After three years of measurements,
surveys, another consultant brought in to advise, studies,
reports, consultations (remember the list of 50 ideas which the
District published earlier this year - including one-way systems
and gated flows?) a report was presented last week (4th September
2008) to the Oxfordshire County Council Cabinet Member for
Transport. Read the quite surprisingly short report here.
http://www.oxfordshire.gov.uk/content/public/Resources/hlpdownloads/XT/XT040908-06.htm
As you read it consider that the cost in fees, time
and resources to get this point must be at least hundreds of
thousands of taxpayers pounds. All the different ideas which had
been put forward and discussed during the consultation - including
by-passes of all shapes and sizes - were thrown out . All
the ideas that is except just one. A weight limit!
The key finding in this report
is:
"...the
option which appears to be the most suitable for inclusion in the
Action Plan are measures to control lorry passage through the
town. It should be stressed in the Action Plan that all of
these measures will require the consent of neighbouring
authorities, which cannot be guaranteed, and that the
effectiveness of such measures in reducing lorry numbers is
variable. The measures will require additional investigation
before specific proposals can be submitted for approval.
This investigation will includeimposing
an environmental weight limit, including the scope and extent of
any limit, costs, timescales and consultation with neighbouring
and other affected councils."
The only substantial
recommendation is:
The Cabinet Member for Transport is
RECOMMENDED tosupport preparation of an
Air Quality Action Plan for Chipping Norton on the basis of
measures to reduce lorry movements through the town as the
principal action.
So there you have it folks.
We have gone full circle. Five years of bureaucratic delay and
muddle and not a single step further forward. After rejecting the
town's own proposal for a weight limit five years ago, the County
have now agreed that a weight limit is the only serious option. I
suppose we should be grateful for that but they still don't seem
really convinced that its practical. The report sounds less than
positive about it all. This is the ONLY recommendation and after
five years they still haven't got it sorted properly. Amazing...
The most straightforward
method of controlling heavy goods vehicles would be through the
imposition of an environmental weight limit through the town.
To be effective this would require advance warning and signing of
alternative routes. For A44 traffic this could use the
existing advisory route via Northleach, for traffic travelling to
Banbury via A361 there are no obvious alternatives and this would
need to be negotiated with the relevant neighbouring authorities.
A weight restriction is already in place on the parallel A3400
through Compton so this route would not be suitable. A
complicating factor to this is that the A44 is designated as the
national Primary Route between Oxford and Evesham. While
this does not preclude the imposition of a weight limit there
would be a contradiction if a restriction was placed, given that
Primary Routes are a major component of the National Lorry Route
Network. This would be likely to place a limit on the level
of compliance with any local restriction. Removal of Primary
Route status from the A44 would require the designation of an
alternative Oxford-Evesham Primary Route with the agreement of the
relevant highway authorities and government offices. There
would also be considerable cost given that this would require the
replacement of green backed signs with white ones – without which
the change in status would not be evident to drivers.
Enforcement is a considerable issue with any environmental weight
limit given that the general exception for access makes
identification of offending vehicles very difficult. This
would be particularly the case for a limit in Chipping Norton
where the alternative routes would represent a considerable
increase in both distance travelled and time taken.
And so they are recommending
yet more investigation and consultation before actually proposing
it to government. This makes any action years away! For goodness
sake Heathrow Terminal 5 was agreed faster than this. For myself I
think they are just having a laugh - at our expense. Nobody has
the slightest intention of doing anything about air quality in
Chippy! I think both councils (County and District) believe
that if the talking can be strung out long enough low emission or
even electric lorries and buses will have arrived and the problem
will disappear. So meantime carry on wheezing Chippy. Just don't
hold your breath.
STOMPIN'
IN THE MARKET SQUARE Jazz Day got off to a cracking start
with the CN Allstars
attracting a big midday crowd outside the bookshop.
It was great having music belting out across the square.
Reminded me of France!
Why don't we have a bandstand??
Making youth
a priority
The
issue of young people hanging around on street corners has been listed as
a priority concern by community groups in North Oxfordshire.
All 13 Neighbourhood Action Groups (NAGs) raised the subject as a
worry. District councillors have now taken up
the mantle and plan to investigate whether young people are being
antisocial - or whether it is simply people's perception that they are up
to no good.
The task
group chairmanhopes the cross-party group will
be able to restore confidence in young people across the district.
She said: "Every Nag believes young people hanging round on street corners
leads to antisocial behaviour.What the task
group wants to know is if this perception is justified. Are the groups
causing trouble or are they simply minding their own business in a public
place?We also hope to find out what motivates
young people to hang around on street corners.
If it is because there's nowhere else for them to go, then the council
must look at what kind of facilities could be provided.
This is a very safe place to live, but people don't always believe
this.If we do find out there is an antisocial
behaviour problem then we can look at ways to address it."
OOPS The
only problem is that this news item refers to CHERWELL DISTRICT
COUNCIL. Our own district council have no plans for a
fact-finding task force!! ED
CCTV is
coming to Chippy
Witney
is to get more anti-crime spy cameras, and Carterton and Chipping Norton
are both in line to have their own CCTV systems.
Nine fixed cameras are to be installed in
Witney's £50m Marriotts Close redevelopment, due to open in
autumn next year.They will monitor
public areas of the shopping and entertainment complex as well
as the multi-storey car park.The
addition will bring the total of CCTV cameras in Witney to 33,
joining up with the 24 which have already been put round the
town centre over the last decade.They
are linked to the 24-hour monitoring centre at the town's police
station in Welch Way.
And a deal is close to being struck to include
the district's two other main towns, Carterton and Chipping
Norton.Both towns have been keen to
have CCTV for some years, but the issue has always been over who
pays for it.Bill Oddy, the district
council's head of community services, said he expected that the
extension of the Witney scheme to include Marriotts Close would
be largely financed through businesses moving in there.Private sponsorship is also expected to make up part of
the schemes in the other two towns.
The capital costs are in the region of
£130,000 which will have to come mainly out of West Oxfordshire
District Council funds because Home Office grants have dried up.
Thames Valley Police is keen on the scheme and has set aside
£20,000. The running costs are about £15,000 a year each for
Carterton and Chipping Norton, mainly to pay for the rental of
fibre optic cables linked to the control system at Witney police
station.
Apart from town council contributions, the net
has been spread to include local businesses. Carterton and
Chipping Norton will at first only have four fixed cameras each.Mr Oddy said: "We are very close to securing the
finances."Negotiations were coming to
a close and he expected a deal to be signed in the next month.
NEWCOMER TO MIDDLE ROW
I'd like to introduce myself, my name is Melissa
Blundell and I am the owner of the new children's clothes shop "
Bubble & Squeak " situated in Middle Row
(No 6, which used to be Totally Tiles).I opened Bubble & Squeak on the 2nd of August and so have
been trading just over 3 weeks now.I have had some really good feed back from the residents
and passers by who have popped in to my shop, the comment I hear
again and again is that "this is just what Chippy needs" and "
it's so reasonably priced!". I myself live in Chipping
Norton and have a little girl who's just turned two and a half
(Isabella who you can see in the photograph)
and so I know how inconvenient it can be not to mention
stressful to make a special journey to the nearest children's
clothes shop which would have been Banbury I guess or maybe
Witney, just to buy some socks or a few tops for example.
This is how my new venture started out.Last year I needed some
socks for my little girl and searched the shops in Chippy but,
without any success so had to make that trip to Banbury. I kept
thinking how Chipping Norton needed this gap filled and that it
would provide such a service to the town and all those parents
and grandparents who live here and in surrounding villages, so I
did some homework and 12 months later here I am.
Being in Middle Row is just a little bit tucked away from
the main streets and alot of people
probably don't even know I'm there.
I look forward to welcoming you to the shop at 6 Middle Row
Tel: 01608 646468
Kindest Regards
Melissa Blundell
Deputy Mayor Keith Greenwell was interviewed
at length on Radio Oxford about politics in Chippy. CLICK TO HEAR THE INTERVIEW
HASSLING HGVs - WILL IT WORK? Its certainly worth a try!
Oxfordshire County
Council's Trading Standards carried out a four-hour vehicle
check on Thursday August 14th in Chipping Norton in response to
concerns over the number of HGVs driving through the town. The
team was joined by Thames Valley Police and the Vehicle Operator
and Services Agency (VOSA) as they stopped 34 vehicles along the
town's main road to check for weight and mechanical defects on
Thursday (August 14). Of
the 25 vehicles which were weighed, four were found to be
over-laden, resulting in two vehicles being prohibited from
continuing their journey and two drivers being warned. Route
maps and advice were also given to 14 HGV drivers in a bid to
persuade them to consider using alternative routes avoiding
Chipping Norton centre.
Just over a quarter of the
vehicles stopped (26 per cent) were found by VOSA to have some
form of mechanical defect. Faults included faulty brake
lights or no brake lights, loose front bumper, a defective
trailer and a tachograph operation offence.
Oxfordshire
County Council's Cabinet Member for Community Safety Judith
Heathcoat said: "We are very pleased with the results of
yesterday's operation. It is vital that drivers and hauliers get
the message that they are responsible for ensuring their vehicle
is roadworthy and not overloaded. We hope the operation has also
persuaded HGV drivers to consider the possibility of using
alternative routes which avoid the centre of Chipping Norton."
This new
initiative will hopefully be repeated. It has come about after
consistent pressure from the County Councillor Hilary Biles to
get some action to try and cut down on the weight of HGV traffic
through the town. The next major development will be the
publication of agreed recommendations on improving Air Quality -
due in early September.
EDITOR writes> It
is good to see that a report on this road check is featured
prominently on the industry website ROADTRANSPORT.com so perhaps
other drivers will notice!!
WHERE SHOULD WE PUT THE MUGA?
(Multi-use games area)
Join in this week's big
debate. Is the Recreation Ground the right place for a MUGA? And
if so where exactly should it be built? Everybody is suddenly
realising just what a MUGA is. Great as they may be and much as
they are a great asset, they don't exactly win any beauty
contests. Some people think they look dreadful eyesores. Try and
put one down next to a major trunk road, overlooking a
conservation area, next to a kid's playground and next to a
special needs school and you have all the ingredients for a
major argument. A number of councillors went over to Steeple
Aston this week to have a look at the MUGA there which is
exactly the same design as ours will be. Councillor
Watkins is seen in the picture below alongside the Steeple Aston
MUGA. However our "standard size" MUGA is twice the size of
this one at Steeple Aston. Apparently there is no standard
size MUGA anywhere else in West Oxfordshire to look at. We will
be the first.
(with thanks to Deputy Mayor
Keith Greenwell for the picture)
Should we put this structure
next to the road alongside the existing playground or build it
further back on the recreation ground away from the road? Some
people think the sense of security the road provides is
important (passers by can keep an eye open for any trouble). The
Police are said to favour this location - others worry about
balls going over the fence and into the traffic. Some people
think it would be too "in your face" for visitors approaching
the town along our avenue of chestnuts to be confronted with
this monstrosity. And what about the couple of nearby houses?
What will they think? Others say that all this is absurd and we
will soon grow to love the look of the MUGA. But will squeezing
it in by the road create a sort of "fenced compound" feeling for
mums and kids on the existing playground. Why not keep the "open
space" feeling we have at the moment. Much better to separate
the teenage groups most likely to use the MUGA from the
toddlers. That's all very well but what will happen if teenagers
are encouraged to congregate well away from the road? What about
lighting? And don't forget that Penhurst bedrooms look out over
the recreation ground. The debate goes on...Join in on the Forum
and vote for your preferred location here. The Town Council will
be deciding the issue next Monday.
The Council decided at its Meeting on Monday
18th August that Position A was the answer.