Parish Council Reports 2008-2009
You will have seen in the Upton News that the reports will not be read out in full at the meeting this year which gives us the opportunity to include more detail than in previous years. Rather than go over the report information in full we feel there are more important issues that we would like to discuss with you in the time we have available at the Annual Meeting. In particular we would like your thoughts on the following
1) It is now 5 years since we worked on the Parish Plan. Its publication created a lot of ideas and work for the council but things have moved on and we need your latest thoughts, criticisms and ideas on what we should be looking at in the coming year.
2) The future of the Volunteer Work Force, which you will remember was an early spin off from our Parish Plan. There is a feeling that it would be better if the Force were to be organised by a small group of volunteers away from the Parish Council. It would be the role of that group to come up with projects, seek the finance necessary and organise the working parties. The advantage would be to further share the workload, to involve more people coming up with more ideas of how we can improve our environment, make it easier for that organisation to seek project funding and it should help make parishioners proud to be a member of the force.
3) What can we do about finding a Parish Transport Representative?
4) The likely effects the work on constructing the hall extension will have on the availability of the hall and the use of the children’s playground.
The Parish Council reports and all the other reports received prior to the meeting can be viewed on the Upton village website and will be made available in hard copy prior to this meeting. We hope will read through them and then at the meeting we will welcome and encourage questions and requests for more information or clarification that we will be pleased to provide.
We really do hope you will be able to join us on Monday April 6th at 7.45 p.m. for 8.00 p.m. and that we are able to enjoy a very constructive meeting.
Chairman’s Report
This year has seen some changes in our composition having begun the year with just 5 councillors.
In July we welcomed David Mason onto the council and asked him to take the lead role in our work to support and provide facilities for our younger residents.
No sooner were we back to our full compliment than unfortunately in November Belinda Drew had to resign as she was leaving the area. During the 18 months that Belinda served she proved to be a valued and enthusiastic member of the council, we appreciate and thank her for her efforts.
Belinda’s resignation has created a vacancy that has been advertised in accordance with the regulations. We are hoping that we will have co-opted a new member before the Annual Meeting.
You will recall that last year I told you that we were doing our best to share the workload and that has continued this year.
Stuart Norman has continued with the lead role on roads and footpaths and is also our representative on UVHAT.
John Dickens has continued with the lead role on matters relating to our Recreation Ground and also continued as our representative on the Neighbourhood Action Group until January when that role was taken over by Celia Davies to complement her valued work as our Neighbourhood Watch co-ordinator.
Tracy Seelig has continued with the lead role on matters relating with the play-area of the Recreation Ground and has taken over from Belinda as our representative on the Harwell Site Liaison Committee.
I have temporarily taken the lead role on planning matters as well as continuing with my responsibilities for amenities and communications (Upton News and Website).
Clare Lightfoot has continued to give us excellent support in her role as your Parish Clerk and Finance Officer.
This has been a year of mixed achievements with just about equal amounts of success and disappointing outcomes.
I will deal with the disappointing internal outcomes first.
One of the downsides (there are many upsides) of having a young council is that other than myself they all have to earn a living and three of them also have a young family to consider and that means as volunteer councillors they have limited time to spend on council activities. This needs to be taken into account when looking at the short-comings we have experienced this year. A disappointment to me personally has been our failure to get the energy saving project off the ground despite agreeing that 3 councillors should take this idea forward some 18 months ago. The idea of this type of project, which has been so successful in many other villages in the county, is to help us all save energy and to make us all aware of the ways available to us in which we can improve our carbon footprint. When the initiative was seen to be floundering within the council we asked for help from the village, none was forthcoming and we will need to agree at the meeting that this initiative is unfortunately dead.
Another internal problem has been our failure to find a member who was prepared to take on the role of Parish Transport Representative following the “retirement” of Peter & Juliet Gardiner who have done sterling work in that role for the past 10 years. This is a very important task if we are to continue to have our say on the standard of bus service we receive and have any influence on other local transport issues. Once again when we realised we had difficulties within the council we asked the village for help and sadly no one has come forward.
The third disappointment for me was our decision not to go ahead and enter the Village of the Year competition. The decision, which I believe to be the right one, was a combination of the difficulty in finding a group of volunteers to organise and present our entry and our feeling that we had not sufficiently moved on from the position at the time of our previous entry due to our failure to make progress on the energy saving and on an environmental improvement project.
On to the disappointing outcomes where we have tried our best without success.
The council did everything that it could to try to prevent the closure of our Post Office. On your behalf we spent a lot of time, sent out many protest letters and made countless telephone calls to all parts of the UK including Ireland. Right from the outset we were told that Upton had the lowest usage of any of the offices under threat in Oxfordshire and was the No 1 target for closure. Undeterred we made every effort including asking the Post Office for conditions under which the council could consider a deal where we covered the losses being made in this parish. The terms that they eventually offered just a week before the closure included us having to pay to them a non-negotiable £30,000 security up front to show we were able to cover the losses and were a capable organisation. We could not consider such action and at that point we had to reluctantly accept the inevitable knowing that we had done our best to prevent it.
You will recall that as soon as an application for an additional exit from Beeching Close onto the hump in Station Road was approved by the District and County Councils we called a public meeting because of our concern over safety. Over 50 of you attended with 20 more apologies and left us in no doubt that we should do our best to get the planning decision reversed. We wrote letters to the leader of the District Council and the leader of the opposition at the District Council. The leader of the opposition has still to reply but the leader of the council set up a meeting for us to go down to Abingdon to air our grievances and to seek a review. At that meeting the District Council agreed to seek clarification from the Highway’s Dept. on the contents of their erroneous report. The Principal Highways Engineer has replied with a less than factual response. We have pointed out the errors in his reply to the District Council but it would appear they have accepted his comments, or at least they have failed to respond to our latest letter.
We have now taken the matter up with Ed Vaizey who at the same time has been working with the residents of Beeching Close on other areas where the County Council have behaved in a manner that is less than acceptable.
The way this application has been dealt with by the District Council Planning Dept. and the County Council Highway’s Dept. clearly shows the difficulties we have in dealing with them. To both of them we are a minor irritant that keeps asking awkward questions and won’t go away despite their attempts to ignore both ourselves and some of our parishioners. I regret that despite our showing up the obviously flawed practices of both councils the exit will go ahead and the local residents will I am afraid have to put up with the safety consequences.
The later letters on this issue I have posted on our website so that you can make up your own minds on the competence of those involved in imposing this decision upon us. Please look under ‘Village News’ for an item titled ‘Planning Communication – Station Road’.
Having got the downsides out of the way let us turn to this year’s achievements of which we can be proud.
First an internal plus.
In November we suddenly stumbled on a directive that we must set up a system in which we had to make available to the world a vast array of documentation and it had to be in place by 1st January 2009. We obviously were not the only council caught on the hop as a few days later the deadline was extended but we had to be seen to be underway by 1st January. You will be pleased to hear we were much better organised than we might have been and had much of the documentation within the council but had not made it available to the public.
We were very grateful to Brian Rippon who worked miracles on the new website and soon had it set up and tailored for us to use. I estimate it has taken about 100 hours of councillor’s effort in writing, collating and posting documents to get to where we are now. We have now completed the task and this week with more help from Brian the Parish Council section of the website has been tidied up. You now have access on the web to all the council’s documents that the government says you should be able to see, we will be very pleased to hear back any comments on the way the section has been set up and on documentation we have produced. Whilst at the time we were definitely not pleased with the government edict we can now look back and see that the effort we have put in can only improve the way in which both ourselves and future councils will work. The size of the Parish Council section on the website and the number of documents involved has left us with an on-going problem namely the amount of work that will be necessary to keep it up-to-date.
And now to the areas where the village can be proud.
The volunteer spirit within the village is still alive. With the help of a generous donation from Infinium the village volunteer work force has installed new safety mats under the swings and the climbing chains and has made good use of the best of the old safety mats by putting down an all-weather surface to allow greater use of the ball wall.
On another front that volunteer spirit has allowed us to make an enormous improvement to our Recreation Ground by allowing us to take control of mowing our own grass. The work of the 13 volunteers who manned the mowers for us during last summer was great and from the number of compliments that I received about the state of the Recreation Ground I know how much many of you appreciated their efforts. Due to the higher price of petrol and the fact the grass grew so well last summer we have not saved quite as much as I had predicted but including a generous write off on both mowers we still saved over £500 as well as improving the use and the appearance of our amenity.
It is largely down to savings like this by using our volunteer work force on so many jobs over the last 4-5 years and by very sensible forward planning that the Parish Council have been able to put up the sum of £9000 towards the cost of building the extension to our Village Hall. This initial promise from within the parish together with the news that something approaching that sum was also being raised by the residents has enabled UVHAT to go out to other organisations and obtain promises of funding that hopefully will allow work on the extension to begin in the next few months. Had the council not been able to put up that sort of sum I doubt that UVHAT would have had the same success. We hope by this time next year our enlarged hall will be in use and all the volunteers who have helped the council save money and all the councillors past and present who have sensibly planned the council’s finances can take their share of pride in that achievement.
If you have read the earlier version of this report with the note on the Litter Pick you will be delighted to hear that we did match last year with 30 volunteers going out on a cold but fine morning to do their bit in tidying up our parish. Those passing the Recreation Ground will see the results of our labours.
The above items are just some of the topics that has kept us all busy during the last year, there are many others that we have done our best to take forward with various degrees of success including getting part of our AONB tidied up, improving the safety of Chilton Road, creating a cycleway to Blewbury and improving the state of Frog Alley and the adjacent stream.
Mike Brown
Chairman Upton Parish Council
28/03/09
Finance Report
At the time of writing this report, which is not quite the end of the financial year, the council’s bank account shows a holding of £14,630. When the contribution of £9000 towards the village hall extension is made this will give the council reserves of just over £5000 which should be seen as very healthy for a parish of our size. With no further large projects looming in the foreseeable future your council will budget in future to maintain its reserves at that level.
It should be noted that about £400 recently donated by parishioners for improvements to the children’s playground is being held by the council and will not be spent until the extension to the village hall is complete.
The decision to undertake our own mowing has resulted in a saving to the council of just over £500 compared to the cheapest quotation that we received. It has been agreed that both mowers will be written off over a 5 year period at £450 per year. The saving on mowing whilst very acceptable was not as high as we had predicted due to the higher price of petrol last summer, a healthy grass growing year which meant more cuts and a higher than predicted maintenance cost.
Other significant outgoings during the year were
Clerks Salary £1900
Burial Ground Loan £826
Insurance £337
Playground Improvements £850
Village Hall Planning Approval £356
Our total spend in the financial year is predicted to be £6800 with a predicted income of £8000.
Next year we will see a loss of income due to a large drop in bank interest and a much smaller sum invested.
In the coming year the Parish Council will be heavily involved in handling the finances of the hall extension, in order that this in no way interferes with the normal council business separate bank accounts and income/expenditure reports will be set up.
Mike Brown and Clare Lightfoot
Chairman and Finance Officer Upton Parish Council
25/03/09
District Councillor’s Report 2009
The main issues to which I would like to draw your attention are:
- the expansion of joint working with South Oxfordshire District Council,
- the joint senior management arrangements between the Vale and South Oxfordshire,
- the new waste collection contract,
- Continuing pressures on the Vale’s budget.
I have long thought that the structure of local government in our part of Oxfordshire was wrong. It seemed crazy to me that the Vale, a small authority with fewer than 120,000 electors had its own Chief Executive, its own legal department, HR department etc. and that SODC, a similarly sized council, had the same. For this reason I enthusiastically supported the proposal in the consultation a year or two ago that the Vale and SODC be allowed to form a unitary authority – in other words one that was responsible for the services at present provided by both the County and District Councils. In addition to efficiency savings, this would have the advantage that there would no longer be any doubt in the public’s mind as to which council was responsible for providing a particular service. Sadly, after a change of ministers the government seemed to loose interest in the subject and permitted only a relatively small number of new unitaries. A Vale/SODC unitary was not among them, but the government did say that it expected local authorities to make the savings by joint working anyway.
Three years ago the Vale and SODC jointly outsourced their finance operations to Capita Local Government Services and this operation is overseen by a Supervisory Board made up of councillors from both authorities. This year joint working has been taken substantially further forward with the creation of a joint senior management structure for both councils which now share a chief executive, David Buckle, who was previously the chief executive of South Oxfordshire. David is supported by three very experienced strategic directors who divide between them oversight of all functions of both councils. Under the strategic directors each service has a senior officer responsible for similar operations in both councils so that, for instance, the same person is head of planning at both Vale and SODC. Getting to this position has, inevitably, been a difficult and at times, painful process, as serving officers sought to gain selection for jobs that covered much of their existing responsibilities. It was made slightly easier by the fact that several officers elected to take early retirement and there had been one post vacant. Even so three long serving officers were made redundant, or four if you count Terry Stock, the former chief executive of the Vale who lost out to David Buckle.
This January a contract was awarded jointly by the Vale and SODC for waste collection in both districts. This will entail the weekly collection of food waste, both cooked and raw, and also either recycling or residual waste on an alternating basis. The new arrangements come into operation in SODC this year and in the Vale next October when the present waste collection contract expires. Hopefully, this will mean that any snags with the new contractor will be ironed out in SODC before operations start in the Vale. I believe that it will result in a significant increase in the recycling rate, which has been the experience with similar waste collection regimes which are well established at other councils.
The new contract will also bring substantial financial benefits to both the Vale and SODC. It is anticipated that by municipal year 2011/12, the first full year of operation for the Vale, the benefits of the new contract and the enhanced recycling credit income will save the Vale over £760,000 a year. This will be most welcome as the Vale continues to face relentless financial pressures, particularly as a result of the new duties that the government imposes on the Vale, but does not fund satisfactorily.
A good example of the above is the Council’s experience with concessionary fares. Although the government says that it is fully funding this scheme, this is far from the truth. Last year’s budget, the first covering the new national free bus pass for the over 60’s, contained a provision of £130,000 as our finance officers believed that this is what it would cost the Vale over and above what the government may have provided – and even that is obscured by smoke and mirrors. In the event the new scheme has proved to be even more popular than anticipated, and this year a further £319,000 is required to meet the cost of providing this service.
Last time that I travelled on a bus from Blewbury to Didcot it cost me £2.50 return, (although this was almost a year ago and it may have gone up since). I presume that the fare from Upton would be similar so that just one trip a week would add up to £130 per annum. Compare this with the amount of one’s council tax bill that is retained by the Vale (as opposed to being passed on to the County Council, the Parish Council and the Police) which ranges from £74.87 for a Band A property to £224.62 at Band H, with Band D, the most often quoted measure, at £112.31. The only slight sign of relief is that during the really cold weather a month or two ago the use of bus passes fell quite sharply.
A further financial pressure comes from the credit crunch, from which the Vale is not immune. When the budget was being finalised it was anticipated that lower income from the council’s substantial cash and property investments would reduce revenue income by over £1.1 million, and, if anything, interest rates have eased further since then. All these figures should be seen in the context that this year the Vale will be raising £5.38 million in total from the council tax payer. Our council tax is capped so that once efficiency savings have been exhausted any revenue shortfalls have to be met by cutting services.
I will, as always, be happy to answer any questions that anyone might have about this report or any other council matter, either at the Annual Parish Meeting, by phone (850275), or by email at richard.farrell@whitehorsedc.gov.uk.
Richard Farrell
Upton Parish Transport Representatives (PTR) Report.
Buses: During the year, the 94 service came up for its 4-yearly review under the County Council Review of Subsidised Bus Services programme. Although the previous company had proved to be unreliable and unable to sustain the service, the timings of the buses had been very satisfactory for the village. However, the 94 was under great threat as it was a heavy loss-maker for the County Council. We therefore made representations and attended meetings with the Council to do all we could to save this service, which is of vital importance to the village. In May we heard that the service was to be taken over by Heyfordian, and that the timetable, with minor alterations, would stay very much as it had been before. This was good news – the only disappointment being that the 9.00 a.m. bus had been removed, the one that had proved of most use to many villagers. A 9.50 a.m. service has been substituted which, although free to pensioners, is far too late for most purposes. Since it started on 1st June, the Heyfordian service, with its comfortable and reliable bus, has proved very satisfactory.
Cycle Track: For many years we have been Sustrans rangers for the Upton end of the track. This unfortunately we are unable to continue to do. There is another ranger, Keith Walton of West Hagbourne, but as he is also in his seventies it is not really possible for him to carry out the heavy work of clearing up bad cases of litter, which is a continuing problem.
Railways: We understand that a planning application has at last been submitted for the radical redesign of the forecourt of Didcot Parkway station.
Upton PTRs: After 10 years as Upton PTRs, we feel the time has now come for us to retire. We sincerely hope a new volunteer can be found, and will be only too pleased to give all the help we can in the meantime.
Juliet and Peter Gardiner
United Charities of the Ancient Parish of Blewbury (Blewbury, Upton and Aston Upthorpe) Report.
The United Charity is managed by a group of Trustees. One of our functions is to provide financial gifts to certain elderly residents of Upton at Christmas time and to contribute to a Christmas lunch for them. This was carried out last year but the number of recipients has, sadly fallen. If anyone feels that they would like to nominate a new recipient to the charity, would they please contact me. There are certain financial criteria to be met, but we guarantee total confidence and careful consideration of any nominations made.
Charmian Whitmell Trustee, representing Upton, Tel: 01235 850135
Blewbury School Report
We are pleased to report that in its recent Ofsted Inspection Blewbury School achieved not only a “good” rating, but one with significant “outstanding” elements. Here are some of the highlights from the report which provide a good summary of the school and what it stands for:
“The school provides an exceptional curriculum” which “captures pupils’ enthusiasm for learning and their thirst for knowledge.”
“Teachers… invariably set interesting and challenging activities that are well matched to pupils’ interests and learning needs”
“Provisional results in the 2008 national tests at the end of Year 6 show standards that are above average in English, mathematics and science”… “Current year 6 pupils are achieving well and are on track to attain the targets set for them and to improve on the current above-average results”.
“Pupils in all year groups are eager to learn, enjoy coming to school and behave exceptionally well.”
“Pupils’ spiritual, moral, social and cultural development are outstanding.”
“Pupils are proud of their contribution to the school and to the lives of others through membership of the influential school council and eco-councils” and “thrive on the many opportunities that they have to take responsibility”.
“Parents were unanimous in saying that their children enjoy school and this is reflected in the exceptionally high levels of attendance.”
“The outstanding emphasis on global development has enabled the pupils to have a highly developed sense of the importance of global understanding.”
We believe one of Blewbury’s strengths is its ability to identify areas for improvement and address them. This was reflected in the really encouraging comment from the Inspector that the school had the potential to achieve an “out-standing”.
Aside from the Ofsted inspection, the school has had a very busy and successful year:
- Maintained our excellent staff from 2008/9 into 2009/10
- All new Early Years Foundation Stage curriculum requirements met in full
- The Creative Partnership Project gave children the opportunity to work with an architect and visual artist, solving problems in practical and constructive ways
- The Comenius Project ‘Fit for the Future’ took place in which 6 pupils travelled to France and took part in an Eco Council
- Secured place in “Pathfinder” trial – grant to enable economically disadvantaged children to participate in activities as part of extended schools and beyond.
- 89% of key stage 2 children participated annual activities weekend, where they learn to take risks and extend their perception of their capabilities
- A number of teachers visited Uganda (grant funded) and have been able to bring Uganda “alive” in the class room
- New website launched, new prospectus produced and increased Upton News articles
- Hosted a trainee German teacher in Summer 2008 and will host two further teachers in 2009
- Art Exhibition raised funds for the school and displayed children’s work
- Mid Summer Night’s Dream production by Year 2 in Spring 2008
- The school will introduce a breakfast club in September 2009
Andrea Brown, Local Authority Governor
UVHAT Annual Report 2009
A revised planning application for the hall extension is currently being considered by the Vale of the White Horse District Council. The original plan included dividing doors across the hall to enable two meetings to take place simultaneously. Due to a shortfall in funds available the dividing doors will not now be installed. The revised plan adds a metre to the length of the archive room and includes a window and an emergency escape door. This will facilitate holding two separate meetings at the same time.
Promises amounting to £67,770 have now been received from various official bodies and £5,595 from people living in the village. A further £4,145 has been raised at events held in the village during the past twelve months and the Trust itself has built up some financial reserves in recent years.
The Trustees think, therefore, that they may soon be in a position to go ahead with the scheme to extend the hall – providing the building of the patio and the extension to the car park is deferred. Providing also, of course, that an affordable tender is forthcoming from a reputable building firm.
The Government has reduced the VAT payable in 2009 to 15%, and so completion of the work by the end of the year would save about £2,000.
Accordingly, the Trust has appointed a Managing Architect to oversee the invitation of tenders, the letting of the contract and the execution of the work.
It should be stressed that the work will only go ahead in the next few months if an affordable tender is received.
It is important that the fundraising should continue. Any money received that is not needed for the extension itself can be used for the patio.
Brian Simpson
UVHAT Treasurer
Neighbourhood Watch Report
On the whole we have had a quiet year in Upton on the Neighbourhood Watch front.
In October 2008 there were 2 reports of vandalism in the village, one being an empty property in Fieldside being renovated by builders where damage occurred and the other being flagstones removed from outside a dwelling, also in Fieldside. Both incidents occurred on the same night.
In Frog Alley a car was stolen from the owner’s driveway and in Fieldside a 4 Wheel Drive was stolen also from the owner’s drive.
There were 3 burglaries in the summer of 2008.
One being in Beeching Close and 2 along the Reading Road area of Upton.
Otherwise things have been fairly quiet especially when you compare our few incidents with those in the larger local villages and Didcot itself.
Celia Davies
Upton Organiser NHW 29th March 2009
St Mary’s Parochial Church Council Report
Church life in the village continues to flourish with a regular congregation attending our weekly Sunday morning services together with the other acts of worship. We now hold a Family Service once a month starting at the later time of 10.00am which over the past year has been well supported by children and their parents. These are set to continue and all are very welcome to attend.
During the year we welcomed our new Rector, Father Jason to St. Mary’s who together with his wife Miranda have now settled in the Benefice living at The Rectory in Blewbury. Together with Father Anthony and The Revd. Louise Butler they lead our acts of worship at St. Mary’s at most of the services and provide important pastoral care. In turn, the Lay Ministry Team and those who serve on our Parochial Church Council to whom we are extremely grateful support the Clergy.
The final phase to complete the refurbishment of the Church building has recently been undertaken namely the internal redecoration. This now complements the new roof, floor, lighting and heating systems that we have installed over the past few years. A great deal of this work was carried out and supervised by our dear friend and long serving Churchwarden Tony West who sadly died during the year. He is sorely missed for many reasons not least as our regular organist.
There will be ongoing repair work as for any building and particularly one of this age but the fabric is now well protected for the foreseeable future.
Our annual fete remains one of the primary sources of fund raising for the work of the Church including the maintenance of the property. The support received from those living in the village for this event is much appreciated.
Julian Sayers 30th March 2009
County Council Report
The Audit Commission report on the County Council this year gave it an overall rating of three stars, out of a possible four, and “improving well”. This is not quite such a good result as two years ago, but it is still very satisfactory in comparison with many other Councils, including the Vale. The report says that “the Council is delivering better outcomes and infrastructure improvement that are enhancing the quality of life for its residents. Effective partnership working is improving health, reducing inequalities and making Oxfordshire a safer place to live. The environment is well managed, with strong focus on sustainability.”
Areas where there is some criticism are GCE results, road deaths and violent crime. These are difficult matters to address and you may wonder why the Council is blamed for violent crime, when that is not under its control. The answer to that is that the Government is now insisting on “Partnership Working” with other bodies such as the Police and the NHS. If a Partnership fails to deliver its targets the Council has to share the blame. However, as the report gave financial management and use of resources the maximum possible score you can feel satisfied that the Council is using your money wisely.
Elections for a new Council will take place on 4th June this year but I shall not be standing for re-election. I have done four terms as a councillor on the Vale and the County and I think I deserve a rest. It has been a privilege to represent you, which I have very much enjoyed.
Colin Lamont