The clocks have changed and the weather is definitely more like summer. My lawn has had its first mowing. This last week was busy. I moved into Coffinswell with all the usual moving problems - no phone and nothing was packed where I thought it would be. Unpacking continued into the small hours.
This week I spent time getting to know Kingskerswell. An interesting Parish Council meeting demonstrated a fair bit of disquiet with the way things were being run which I suspect will be reflected in the Parish Council election results. In short, matters and concerns which had been raised over the year had not been progressed and the finances were at best in a bit of a muddle.
I held a public meeting on Saturday to find out what issues and concerns residents had. The most pressing issue was the proposed by pass - talked about for 30 years with no solution emerging. It is very clear that the labels "for" and "against" the by pass are misleading. Everyone recognises there is too much traffic and that it is bottle necked causing excessive pollution and limiting travel - the disagreement is over the route. My overwhelming sense is that the planners have not really understood or got to grips with the problem and have therefore failed to come up with an appropriate solution. This is something I will tackle.
The health centre has just been rebuilt in Kingskerswell and is really quite something. Concerns were however expressed that such a building and amenities should be more used. One young lady came up with a brilliant idea - we could move the library above the health centre rather than closing it. While the decision on the existing library has been held over until June, most people expect the decision to be to close it. Building above the health centre would however be a cheaper and better alternative and would put the library in a much more central position with better parking. And the lack of parking generally was another key issue. I asked about the post office - a real success story of a business that has really taken off and provides a vast range of services. Better still it provides a community voice and produces a regular newsletter!
I found a real gem in Kingsteignton - Kingscare - what a tribute to all those who set it up! It provides a quite unique service to patients of the Kingsteignton GP Surgery and the local community. Not only does it provide a service to collect and return patients home for appointments but it also organises events and outings giving people a chance to get out of their homes and socialise. It has even published a book with another on its way! Maggie Bonnell and her team are to be congratulated for what they are doing.
Best wishes
Tuesday 27 March 2007
Sunday 18 March 2007
Plastic daffodils,hail stones - and education
Global warming has clearly taken its toll this year and nature is having to adapt...and so I think must we. I am not entirely convinced it makes sense to plant plastic daffodils because the real ones have come unseasonably early - nature is a wonderful thing because it is just that, natural. Hail storms and snow are promised and our weather is increasingly unpredictable. While it must be a priority to reverse or at least arrest the march of global warming, lets make the most of these differences and if our daffodils arrive in January next year lets enjoy them then.
Following my visit to "Shopmobility" in Teignmouth last week, I was invited to attend a meeting of the Teignbridge Access Group which meets once a month in Newton Abbot to discuss access issues for the disabled and less mobile. What an enthusiastic bunch of people! They have been incredibly successful, fighting for improvements in pavement structure, crossings, loos, better access to local shops and banks and for better access to leisure facilities. We owe a lot to individuals like this.
Candidates' nomination forms for the District and Town Council elections have to be submitted at the beginning of next month so this month sees plenty of activity getting forms filled in and putting the final touches to the election campaign. I am pleased to be welcoming a number of new faces to our band of councillors , many of whom have said to me that they want to stand up and be counted and get things changing for the better - and some have crossed the floor to do this. Sitting council members are holding local meetings to give us all a chance to tell them what isn't working. This coming week we have a meeting in Kingskerswell on Saturday 24th March at 10.00 am at the community centre - everyone is welcome and I hope to see you there!
On Friday Tim Laughton, Shadow Minister for Children and Health, joined us in Teignmouth to get a better feel for and understanding of the issues teachers, children and parents face - and what we can do to improve both teaching and learning. Our first stop was at Inverteign Community Nursery and Primary School. Here we visited the Family Learning Centre - a real jewel in the crown and a first class success story in education. A highly motivated and very welcoming group offer a range of learning opportunities to a community which has some of the most socially deprived families in Teignbridge. Parents, grandparents and children all learn together. The courses are designed in response to requests for help so they really are relevant. That the school is community led is one of its greatest strengths. The latest addition is a course for Dads, created by Dads and run by Dads - fantastic!
Rydon Primary School was next on the visit - a really popular school with more demand on its places than it can comfortably accommodate. Neil Graham, the headmaster is a wonderful man, clearly totally driven by what he can do to continually improve the learning of his children. After a brief tour around the school with Neil and Joan Lambert, a school governor and the local district councillor, Neil shared with us some interesting insights. The first will come as no surprise - a lack of space, clearly evidenced by the size of the school's library. The second was more of a surprise - Neil has found it hard to find male teachers to recruit and at present he is the only male member of staff.
The weekend should have seen me in Nottingham at the Conservative Spring Forum - but when someone ran into my car, that was the end of that! Instead I was finding a car repairer and filling in insurance forms. I am still not sure if I will be mobile next week!
Following my visit to "Shopmobility" in Teignmouth last week, I was invited to attend a meeting of the Teignbridge Access Group which meets once a month in Newton Abbot to discuss access issues for the disabled and less mobile. What an enthusiastic bunch of people! They have been incredibly successful, fighting for improvements in pavement structure, crossings, loos, better access to local shops and banks and for better access to leisure facilities. We owe a lot to individuals like this.
Candidates' nomination forms for the District and Town Council elections have to be submitted at the beginning of next month so this month sees plenty of activity getting forms filled in and putting the final touches to the election campaign. I am pleased to be welcoming a number of new faces to our band of councillors , many of whom have said to me that they want to stand up and be counted and get things changing for the better - and some have crossed the floor to do this. Sitting council members are holding local meetings to give us all a chance to tell them what isn't working. This coming week we have a meeting in Kingskerswell on Saturday 24th March at 10.00 am at the community centre - everyone is welcome and I hope to see you there!
On Friday Tim Laughton, Shadow Minister for Children and Health, joined us in Teignmouth to get a better feel for and understanding of the issues teachers, children and parents face - and what we can do to improve both teaching and learning. Our first stop was at Inverteign Community Nursery and Primary School. Here we visited the Family Learning Centre - a real jewel in the crown and a first class success story in education. A highly motivated and very welcoming group offer a range of learning opportunities to a community which has some of the most socially deprived families in Teignbridge. Parents, grandparents and children all learn together. The courses are designed in response to requests for help so they really are relevant. That the school is community led is one of its greatest strengths. The latest addition is a course for Dads, created by Dads and run by Dads - fantastic!
Rydon Primary School was next on the visit - a really popular school with more demand on its places than it can comfortably accommodate. Neil Graham, the headmaster is a wonderful man, clearly totally driven by what he can do to continually improve the learning of his children. After a brief tour around the school with Neil and Joan Lambert, a school governor and the local district councillor, Neil shared with us some interesting insights. The first will come as no surprise - a lack of space, clearly evidenced by the size of the school's library. The second was more of a surprise - Neil has found it hard to find male teachers to recruit and at present he is the only male member of staff.
The weekend should have seen me in Nottingham at the Conservative Spring Forum - but when someone ran into my car, that was the end of that! Instead I was finding a car repairer and filling in insurance forms. I am still not sure if I will be mobile next week!
Sunday 11 March 2007
Spring is here - March 2007
A busy week meeting friends and new members in the run up to the District Elections. On Monday I met friends in Kingsteignton in the Ten Tors pub and we exchanged views on local issues over a pint of beer. A number of you have taken the time and trouble to show me just how diverse Kingsteignton is - it is both an active farming community and busy urban village - and the concerns of both must be met. A common theme is always the rapid expansion of the village and the inadequacy of the roads, schools and other facilities to meet the needs of this fast growing community. Worst of all the planners seem to have failed to consult us all on what we think is needed and to have ignored some of the geographical quirks of Kingsteignton - in particular the flood plain and landfill sites on which much of modern Kingsteignton has been built.
On Tuesday, I spent the morning with the Shopmobility team down by the quays in Teignmouth. I take my hat off to John Birch and his team of volunteers who have made such a difference to helping the less able to get around - giving them a sense of freedom and Independence. John gave me a lesson on how to drive one of the buggies and off I went! In the afternoon I visited Kingsteignton's many housing estates that have been built in the last twenty years and was surprised at how different they all are, reflecting changing building ideas over the last decade or two. I was made very welcome at the local Bowls Club in Kingsteignton - that is quite a facility! A beautiful state of the art bowling green, home to some very successful teams and individual players, its walls covered in cups and prizes tell their own story. But we need to support this great game so that the club remains financially viable. I know that new members would be very welcome. It is also a good venue for meetings and celebrating special occasions - and what a view of Newton Abbot race course.
Thursday was devoted to Newton Abbot. A group of us got together to thrash out what we thought the Council should be doing but wasn't doing to make Newton Abbot thrive. Traffic congestion, parking, the "Asda" eyesore and the plight of the bypass were high on the agenda. On Friday I stood on Walborough Hill and could see very clearly the stream of almost static traffic heading south out of Newton Abbot to Torquey on the A380. This problem now almost fifty years old has now finally to be addressed and working with you all we need to find a solution. I suspect one of the main problems is that the current route proposal for the bye pass isn't in the right place and isn't solving the real problem.
At 4pm on Friday I was asked to stand in and speak at an event put on by the Honiton Conservative group that evening as their speaker had been delayed returning from a trip abroad - so my week ended with a quick rescheduling of plans to accommodate this! Saturday was filled with a coffee morning, committee meeting and then a dinner at which I was the guest speaker. We must be doing something right - the turnout was three times the usual number!
On Tuesday, I spent the morning with the Shopmobility team down by the quays in Teignmouth. I take my hat off to John Birch and his team of volunteers who have made such a difference to helping the less able to get around - giving them a sense of freedom and Independence. John gave me a lesson on how to drive one of the buggies and off I went! In the afternoon I visited Kingsteignton's many housing estates that have been built in the last twenty years and was surprised at how different they all are, reflecting changing building ideas over the last decade or two. I was made very welcome at the local Bowls Club in Kingsteignton - that is quite a facility! A beautiful state of the art bowling green, home to some very successful teams and individual players, its walls covered in cups and prizes tell their own story. But we need to support this great game so that the club remains financially viable. I know that new members would be very welcome. It is also a good venue for meetings and celebrating special occasions - and what a view of Newton Abbot race course.
Thursday was devoted to Newton Abbot. A group of us got together to thrash out what we thought the Council should be doing but wasn't doing to make Newton Abbot thrive. Traffic congestion, parking, the "Asda" eyesore and the plight of the bypass were high on the agenda. On Friday I stood on Walborough Hill and could see very clearly the stream of almost static traffic heading south out of Newton Abbot to Torquey on the A380. This problem now almost fifty years old has now finally to be addressed and working with you all we need to find a solution. I suspect one of the main problems is that the current route proposal for the bye pass isn't in the right place and isn't solving the real problem.
At 4pm on Friday I was asked to stand in and speak at an event put on by the Honiton Conservative group that evening as their speaker had been delayed returning from a trip abroad - so my week ended with a quick rescheduling of plans to accommodate this! Saturday was filled with a coffee morning, committee meeting and then a dinner at which I was the guest speaker. We must be doing something right - the turnout was three times the usual number!
Sunday 4 March 2007
Investing in Newton Abbot
A warm, wet and busy week - but a very successful one! I have found a house in Newton Abbot to buy which will put me at the heart of things. It has been a long search but with a very worthwhile result. The average purchase takes three months - so I should be moving in late May or early June. In the meantime I have found a cottage in Coffinswell to rent from the middle of March. This week I spent some time in Westminster meeting with Members of Parliament from other parts of the South West. We have a number of common issues across the West Country -together we have a much more powerful voice!
One of the issues I have been exploring is how we can attract new businesses to invest in Newton Abbot not just to create new jobs, but to create a greater variety of jobs outside retail and tourism. That way we will have more to offer our young people to stop them leaving and may even be able to attract those who have left, back. A technology company might be one answer. I am exploring this and other ideas with friends and former colleagues in London. But I don't have a monopoly on good ideas - I would very much like to hear from you with your ideas! Together we can and must regenerate Newton Abbot and reduce the huge and quite unacceptable gap between the average pay packet and the average price of a house.
One of the issues I have been exploring is how we can attract new businesses to invest in Newton Abbot not just to create new jobs, but to create a greater variety of jobs outside retail and tourism. That way we will have more to offer our young people to stop them leaving and may even be able to attract those who have left, back. A technology company might be one answer. I am exploring this and other ideas with friends and former colleagues in London. But I don't have a monopoly on good ideas - I would very much like to hear from you with your ideas! Together we can and must regenerate Newton Abbot and reduce the huge and quite unacceptable gap between the average pay packet and the average price of a house.
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