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I’m supporting 3 important local history initiatives – an excellent WWI exhibition in Colyton, the ‘Living Memories’ project to help dementia patients, and discussions on making Seaton Museum more accessible.
If you’ve time in the next couple of days, head to the church in Colyton for the really excellent First World War centenary exhibition, the product of much loving labour by numerous local volunteers, but very professionally presented and above all a moving evocation of the lives of local people in that terrible episode in our country’s history.
I supported this with my Locality Budget, and I’ve also recently approved an ‘Invest in Devon’ grant for another Colyton-based project, Living Memories, which aims to use documentary films from the mid-twentieth century as a means of aiding the personal memories of older people, especially dementia patients.
This week I also attended a meeting of the committee and trustees (of whom I am one) of the Axe Valley Heritage Association, which began to discussions on how to make the wonderful collections of Seaton Museum more accessible in the future. The Association elected a new chair, Roger Bookman, and I hope its decision to develop a plan for the future of the Museum will be a fitting birthday present for its founder and Curator, Ted Gosling, who reaches 90 in January 2019.
The Museum, to the side of the Town Hall (Gateway), will have its Christmas opening on Thursday 29th November from 2-5 pm and will be open 10-5 the following day.
‘NHS vs Brexit’: on Sunday I joined 700,000 people to march against the shambles which is draining resources from our health system and public services
On Sunday I marched in London with 700,000 other people to call for a chance to end the nightmare which Brexit has become – a mess which is sucking the lifeblood out of our country, draining resources from the NHS and public services and driving away many of the doctors and nurses we so desperately need in Devon.
I know many people in Seaton and Colyton supported Brexit in 2016, but surely you didn’t vote for the chaos which it is causing. Johnson, Gove and Farage didn’t tell you how difficult it was going to be – maybe they didn’t even understand themselves. It is time now for us to vote on whether we like the outcome.
@cpredevon’s reports on housing need in Devon are probably the most important reports on the county in the last decade – it is essential they have wider circulation and are made available online
The Devon branch of the Council for the Preservation of Rural England has published Devon’s Housing Need Evidence Report and A Review of Government Housing Policy & Its Impacts on Devon. CPRE says of the first:
‘Launched at a packed seminar in Tiverton on 12th October 2018, this independent report by Opinion Research Services (ORS) provides the real facts about Devon’s housing needs. The comprehensive data includes housing projections, targets, costs and tenure, numbers planned and population trends across the entire County. This brand new CPRE Devon commissioned research cuts a swathe through official figures and, for the first time, reveals the truth about Devon’s REAL housing needs. It should be a valuable resource to anyone interested in housing throughout the County.’
The second report, by Dr Philip Bratby, is an equally crucial, evidence-based challenge to government policy as it affects Devon. Together, these reports show that centrally imposed targets grossly overstate need and are driving excessive and inappropriate development. We need to change course.
Hard copies are available here, for £36 and £10 respectively, or free if you join CPRE before 31st October (£36 per year). I understand that CPRE needs to recoup its costs, but I think (1) that copies should be supplied to all County and district councillors and parish councils, and (2) that they need to be made available online for the public to read.
Constructive A35 meeting at Wilmington with @HighwaysEngland – but I am concerned that the timetable is slipping
I was at a meeting of the A35 Action Group with Highways England yesterday, in Wilmington Village Hall (members of Widworthy and Offwell parish councils attended). There was a constructive discussion of HE’s emerging proposals for managing speed on the 13 mile stretch between Honiton and Charmouth, together with remedial measures in Wilmington itself. The chair of the Action Group, Dr Phil Webber, will channel comments and suggestions on the proposals to HE following the meeting.
It was good news that the study of the proposals is under way and will be completed by March. However I was very concerned that the detailed design phase, which was envisaged for 2019-20 when I met HE two months ago, is now pencilled in for 2020-21, and delivery has slipped from 2020-21 to 2021-22. I am writing to the regional Programme Development Manager to ask that they return to the original proposal.
‘Colyton’s War’ event will commemorate ending of First World War 100 years ago next month
I hope to be at the opening ceremony for this important event commemorating the end of the First World War 100 years ago and the lives of local people during that conflict.
As an unpredictable nationalist occupies the White House and cynical authoritarians rule in Russia and China, this is a good moment to remind ourselves that peace is fragile and that in the 21st century we still need the institutions which Europe and the world created to maintain it after the Second World War – which had claimed even more lives than the first.
#lovelibraries ‘A seven and a half per cent annual reduction in book issues – if we carry on like this, libraries won’t be dusty, they’ll be gone’, Devon Scrutiny Chair tells library chiefs and @LibrariesUnLtd
In a far-reaching discussion of the state of Devon’s libraries on 25 September (minute and webcast at item 83), the County Council’s Corporate Infrastructure and Regulatory Services Scrutiny Committee – which looks at services like libraries which have been outsourced, in this case to the mutual Libraries Unlimited – considered a continuing decline of book issues which, as this comment of our chair, Cllr Alastair Dewhirst, suggests, could soon threaten the very existence of many of the county’s 50 libraries.
I was unable to attend, but had played a part in preparing the discussion. In this post I try to take stock of where we are now. Cllr Dewhirst’s comments referred to a remark by Cllr Roger Croad, Cabinet member for libraries, at the previous meeting in June, when he talked about the image of libraries as places full of dusty books. Cllr Croad, Ciara Eastell (LU chief executive) and other officers had lauded the work LU had done in making libraries more attractive places through refurbishments, ‘fab labs’ in major libraries, arts activities, friends groups, and functioning as local community centres in towns and villages.
LU also emphasised the increasing numbers of e-book issues, but the modest rise in these has been tiny compared to the loss of book issues. Nationally and internationally, the traditional book remains strong, with rising sales. The idea that it would be replaced by e-books has proved misleading. We need libraries to be full of the many great new books for adults and children alike which are appearing every year.
The relentless decline of book issues
The Committee clearly appreciated LU’s efforts to expand Devon libraries’ impact, and the commitment of the Council, guided by Cllr Croad, to maintain the service despite its diminishing funds (not one library has been closed). Nevertheless the Committee had to address the relentless decline of issues (halved over the last decade), the underlying weakening of the quality and quantity of the book stock, and the diminishing role of librarians.
On present trends, it seems almost certain that some time in the next few years, libraries in some Devon towns and villages will face a moment of truth. ‘The concern is‘, Cllr Jackie Hook said, ‘that the library is losing what makes it a library and not having the the quality of books and professional staff.‘
The Committee recognised these issues by recommending that LU add two new Key Performance Indicators for its work: Stock issues to children [since children’s reading is clearly at the heart of a library service], and Professional hours worked by library staff. The Committee will receive a further report in 12 months time.
A major challenge – and a radical reorientation needed
Ciara Eastell told the Committee: ‘Books and reading are absolutely at the heart of our mission’, and I think the discussion is a real step forward in acknowledging the major challenge which Devon’s library service faces to its core role. However it often sounds as though LU and County Council chiefs believe that expanding other activities can compensate for the failure to address the service’s central decline, which began before LU was established but which LU’s current policies are failing to stem.
Now that the issue has been brought so clearly to their and the Council’s attention, I hope they will address it head-on. Let us see a real reorientation of policies and funding priorities to address it. Let us hope that in 12 months time, they will be able to report a different picture.
The task is especially urgent because of the unremittingly gloomy outlook for public services and local government. Although Theresa May says that ‘austerity is over’, county councils like Somerset and Northamptonshire are going bust, Brexit is leaving a big hole in the government’s tax base, and Devon faces a further big withdrawal of government funding next year. To defend the level of library funding, we need to show that it is being used to maintain a well-stocked library system which can attract and keep new readers.
I make the case for a Dorset and East Devon National Park at the County Council, who will invite national review panel to visit
Yesterday Devon County Council agreed a recommendation to invite the review panel on national parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty, recently established by the government, to visit Devon. This was in response to a motion I proposed supporting the idea of a Dorset and East Devon National Park. I explained my support in a speech which you can see on the webcast.
Red faces at County Council as Leader’s reply shows someone doesn’t know what a no-deal Brexit means
At yesterday’s Council I asked what preparations Devon had made for the UK crashing out of the EU without a deal on 29 March 2019. The written answer provided talked about would happen at the end of a ‘transition period’ in December 2020. It was obvious that whoever wrote the reply didn’t realise that without a deal, there will be no transition period! The Leader, Cllr John Hart, in whose name this reply went, did make it clear when I challenged him that he understood the risks. But the fact remains that the County Council, which is the emergency planning authority, has made no significant preparations for a potentially serious disaster – caused by the policies being pursued by the Conservative government.
Seaton Visitor Centre Trust series of Winter Talks begins on Thursday 18th October with Richard Edmonds on the Great Bindon Landslide of 1839
‘Creeping towards a modern model for the Great Bindon Landslide of 1839’
Richard will summarise the great event and focus on where the work is going in terms of understanding this most famous of landslides.
Thursday 18th October, Marshlands, Harbour Road, Seaton, EX12 2LT, 7pm for 7.30pm. £3 on the door. Licensed bar
Seaton & Colyton MATTERS 