Grove Annual Parish Council Meeting

On Friday evening, I attended the Annual Parish Meeting of Grove Parish Council at the Old Mill Hall.  I gave the following report to residents about the work I have undertaken in my role over the past year as County Councillor for Grove and Wantage.  I hope it will be of interest to residents who were unable to attend.

COUNTY COUNCIL ANNUAL REPORT TO PARISH COUNCIL 2017

This year, I have been back to my usual council duties as your representative for Grove and Wantage, but it has been a real honour to have taken on the role of Vice Chairman of the County Council during this last year.  This has meant that as well as supporting the Chairman at County Council meetings, I have been out and about the county doing many duties on his behalf when I can.  Several of these duties have included supporting events of the Armed Forces, but I was particularly delighted to have opened the A338 Wantage Road bridge after the Network Rail electrification works had been completed last July.  As many residents will recall, this was a controversial issue when the original plan to close this busy road for 6 months was avoided when it was agreed with the County Council that the new bridge would be built alongside the old one which was eventually demolished.  I must admit I have had a lot of good feedback from residents about the new bridge since it has been built, so this was an excellent outcomefor us all.

As I reported last year, a stay of execution was given to our local Childrens’ Centre in Grove and Wantage to enable community solutions to take place where possible. I am pleased to say that I have chaired our local steering group with St. John’s Parish Church where we have been working with many volunteers to find a solution.  We put in a bid to the County Council’s £1M Transition Fund and were given an interim payment of £10,000.  We were also fortunate in winning a successful bid from Wantage Town Council, who have very generously promised us £10,000 over the next 3 years.

I have now handed over the Chairmanship of this group over to the PCC (Parish Church Council) who will continue running services for mums and babies in the area both at The Beacon in Wantage and at St. John’s Parish rooms in Grove.  We are also seeking more funding to ensure this group continues in the future, as it is much valued, especially with more houses planned for the area. The long term aim will be that this group will come under management of the Vale Academy Trust when it begins building the new Grove Cof E Academy in Grove. 

I am sure that many of you will be aware that the bid to the Dept. for Education to build this new school for Grove to cover ages 2-16 has been successful. I must say I was delighted to hear this news, after campaigning for Grove to have its own secondary school in its own right for many years as it has always been a problem for as long as I can remember that schoolchildren have to travel into Wantage (a near 3 mile journey for some) to go to secondary school. This should provide a seamless education right from nursery through to 16.

Regarding the cuts to bus subsidies which went ahead last year, I have been working hard with officers and the bus companies to see if we could keep some of our valuable routes going.  Since the 38 Town Service has gone, I believe that Thames Travel tried to incorporate some of the routes into their services to Didcot/Harwell, but this has been difficult, because their services do not cover Grove.  This means that although we still have a regular service to Oxford with the Stagecoach X30 and the 31 which also covers Abingdon, to go to Didcot or Harwell, residents have to change buses in Wantage.  This has been creating problems with Wantage Town Council complaining about too many buses in the Market Place.  On the other hand, the local town service around Charlton and Stockham has been discontinued. So the dilemma for the bus companies is how to make their services commercially viable whilst trying to keep their regular loyal customers. There has been a recent consultation undertaken with Stagecoach re-routing the X30 or 31 services, but I haven’t yet heard the outcome of this.  I did meet the manager of Stagecoach to ask him to extend the consultation period until the end of March which they did thankfully. Early signs (though not official) is that the route may not change.  I am still waiting the official results of the survey.

Last year, I did report that there was a consultation regarding one unitary council for the whole of Oxfordshire.  As far as I am aware at the current time, the South and Vale district councils have now agreed on this proposal renaming it ‘A Better Oxfordshire’ and I understand this re-organisation bid is currently with the government.  With a General Election now called for  in June, it is unlikely any decision will be taken for some time after that.  I am sure that district councillors present here may wish to say more about this.

We have had some success with road resurfacing in the area (for example the recurrent potholes on the Denchworth Road by the Bay Tree), but for most people the biggest problem is that potholes are not fixed, or left too long or once fixed, they come back.  I am always told that the best way to report anything like this is to the Oxfordshire County website page ‘Fix My Street’.  This way, you are able to track dates of repairs and see others who may have reported it, as well as learning the current status of repair.

Finally, just to update you that the County Council’s Health Scrutiny Committee did write a letter to the Secretary of State for Health Jeremy Hunt regarding the lack of funding for GP surgeries in the area. This included both Wantage & Grove Health Centre at Mably Way and Faringdon.  Of the £50 Million bid for Oxfordshire, only £2 Million was allocated and none of it came here.  There will be another bidding round next year which we hope will be successful.

I am sure that there may be something I have missed, so please feel free to ask any questions.  As you know, I usually hold my surgeries in Grove Library one Saturday a month, but I have none planned at the moment because there are County Council elections on 4th May and obviously, we don’t know the outcome.  However, what I would like to say is that Grove Library has been one of the first in the County to have been given open access (meaning you can access the library out of hours) at all times. If you feel you would like to take advantage of this service, then please see library staff and I am sure they will help.

May I just say that it has been a real pleasure serving you as County Councillor for Grove for 16 years now, and depending on the wishes of the electorate may or may not be here to continue.

Cllr Zoé Patrick 

County Councillor for Grove & Wantage