The NEWSLETTER BRlZE NORTON PARISH COUNCIL

BRIZE NORTON

May/June 2018

Issue no. 157

WHAT'S ON?

VILLAGE BASH
Sunday 8 July from 2pm - 5pm
The Village Recreation Field

The theme this year is 100 – THE CENTENARY - a commemoration of WW1 ending, the Centenary celebration of the RAF and the Centenary celebration of Women’s’ Suffrage.

To start the celebrations, we would like you to make a ‘100’ themed scarecrow and if possible to display it in your garden from Sunday 24 June, then bring them to the Village Bash for judging.  For more details and rules please refer to the Brize Norton Parish Council website or contact Carolyn (844102).  Last year’s ‘Space’ theme was a great success but this year we can do even better; let your imagination run free and start creating!  We would also like anyone who has bunting to display it in their gardens or home to help give the village a festive carnival feeling.

On the day itself there will be the usual stalls, such as the barbecue, bar (with real ale), raffle (with great prizes), tombola, bottle stall, skittles, cakes, music and the jousting (war) horse. There is a mini sports day for the young ones and tea and cake served in the Elderbank Hall for everyone! 

New attractions for this year are a Prosecco and Pimms tent, vintage tractors, a marquee full of kitchen memorabilia, and name the donkey (real ones!), together with the tennis coaching games and a police car and fire engine (dependent on availability).

In addition to all that there will the School’s Silent Auction with lots such as a guided tour around the Aston Martin factory and a family ticket to Crocodiles of the World plus many more - look to the school report for more details on how and where to bid.

With the weather already organised as warm and sunny (subject to late alterations) and with your help we can make this the best Bash to date, so do come along and enjoy the great village get together!

BRIZE NORTON DANCE CLUB

We meet every Thursday evening 7.30pm-9.30pm in Elderbank Hall

We dance Ballroom, Latin and Sequence dances to CD’s. We have tea and biscuits in the interval.
 
For more information ring Joy Douglas on 842373.

BRIZE NORTON OVER 60’S CLUB

Our past few meetings have included an interesting talk about photography by Gordon, and Tom Smith talked and read his poems about the past.

Our coach trip to Bath in March was good and the weather was fine. We enjoyed our meal in April at The Trout, Lechlade, and we had a successful Coffee Morning.

Our future programme is as follows:

June 5th – Trip to Bourton on the Water
June 19th – Quiz, tea and chat
July 3rd Bob to talk on Memory Lane
July 17th COFFEE MORNING 10.30am at Joy’s. Bring and Buy, Raffle. EVERYONE WELCOME
August 7th – Cream tea at The Chequers

We are a village group of 27 members. We meet on the 1st and 3rd Tuesdays of each month, at 2pm at 4 Squires Close. We have an outing and a meeting each month. After our meetings we enjoy sandwiches, homemade cakes and a cup of tea, thanks to June, Connie, Benita and Ellen.

For more information ring Joy on 842373 or look on the notice board

BRIZE NORTON – NGS GARDEN OPEN DAY 2018

The NGS Garden Open Day will be one week later than normal this year, to be held on Sunday, 24th June 2018, starting at 1pm, so that it does not coincide with Father’s Day.

This year, we shall have 2 completely new Open Gardens to delight you. Also 3 more gardens that were previously open, making a total of 12 glorious gardens, along with the Flower Festival held in St Britius Church. All the gardens are very diverse in their planting, so there will be something to inspire you all.

The entrance fee to all 12 Gardens and the Church Flower Festival will be £5 for each adult; the children’s entrance is free. So please do come along and visit these beautiful gardens and the Church with your friends and family. In doing so you will not only be supporting the NGS Cancer & Macmillan Nurses Charity, but also some of our own local Village Charities (eg. The Brownies, Over 60’s Club, St Britius Church and the Horticultural Society), that benefit from the Funds that we raise on the day.

Food and refreshments will be available at Elderbank Hall courtesy of the WI. Lucy at Grange Farm, Burford Road, will also provide teas and cakes and all monies raised at Lucy’s will go direct to our local Village Charities.

Also, don’t forget that if there are any gardeners in the Village who would like to join us and take part in next year’s annual NGS Garden Event, then please let Jean know, by telephone on; 841347 or by e-mail on; prbutcher1@btinternet.com.

We look forward to seeing you all, on Sunday, 24th June 2018, starting at around 1pm

The NGS Open Gardens Group

ST BRITIUS CHURCH

You are all welcome to come and visit the church for the Flower Festival as you wander around the village gardens on NGS Open gardens on Sunday 24 June. The church will be open until 6.00pm.

In preparation for this and to smarten up the churchyard work will be done to clear ivy and weeds from the gravestones in the old churchyard over the next few weeks. If you could spare a little time to volunteer to help, please ring Carolyn (844102). Thank you to those regular volunteers who assist in this year-round task already.

We also look forward to taking part in the Village Bash on Sunday 8 July. Come and buy from the cake stall and enjoy tea and cakes in the Elderbank Hall during an afternoon of fun being organised on the Recreation Ground. We would be pleased to receive any donations of homemade cakes or offers of help to serve teas. Proceeds from the cake stall and teas will go towards our general funds.

CARTERTON & WITNEY HEALTH WALKS

Carterton: On Monday, Thursday and Saturday we meet at the Town Hall in Carterton at 10.00am. The walks are 1 to 2 miles long.
For more information contact Barbara Goudal on 01993 845923.

Witney: We meet at the Windrush Leisure Centre in Witney at 10.00am on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. We do two walks; one is 1 to 2 miles long, the other is up to 3 miles long, both ending up with a cup of coffee.
For more information ring Joy on 01993 842373.

BRIZE NORTON PARISH COUNCIL CHAIRMAN’S REPORT

Hello to all the residents of Brize Norton from Tony Shillingford your New Parish Council Chair, fresh from my first official event which was the Village Meeting on Tuesday 22nd of May. Thank you to all those that attended. As always it would have been great if more people had been there, but we appreciate families and work take priority.

Unfortunately, Anna Fairhurst, Head Teacher of Brize Norton Primary School, Cllr Alex Postan, our WODC Councillor and the representative from RAF Prize Norton were unable to attend. They both provided reports for the meeting and these were read on their behalf. Inspector Steve Hookham of Thames Valley police and Nicholas Field-Johnson of Oxfordshire County Council attended and delivered their reports in person. Lack of funds seems to be of concern to both these organizations. Manpower is the main issue for Thames Valley Police while Oxfordshire County Council lack essential funds to fix the roads, a matter of great concern to residents across the county. As we have mentioned before, your Parish Council has been providing detailed complaints about the roads with pictures to OCC on a regular basis.

We also had a report from Les Goble, your newest Parish Councillor, who provided an update on the Neighbourhood Plan. Pip Squire was able to update the meeting on planning during 2017, including the Fosseway Development, Lagan Homes and West Brize Norton Development (Bloor Homes). He included the latest on Parish Council Agreements that underpin the S106 agreement associated with this development.

Activities planned for our village this year include the Horticultural Show; the combined school fete and village event (The Village Bash) with its 2nd annual scarecrow competition; National Open Gardens week and ‘RINGING OUT FOR PEACE', 11TH NOVEMBER 2018 & ‘BATTLE'S OVER - A NATION'S TRIBUTE’.

It’s never too early to make a start so if you wish to receive an emailed copy of the program for the Horticultural show please ask me to send it to you by contacting me on tonyshillingford@yahoo.co.uk

I look forward to seeing a good turnout at the Village Bash on the 8th of July; Please start making your scarecrows now. The theme is three centenaries, 100 Years since the formation of the RAF, 100 years since women were first allowed to vote and 100 years since the end of World War One.

BRIZE NORTON PARISH COUNCIL

Parish Council meetings are held on the 1st Monday of each month. Meetings are held in the Brize Norton Sports and Social Club, opposite the Elderbank Hall and the public are welcome to attend.

	Brize Norton @brizenortonvillage or
	us on @BrizeNorton at Brize Norton Village.

We share events or points of interest or discussion and also share items relevant to the village from OCC, WODC, & RAF or weather warnings, bin collections and repatriations.

Or e-mail clerk@brizenortonparishcouncil.co.uk

NEIGHBOURHOOD PLAN

By the time you read this article, we will have displayed the ‘Results of our Village Survey’ at the Annual Village Meeting in May, which I hope you found interesting.

Our Neighbourhood Plan is progressing at a pace!

The Steering Group is busy gathering evidence to support our Objectives and Policies statement. Please do not be alarmed if you see members of the Steering Group with clip-boards walking through the village staring at your properties because one of the ‘Policy Evidencing’ items we require is a ‘Village Assessment’.

Although we live in a small village, the amount of detail required for individual or groups of properties is immense!

If you can help with either request, then please contact me through our website www.brizenortonplan.org.uk.

See us at the ‘Village Bash’ in July if you would like to come and see us or have any questions.

Many thanks,

Les Goble
Chairman of Brize Norton Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group

BRIZE NORTON PRIMARY SCHOOL

Our neighbours will have noticed several changes in the school recently. We just had to share our letter from Nick Gibb, the Schools Minister, with the world by putting a banner up – it feels really good to be told we are “one of the top 1% of schools for Mathematics”. I am always extremely proud of our children’s and staff’s achievements and it is great to have something concrete to celebrate.

We have also installed our new playground equipment in the “story garden” to the side of the school building. We want to encourage more children to be active at playtime and we are lucky to have such lovely grounds – this will get more of them using them more of the time. The new facilities were planned by our School Council children by looking at brochures from several companies and consulting with their classmates, and it has been paid for partly by the School Association (thank you!) and partly through the Olympic-legacy Primary Sports Grant.

At the time of writing, our Year 2 and 6 children are once again facing their national tests. We will not know the results until July, but what I do know is how hard they and their teachers and teaching assistants have worked – and their families too, of course. Whatever the results, they will have done very well.

Meanwhile, we have not let up in our programme of special events and trips, large and small. It was lovely to have a visit from Little Jen, a donkey, and her tiny baby: thank you to the Barber family for that. Our children have taken part in a range of sporting events, from specialist coaching at Magdalen College School, Oxford, to tournaments with other schools in the Burford Partnership and collaborative events including dance and a mini Olympics. We are planning not one but two special PE days this term: we have another visit from Mike Mullen, whose BMX event was so popular last year, as well as a PE ‘Wow’ day involving a range of activities.

Reading is a big focus for us, and we have had several special events to do with that, including a visit from the author Jay Burridge, whose book about dinosaurs inspired a whole day of activities. We have a weekly book club led by a volunteer, in which children of differing abilities are encouraged to share a book together, and four year groups met authors at the Bookfeast Book Festival in Oxford. Our youngest two year groups not only met the great Julia Donaldson (author of The Gruffalo and much more), they took part in a concert with her, performing songs from some of her books. We are also the first school in Oxford to have an official qualified Reading Dog: Honey comes in twice a week with her human, Andrea Godfrey, to read with children who may lack confidence reading to a human. This is of course, not to mention the things which have been going on for a while, not least Phil and Mary Holmes’ volunteer reading programme which has been invaluable for many years.

As the summer approaches, we enjoy going outside a lot more – although Forest School has been going on all year. This term is the chance for our oldest children to join in, learning to use knives, light fires and take risks in a controlled way. (The youngest children enjoy Forest School all year round, but the others alternate through the year.) Our pond area has been recently renovated by Dave Golding, another one of our fantastic parents.

All our classes are using the Rec for PE this term; we are always grateful to the Parish Council for letting us use their lovely space. After half term, we are planning an afternoon’s country ramble for the Year 3 – 6 children, in preparation for taking Years 5 and 6 on a camping trip and a climb up Snowdon in mid-June. Nobody can accuse us of being a boring school!

However, the summer also means we look to changes for the new academic year. We were once again oversubscribed for next year’s Foundation Stage. This secures the school’s future, but it is good that all children living in the village, and all siblings of current children, have secured a place. All our Year 6 children have secured places at secondary schools of their choice, with most going to Burford – we are lucky both that Burford is such a good school and that they guarantee places for children from our school. We will have some staffing changes, too, as two of our teachers (Emily Harris and Claire Musgrave) will be moving on, Miss Harris to a school nearer her home and Miss Musgrave to Abu Dhabi! We are very grateful for all that Miss Harris and Miss Musgrave have done in their time at Brize and we know they will be successful in their new schools. We also know that the new staff we have appointed are very good and that they will fit in well to our hard-working but fun and happy little school.

ROBERT COURTS MP

I hope you are all well and have been able to enjoy the brief episodes of sunny weather!

Many of you have contacted me about the condition of roads in West Oxfordshire, and I am very aware of the damage that has been done to our roads during the winter months earlier this year – especially along Station Road and the A4095, in particular. I have listened to your concerns and I have campaigned for more funding to fix potholes right across the constituency. I therefore welcome the Government’s recent announcement that local roads badly affected by winter weather will benefit from a further £100 million to help repair any potholes and other storm damage. This means £1.8m will be available for Oxfordshire to repair potholes; when coupled with other funding announcements, this means we will have nearly £3m to fix our roads.

The Highways Team at Oxfordshire County Council (OCC) are working hard to address these issues, using this funding to patch the areas that need it most, and I welcome the good work they have done so far. Nevertheless, I know there is more to do, and I continue to push for more funding – but this is certainly a big step in the right direction.

As ever, if there is anything you wish to raise with me, please do not hesitate to contact me at robert@robertcourts.co.uk.

BRIZE NORTON PRIMARY - SCHOOL ASSOCIATION REPORT

Welcome to the final half term of the year, it’s hard to believe that we are almost at the Summer Bash already!

The School Association would firstly like to take this opportunity to thank our outgoing Chairperson, Jo Rushton. Jo has been a truly dedicated Chairperson; she has put a lot of time, effort and energy (and definitely plenty of blood, sweat and tears!) in to planning and implementing countless activities and raising thousands of pounds. We could not have asked for a more committed and motivated leader.

We would like to thank the many villagers that attended our Quiz Night, it was a fantastic success and the array of puddings was particularly impressive! The Quiz raised an amazing £205.00 we are hugely grateful for Ralph Davies coming back to be our Quiz Master again at short notice.

We raised another £470.00 from our Easter Egg Raffle and Disco, both activities the children really enjoyed!

We have not only been busy raising but also spending this term! We have supported the school in their purchase of new play equipment, which is being installed shortly and should be completed by the end of half term. The School Association also provides on going support to Forest School, which the Reception Children attend weekly and the other children get to enjoy for a term each per class.

Our biggest event of the year is coming up and hopefully everyone will be able to attend! The Village Bash will take place on 8th July from 2-5pm on the Recreation Ground.

We will be running Jousting, a BBQ, The Grand Raffle, a Silent Auction and lots of other fun things for the whole family. Prizes have been kindly donated by; Crocodiles of the World, The Cotswold Wildlife Park, Wychwood Brewery and many others.

The theme of the Bash is 100 Years (RAF, WWI and The Women’s Suffrage Movement), the children will be making scarecrows at school but we are asking that families and friends of the School Association will also join in and display them throughout the village. This year along with the scarecrows we are going to adorn the village with bunting, please feel free to decorate your houses and gardens with bunting to help us celebrate the Village Bash.

We are still looking for volunteers to help set up on the morning of the Bash, please contact Lauren Jacobs 07766521443 if you could spare a couple of hours!

To take part in the Auction visit: https://auctionofpromises.com. Search for Brize Norton

Our final event of this year will be the Summer BBQ on Friday 13th July to celebrate the end of another fantastic academic year. We will also provide the Year 6 Pupils with Leavers T-shirts as a lovely keepsake from their time with us at Brize Norton Primary School.

We look forward to seeing you at the Bash!

SPEEDING SIGNS

By the time you read this there should be new speed warning signs outside the Primary
School. There has been a need for this since the lollipop lady retired. These lights are programmed to flash during the beginning and end of the school day to warn drivers to slow down.

ENSIGN

You may be aware that in the event of a repatriation the flagpole on the edge of Les Marshall’s garden displays the Union flag at half-mast. This has continued during each repatriation showing the relations of the deceased that we share their sorrow. In his absence Keith Glazier does the honours.

The last repatriation was two weeks ago and whilst trying to deploy the halyard, the pulley on the top broke. Les approached the Chief Executive of FLAGMAKERS, CHESHAM and explained what was needed and why Brize village displayed the Jack. They kindly replaced the damaged items FREE OF CHARGE as a gesture.

We hear a lot of bad things in the press and on the news and it is heartening when someone does something positive. We thank them for their generosity.

GRASS CUTTING

NEW HANDYMAN NEEDED

Your Parish council are looking for a new Village handyman to keep the village in a clean and tidy condition and from time to time undertake other roles as directed by the Parish Council or Clerk. The role will the maintenance of village assets together with the reporting of any defects to the clerk. If you are interested in this role please contact Alison Riseley (clerk) at clerk@brizenortoparishcouncil.co.uk, for a more detailed job description. The advert will be posted on the village notice boards

VILLAGE BASH
SCARECROW COMPETITION

To start the celebrations, we would like you to make a ‘100’ themed scarecrow and if possible to display it in your garden from Sunday 24 June, then bring them to the Village Bash for judging on the 8th July.

YOUR COUNCILLORS

BRIZE NORTON PARISH COUNCIL

After the local elections we are pleased to introduce you to your new councillors, with their key responsibilities.

Chairman – Tony Shillingford                                              
Vice-chair – Wendy Way
Andy Ball - Legal
Ben Campion – Liaison with West Brize Norton Development
Les Goble – Neighbourhood Plan                                        
Pip Squire - Planning
Clerk & Finance– Alison Riseley

Many thanks and appreciation to Stuart Guest and Laurence Taylor who have stepped down. We are one councillor short, if you are a willing and enthusiastic resident we would be happy to discuss the role with you. clerk@brizenortonparishcouncil.co.uk

WODC (District Councillor) Cllr Alex Postan
OCC (County Councillor) Cllr Nicolas Field-Johnson

WHO'S WHO?

DIARY OVERVIEW

DATES FOR YOUR DIARIES

JUNE
Monday 4th June 7:30pm Parish Council Meeting
Tuesday 5th June, 2pm (Over 60’s) Trip to Bourton-on-the-Water
Tuesday 12th June WI - Ken Brazier talking on "An Old Man climbing Kilimanjaro"
Tuesday 19th June, 2pm (Over 60’s) Quiz, tea and chat
Sunday 24th June Last chance to display a ‘100’ themed scarecrow
Sunday 24th June, 1pm NGS Garden Open Day

JULY
Monday 2nd July Parish Council Meeting
Tuesday 3rd July, 2pm (Over 60’s) Bob to talk on Memory Lane
Sunday 8th July 2-5pm Village Bash
Tuesday 10 July WI Lynda Warren talking on "The Mystery of Agatha Christie"
Tuesday 17th July, 10:30am (Over 60’s) Coffee Morning

AUGUST
Monday 6th August 7:30pm Parish Council Meeting
Tuesday 7th August, 2pm (Over 60’s) Cream Tea at the Chequers
Wednesday 15th August Send newsletter entries to Alison Riseley