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The Bradworthy Wind Turbines
Councillor
Christie's Weblog
From your Torridge District Councillor Peter Christie
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21st December '08
Bideford, or at least the area around Pynes/Stucley Road is short of community space, at least according to Humphrey Temperley one of our county councillors. At our last town council meeting where he came to liaise with us he raised this lack and said he was surprised that no recent planning development in the area had included a requirement for this. As it was he said that there was some £25,000 earmarked for a suitable meeting place from the receipts from the sale of Exeter airport. Sadly this sum would not be enough and so he was hoping that other funders might come along. Apparently the Devon & Cornwall Housing Association, Tarka Housing and the police are all interested in pushing this idea forward. I wonder if some room could be accessed on the new Bideford College site? Apropos of the school councillor Temperley was asked what the new College is costing and gave the answer £52 million under the worst case scenario – which seemed at variance with the £55 million recently quoted at Barnstaple by councillor Greenslade the county council leader. Whichever it is the budget seems to have considerably risen from what we were last told. Not only is the College the largest ever single investment in Bideford – but it seems to be getting larger all the time!
It is odd what one discovers by accident – as an example I can quote what happened at a recent Torridge meeting when the current Mayor of Northam Roger Tisdale had requested £2000 for some ‘illuminations’ at Westward Ho! This money was to come from funds provided by the developers of the Bath House Hotel site in the village. I was surprised at this and asked whether they had paid the £800,000 they are liable to pay to the council following their request not to have any ‘affordable accommodation’ in this development. Sadly this hasn’t been paid over yet – but they have paid a much smaller sum ‘to promote Westward Ho! As a tourism destination’ and this is where the money for the lights is coming from. If we ever do get the £800,000 I will let you know but given the ‘credit crunch’ I wouldn’t hold your breath.
Mention of the credit crunch prompted councillor Phil Pennington to warn fellow councillors that Torridge’s stated aim of collecting 98.5% of the council tax may not be feasible given the large number of self-employed people in the district who are really feeling the pinch – indeed councillor Bob Hicks reckoned that in some cases ‘it would be like getting blood out of a stone.’ It was in the light of this that when Bob asked the Policy Committee members to ‘give a steer’ to the council officers over the amount of council tax increase we should be aiming for next year everyone he asked, with the exception of Steve Clarke, plumped for a ‘zero’ increase. In fairness to Steve I should say that he did point out that people on benefits pay no tax – and went on to ask for figures regarding what the weekly increase in both percentage and actual cash would mean – and the figures were relatively small. I noted, however, that there are many in Bideford and in the district as a whole who, though not on benefits, are very low paid and would feel any increase seriously. Given that South Hams district council in the south of the county have already announced a zero increase it will be interesting to see if Devon county council, who after all actually take most of the council tax, try any increase in their tax rates. They are, of course, apparently awash with money from the sale of Exeter Airport so any increase might make the public wonder where the money is going.
Now that Woolworths is apparently closing one has to wonder what might happen to its large and prominent shop in Bideford’s High Street. We can always hope that a chain store might take it – but given the current economic situation this might be unlikely. Personally I wonder if it might lend itself to being split into many small units under the one roof – and run as a sort of indoor market. Certainly small, unusual outlets might fit into the future of Bideford’s town centre better now that we seem to be getting inundated with out-of-town ‘barn’ style shops.
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