February/March 2009
Brightwell-cum-Sotwell Community Village Stores
“…the sun climbs slow…”
Plans
It is a joy to be able to report continued progress – the “one step back but three steps forward” kind of progress. Our previous plans, outlined in the September report, have been altered with the help of the Trustees of the Village Hall. Our current plan is for a one storey free-standing shop at the back of the Village Hall with new improved storage space for furniture on the ground floor of the Village Hall. This allows the Stewart Room to remain where it is and to continue to have access from the Hall itself and removes the need for an expensive lift.
Planning
We have received positive encouragement from the Planning Department of the SODC to submit a detailed planning application. We have appointed an architect to draw up plans and a surveyor to undertake a land and levels survey in order to have the documents submitted by the third week in January. The SODC then have up to eight weeks to comment and, hopefully, agree on the plans. That takes us nearly to the end of March – more about timing later.
Community InvolvementWe will have talked with all the neighbouring villagers and presented to, and we hope received the support of, the Trustees of the Village Hall by the time this article is published. Hugh Roderick, Adrian Wood and their merry men will have produced a flyer which will be circulated to all the houses in the Parish and, be warned, we will be approaching everybody for pledges or donations!
You may have noticed the heading at the beginning of this article. We have been strongly advised that we should be able to attract more funding from outside sources if we form an “Industrial and Provident Society for the Benefit of the Community” and we feel that the new title carries this through better than just calling it the Village Shop. This form of organisation, which sounds like a throwback to the eighteenth century philanthropists, is chosen by a large number of Village Shops as it enables everyone contributing to have one share, irrespective of the size of their contribution, and all profits are ploughed back into the shop. A committee of management runs the shop and there is an annual meeting of all members once a year. By adopting this form, we hope that all contributors will feel involved and continue to participate in the success of the village stores.
We will be holding another Village Meeting when we have had the response from the SODC planners, hopefully in early April, to report on progress and to receive feedback
Fundraising
A preliminary budget costing shows that we need to raise about £150,000 to build, equip and run the stores. We have already started our applications for funds. David Dobbin, the chairman of the finance and fundraising group, has applied for ViRSA funds and we have just been told that we have been approved for a grant of £20,000. This requires us to raise at least £20,000 from local villagers, and, in addition as part of the package, a loan from the Co-operative Bank for £20,000 will be provided (which, of course, has to be repaid!).
We have also identified other funds from whom hopefully grants will be secured. Among them is the SODC Community Investment Fund which was so generous in helping us to finance the building of the Jubilee Pavilion on the Recreation Ground. Applications for SODC funds have to be in by 31 March so we need to move pretty quickly to set up the legal structures and receive the needed approvals to qualify. We are cautiously confident of raising the necessary money but cannot place any contracts until we know that we have it or pledges for it.
Operating the Stores
Planning the details of operating The Village Stores is starting now under Corinne Jones. We need those who previously volunteered to help to confirm that they remain prepared to do so and we are still looking out for a paid manager for the stores with retail experience. All suggestions and volunteers to Corinne, please, on 836686.
What Now?
Lots of hard work to come, but encouraging progress recently. There will be many challenges ahead but Arthur Hugh Clough is coming into his own and encourages us to
“Say not the struggle naught availeth…”
2009 could, just could, be the year of the renaissance of the Village Stores. And that’s worth fighting for, isn’t it!
Jim Sanger
Allsorts Pre-School
After the magic of Christmas, with a surprise visit from Santa to the Pre-School and our little people performing their very first play, you would be forgiven for thinking that the New Year may have started with a whimper. But 2009 has kicked off with a bang and it’s party time! Allsorts was thrilled to have been awarded the much-sought-after Stage 3 Accreditation by the Pre-School Learning Alliance as part of its quality assurance scheme. Now that the paperwork has been finalised, we are officially celebrating by throwing a party this term for all those whose day-to-day work make our local village Pre-School such a success story.
There are also other people who, despite the current economic climate, have gone out of their way to help Allsorts when we need it most. Super Service of Frogs Island very kindly loaned us a pressure washer to clean our tots’ play area, helping to keep them and our staff safe. And a big thank-you goes to Matt and the rest of the Bevis clan for going out in freezing temperatures in their personal time to get the job done!
Also proving every little bit really does help, Tescos has succumbed to the charm of Helen Rouse and our fabulous fundraisers and donated tubes of Smarties. We get to have the fun of emptying the tubes and then filling them up again with loose change to go to the Pre-School’s projects for our mini-people. Villagers are invited to join in and hand in their own tubes of silver and copper “Smarties” to Allsorts!
We are also very pleased to see new volunteers join our fundraisers on the new Committee of 2008-9 and hit the ground running. The afore-mentioned Father Christmas funnily enough bore an uncanny resemblance to one of our newest members!
Victoria Clyde-Matthews
Save the Children
“Carols around the Christmas Tree” raised a total of £406.91. Our thanks go to all the people that supported us once again this year, also to our sponsors, the Hand Bell Ringers, Emily, Francesca, Natasha, Xana and Ollie. The Hand Bell Ringers went on to collect a further £69.43 at the George Hotel. Despite our problems with the sound system, the evening was a great success enhanced by the appearance of Father Christmas who needed the children’s help to find the Donkey Sanctuary!
There is an increasing need for the work Save the Children carry out in this Country and around the world. You can be assured that all funds raised really make a difference to those children’s lives.
Celia Collett
St Agatha’s Church
Villages such as Brightwell-cum-Sotwell are an intrinsic aspect of our country's heritage. We should and, hopefully, do count ourselves fortunate to live in such a community and to be able to play a part in ensuring that this heritage is passed along for the benefit of future generations.
Similarly St Agatha's, in addition to being significant on the national scene as recognised by its Grade 11* status, is an important part of our local heritage. Whether or not we are regular church attendees, we surely accept that St Agatha's is a historical and community focus for our village. It has contributed to the life of this locality since Norman times, providing a place where everyone can meet or worship or go for quiet contemplation.
These days we may go regularly to the Church for worship, we may attend primarily for weddings, baptisms or funerals, or we may only go to events such as the Son et Lumiere Millenium celebration or the more recent Faure's Requiem. Most of us benefit in some way from the presence of St Agatha's and its enrichment of our community. We therefore all should be interested in the Church being utilised even more by the public at large, to fulfil its potential for becoming a greater social focus whilst not detracting from its position as a place of worship. However this is constrained at present by the lack of basic facilities, in particular toilet facilities.
This issue has been raised in The Villager on previous occasions by Olive Sutcliffe. We now have a proposal for a small lean-to extension to the Church, leading from the existing south door, to include toilet facilities and a meeting room for church and secular use. By means of the short questionnaire inserted in this issue of The Villager, we seek your views on what is proposed before plans are finalised. Please take a few minutes to give us your thoughts.
I have been invited to set up an Appeal Committee under the auspices of the PCC to raise the necessary funds to allow the project to proceed. Once all approvals are secured we will seek funds locally and from grant providing institutions. We do hope that everyone in our parish will support this very worthwhile cause.
Tony Lascelles
Parish Council
The Parish Council has recently updated its computer system and is now using a Broadband internet service, would you therefore please note that the Parish Council e-mail address is ; bcsparishcouncil@googlemail.com
Bus Shelter
The Parish Council is continuing with the task of providing an additional Bus Shelter on the High Road near to Greenmere. The outcome will depend to a large extent on the availability of financial support from the County Council.
Annual Precept
The Parish Council agreed to increase the precept for 2009/2010 by 2% which is below the rate of inflation. We take this opportunity of wishing all our parishioners a Happy New Year and trust you will come through what will be a trying time for us all.
Lionel Cooper
Bach Centre
If you have ever picked up a bottle of Rescue Remedy in Boots or Tescos, or in your local health shop, or even while on holiday in the US or Europe, you may not know that four of its five active ingredients come from Brightwell-cum-Sotwell.
Rescue Remedy is a mix of five individual remedies – Star of Bethlehem, Impatiens, Cherry Plum, Rock Rose and Clematis. All except Clematis grow in the garden of the Bach Centre, and every bottle of Rescue Remedy in the world contains remedies made from those Bach Centre plants. Rock Rose grows at the front of the garden. The plant used is the wild yellow rose, not one of the many cultivated varieties. (All but three of the 38 Bach remedy plants are native or naturalised British plants.) Rock Rose makes the remedy for terror and great fear.
Impatiens glandulifera – known colloquially as policeman’s helmet – springs up all over the garden, and is the remedy for impatience and agitation.
Our Star of Bethlehem mostly grows at the back of the house, next to the bigger pond, and is used to make the remedy against shock and trauma.
And one of the first of the remedies to be made each year – it should be in flower about the time you read this – comes from the flowers of the cherry plum tree. Our tree was planted by Nora Weeks, Dr Bach’s assistant. She stuck a cherry plum stone in the ground and many years later it is often the first tree to bloom in the early spring. The Cherry Plum remedy is used for loss of control.
Only Clematis – the remedy against faint, far-away feelings – comes from outside the village. But not too far away: it grows only a couple of miles distant. The early spring is a good time to visit the Bach Centre garden and perhaps see remedy making in process – and perhaps leave with one or two bottles of your own.
Stefan Ball
Thoughts from Ickleton Fields
Communications nowadays are so easy, swift and efficient that we take the high-tech electronic age for granted and the traditional means of communication, the bush telegraph, grapevine and pigeon post can be forgotten skills.
Not so for Mole. He heard of the exploits of his cousins on Brightwell Allotments with delight. “ Good for them!” he chuckled “ They got the better of that wicked Mr Debney. Up the Brightwell Allotment Moles! I say”
That’s all very well, didn’t you hear that Mr Debney has a cunning plan?” asked Ratty.
“Far fetched,” said Badger, loftily. “From where does he imagine he’ll find right-handed moles? And I don’t think the Parish Council will approve of his plan to replicate the Big Bang. It would fall foul of Health and Safety Regulations.”
“It’s a funny thing with humans”, said Ratty. If they meet someone or something they don’t like, they kill it. Did you hear what that woman who lives here said when she discovered that rabbits had barked her new fruit trees? Most unladylike language and now she wants to have a couple of Daleks to exterminate them!”
“You earth moving chaps are alright,” said Toad, “But what about we surface dwellers? Every time the Heron comes cruising over here, I shiver.”
“Go and hide under a hosta or foxglove leaf,” said Mole “and don’t fidget.”
“You know, this isn’t a bad place, “ said Badger in his most philosophical mode. “We’re quite safe, here, if we keep a normal watch-out. There are those who accuse me of spreading T.B. amongst cattle but they can’t get me here. The world’s been going round for a long time and, hopefully, will go on turning for a bit longer and we’ll just have to make the best of it.”
Marjorie Randolph - Streatley