Maggie

I have just spoken to someone (in Kelvin Hall's dept ) whose name I did not get, in Shropshire Council. Two of the exploration planning applications have expired and the other one is about to expire, and the Company has done nothing with these. The planning dept do not think that the company will proceed in this form with drilling, but may do exploration with lesser impact which does not need planning permission. I was intrigued because the latest press release from government about cash incentives to councils to allow fracking included the exploration licence area under us, but the guy from Shropshire Council does not think that this cash incentive would also cover CBM.

I can't see any links.

Report of meeting was in the Shropshire Star. http://www.shropshirestar.com/news/2013/12/18/weston-rhyn-villagers-fighting-to-keep-gp-drop-in-surgery/

This from Local Trust today: We are announcing today that Big Local areas will be involved in research to be undertaken by the School for Public Health Research. SPHR will research whether giving people greater control over their lives and their community can positively affect their health and wellbeing. http://www.localtrust.org.uk/?new=big-local-big-opportunity-big-impact-2

Cllr Angela Bright has given me a copy of the notice posted by Chirk Surgery in the Institute. It says: Proposed Closure of Weston Rhyn Surgery in 2014 Completion of he new purpose built health centre in Chirk is expected by the end of March 2014. The practice currently operates a one hour morning surgery within the Weston Rhyn Institute every Monday and Thursday. Our current facilities offered at Weston Rhyn are not fit for purpose and it is with sadness that we feel it necessary to propose bringing these sessions to an end by 31 March 2014. Patients who attend the health centre will benefit in a number of ways as the new premises will offer state of the art facilities and greatly improved access and comfort for all patients. We will continue to oprate a triage system so that same day appointments will be available for all out patients. The criteria for home visits will also not be affected following the closure of the Weston Rhyn surgeries. The practice are inviting comments on the closure proposal and ask that patients write directly to the Practice Manager, Julie Webster at Chirk Surgery, Castle Road, Chirk, Wrexham LL14 5 BS by 20th Decmber 2013. The response from the Parish Council last Monday is reported here: http://www.shropshirestar.com/news/health/2013/12/04/patients-meeting-to-fight-gp%E2%80%88service-plan/ There is a public meeting with on December 17th at 6 pm in the Institute. The Practice Manager will be there Some important issues here are: 1. a lot of people use this service. (there have been about 30 people waiting to see a doctor each day since this was announced) An aging population will see this increase. 2. HOW are these ill, disabled, sick, (without transport or they would already be using Chirk surgery) get to and from Chirk? 3. Why has such short notice been given? 4. Why didn't they talk to anyone in Shropshire Health first? 5. Why are they continuing to use the clinic they run in St Martins? 6. What do they mean by 'unfit for purpose'? (Angela was told that broadband speeds were too slow for them in Weston Rhyn, but I beleive they are even slower in St Martins) 7. The Parish Council pointed out that they pay £7.50 per session to the Institute for hire of 2 rooms. Say 20 people per session and this makes a very good return on the money they get per patient signed up at Chirk Surgery. 8. We should therefore investigate whether any other Practice would consider taking on these patients and taking over the facility. Hope lots of people will come to the meeting on the 17th.

Os Town Council have a meeting with Engish Heritage today, and will decide whether to support the Sam Dev release of land for housing at Old Port, or not. This has attracted national attention. Since it was featured in the Observer 10 days ago http://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/nov/24/old-oswestry-hill-fort-housing-threat there has been an increase in interest, and more people signing the petition. (online now at over 5500, plusthe original 2000 paper petition...) As a local person I am ashamed to say archeologists have termed this sort of decision made against public opinion 'Oswestry Democracy' and are writing lots of comment in archaeology and heritage web magazines, which can keep up with the rapid events rather better than magazines. This is the latest: http://heritageaction.wordpress.com/2013/12/05/from-here-to-eternity-a-big-day-for-oswestry/ . This site is worth following if you are interested because it sees a wider natonal context to what is going on here.

Sorry to hear about Nick. I too wish him all the best for a speedy recovery and hope to see him back up here soon.

No Idea! I regularly check the web site http://www.big-local.org/ but there hasn't been anything posted there either in ages Rumours are that some money has been released from the £1 million, so I wonder what that is being spent on? Does anyone know?

Well finally people are waking up to this CBM extraction stuff in our area. There is a useful post on https://www.facebook.com/oswestryi and a link to this site, http://www.fraw.org.uk/extreme_marches/index.shtml The Northeast Wales antifracking network continues to post up links an information, although to my mind it is a bit too 'campaigny' and so doesn't give all sides of an argument but nevertheless is doing a grand job of keeping us all informed. https://www.facebook.com/NEWAFAN Personally I have not made up my mind about whether CBM is a good thing or not, because I can see that there are lots of local opportunities offered by this, which are balanced against possible environmental damage, Therefore we should find out as much as possible and lobby against potentially damaging operations, to ensure that all possible safety measures are put in place as, if and when extraction takes place. But what do people here think?

The campaign to stop land at Old Port being released for development via the SamDev process has reached an important milestone. On Thursday there is a meeting between all interested parties (Council's, English Heritage etc). The campaign has fought by providing facts to refute the arguments to develop, and will continue thus. The online petition is still open http://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/request-that-shropshire-council-withdraw-proposals-to-build-houses-alongside-old-oswestry-iron-age-hillfort We have a newsletter which is around Oswestry, full of information (produced with the money raised by the benefit concert) and there is a Facebook Page for discussion. Here is the article in the Shropshire Star yesterday. http://www.shropshirestar.com/news/2013/10/12/top-level-talks-in-bid-to-safeguard-oswestry-hillfort/

Oh that is good. But we do need some clarification, because there was a lot of confusion from Shrops Council at the last LJC when they were representing the project to our area.

The map is here. http://connectingshropshire.co.uk/connecting-shropshire-fibre-deployment-map/ It looks like most of Weston Rhyn is to be upgraded in 2015, but most of St Martins is under 'seeking extra funding'. However the boundary of the map of Shropshire Broadband doesn't coincide with the geographical boundaries so it is difficult to work from. When the council officer announced the broadband improvements at the last LJC in June he was wrong footed when he discovered we were on the Chirk exchange and he had no answers.

Superfast Cymru have confirmed that this project is only upgrading Welsh premises. Unlike Connecting Shropshire they have funding to upgrade Welsh premises which are served by English exchanges. Yet again it looks like we are going to be ignored up here for the greater good of central and south Shropshire.

Mmm but as the great majority of people get faster broadband, websites become more dense with extra add on stuff which means that download speeds need to be increased to keep up. I would like to be able to watch telly programmes without the pauses and pink circles (even on lower broadband width settings) and would like to be able to use Skype with video. ButI know that parts of St Martins have such slow downloads that they cannot even do that. I would love 5Mb, guess that St Martins would think 4Mb was revolutionary. It is the fluctuations which annoy most, like you said, from almost nothing or nothing, to 4Mb are usual here. Maybe users of Community Online could report on their speeds to get a picture from around the area? Anyhow, true to their word, Superfast Cymru have updated their website, and Chirk exchange is due to be upgraded by March 2015 but only for Welsh premises served by that exchange. I am querying this... will get back with the answer.

For those of us who are on the Chirk Exchange, (which seems to flummox Shropshire Council), Superfast Cymru have a website which is detailing the progress of installation of fibre optic cabling across Wales. There is no date given yet for Chirk Exchange upgrade, but you can register on the site for email updates. http://www.superfast-cymru.com/where-and-when

Now that is finally an answer to why dog poo bags are in trees! Never thought of dog walkers being stoned.

This weekend is 'Heritage Open Days' and, as usual, Oswestry is putting on a good spread of activities. Pick up a leaflet or See the full programme here http://oswestrytownmuseum.co.uk/index.php/heritage-open-days-2013/ I am doing a walk along the canal in Chirk Bank on Saturday, starting at 3.15 from the Visitor Car Park in Gledrid. see the Gallery for the poster. I am also putting some old photos and canal information on display in the Guildhall on Oswestry, from Thursday, for the weekend.

Didn't there use to be day care in St Martins Centre? What happened to that?

Thank John Waine (Best of Oswestry) and Kate Clarke. I've had nothing to do with it beyond answering questions when asked an trying to keep everyone up to date with information. They have used their contacts etc to help the campaign and they have good press contacts. The numbers signing the petition have been the key to this, that is a story in its own right; but given the amazing Hillfort too...it couldn't help but attract attention. We have made sure that as many relevant people as possible have been contacted, and because we had such a short time to get a petition going Twitter was invaluable to spread the word internationally via archaeological contacts. But we also tapped into local feelings, and there were a lot of signatures on the hard copies of the petition around town. The Hillfort potential development is a big story actually, it is the most contentious one in the Shrops SamDev proposals and it works on several levels because the hillfort is important for several reasons, archaeology obviously, but also cultural,wildlife and landscape, emotional, artistic mythological etc. and add in the element of David taking on Goliath and you have a good story that people want to read about. The local press want something that is relevant, and ideally has a touch of controversy to it, and need facts and reasoned arguments that are simple enough for most people to understand. I don't think there has been anything as formal as a press release involved in this, but there are plenty of written statements around with chunks that can be used as quotes, If you are considering a press campaign then is is useful to have a few prepared sentences at hand for if the press phone you so that you don't sound like a prat. If you are going to write a press release, then put a nice quote in it, and email a high quality photo in too, with its info, names of people, where it is etc. If there is a lot of detailed information, then do a simple press release and include that data as 'further information'. I am sure there is lots of other advice.

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I've just emailed Dart Exploration, to find out more, and will try to do a display in Oswestry Museum. I am working on one about the mining of the area, and this is really part of all that too.

Oswestryi have posted a comment on gas extraction in the Oswestry area. Bit emotive to my mind, but it contains a little film which is worth looking at. http://www.oswestryi.com/?p=770#comment-115

There has been quite a lot of press coverage of this over the last few days. Last night Oswestry Town Council had a special meeting to consider how it should respond to the SamDev Hillfort proposals. It is reported in the Shropshire Star today, http://www.shropshirestar.com/news/2013/09/04/council-adamant-over-protection-for-oswestry-hillfort/ There was a good letter in the paper last night too. http://www.shropshirestar.com/news/2013/09/03/letter-magic-of-old-oswestry-hill-fort-will-be-lost-if-plans-go-ahead/ By the way, the aerial photo of the hillfort use by the Shropshire Star shows the WW1 training trenches on the top really well, the low winter light picks them out beautifully. ..and the petition is still open as it was decide to continue it after the SamDev consultation deadline, when the ,at that stage, current petition was handed in. Please sign it and comment if you haven't done so already. http://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/request-that-shropshire-council-withdraw-proposals-to-build-houses-alongside-old-oswestry-iron-age-hillfort The Facebook Page is kept up to date.. https://www.facebook.com/OldOswestryHillfort and this will be on the Agenda for the next Selattyn and Gobowen Parish Council meeting http://www.2shrop.net/2shropnet/AToZOfMini-sites/S/SelattynAndGobowenParishCouncil/CouncilMeetings

Well the Planning Dept was contacted about receiving the petition, and after a bit of discussion Mal Price agree to receive it at Shire Hall. Hillfort group took the photos, no press involved, and the whole thing was very nonconfrontational, because we just wanted to present the signatures on behalf of everyone who signed, and so saw it as part of the SamDev consultation process. Heather still had the banner in her shed so we took that along too. You should probably get in touch with the Oswestry 2020 Neighbourhood Plan people. I have seen a recent draft, and there is mention of the walking/cycle route in there, as a later phase of the development of the route. It's not published yet but will become a working document for the council planning.

Well the beauty (?) of all this Localism is that informed opinions are not as important as they once were, and the opinions of 'the community' count much more highly than before. The process must have frequent consultation and the numbers game has greater than ever value as a means of demonstrating a majority opinion. Hence so very many petitions around just now, and all those people who just seem to sign anything that is put under their noses. Legally, under these new English Bills, the Council MUST be seen to pay attention to all of this. Whether going through the process and actually responding to consultations are the same thing is something else.