Chair column

As readers will know, Shepton is my home town, and it’s a place I’m extremely proud of.  Last weekend, once again, Shepton was at its best.  Sunday’s “Love Your Library Day” was a great success with many people visiting the library and the Cheeky Bean Café to hear local authors talk about their books and share their experiences about writing. Hundreds of concerned citizens came to demonstrate that Shepton’scommunity is not prepared to lose its services without a fight. 

I’ve noticed recently that there is an increasing confidence within our town. Shepton is not only defiant in our opposition to the loss of services, but also we are finding more ways of finding solutions. The Love Your Library Day was the first event arranged by the newly-formed Friends of Shepton Mallet Library.  There is now little doubt that the vast majority want library services to remain in the town centre. The County Council should be rightly proud of its library staff members, Janet and Kirsty, who again showed what an asset they are to Shepton.

The brilliantly successful campaign to keep all our hospital beds also illustrated how Shepton can succeed if it speaks with a strong and united voice. All town councillors, along with residents, were appalled by the potential loss of these respite beds. 

Opposition to the bed closures was led by Major General Ray Pett and Albert Owen, with support from the hospital action group with legal advice from Paul Turner. The hospital beds will now reopen on 9th July.  To celebrate this, the Hospital League of Friends will be holding a Fête at St. Paul’s School on Saturday 21st July at 2pm. I hope to see as many people there as possible to show our support for the hospital and to thank the League of Friends for their persistence and success.

This coming weekend we have Shepton’s Summer Celebration, Collett Festival. Once again we have 3 busy events in Collett Park to showcase our community: the traditional fair on Saturday followed in the evening by the Madness tribute concert, and our free Children’s Festival on Sunday.  I’m really looking forward to the weekend, with its excellent mixture of fundraising, entertainment and displays of local talent. I hope as many Sheptonians and visitors as possible can join us for a brilliant weekend.

Shepton really is a town going places. We have a renewed confidence and purpose, and the more people who participate in our community events, the stronger we become. As Chair of the Council, I want to promote greater co-operation and collaboration between the Town Council and its residents, since I know that a United Shepton is a formidable, unstoppable force.

Chris Inchley, Chairman, Shepton Mallet Town Council

Chair post

CHAIRMAN’S COLUMN 31st May 2018

June is going to be a very active month in Shepton. We have Collett Festival, the next Sunday Market and even the Charles Chipperfield Circus in the park.  But before all that, the Friends of Shepton Mallet Library have arranged a “Love Your Library Day” on Sunday 3rd June starting at 10am

The campaign to keep our library in the High Street has been very active since Somerset County Council launched a consultation to get the public’s views on its plans to move the  library from the town centre into Mendip District Council’s SHAPE complex. Steve Barlow and Sarah Thomas have worked extremely hard over the past months to raise awareness and organise events to keep our library in the centre of our community.

To make sure everyone understands all the benefits of having this town centre facility, the Friends of the Library have organised a full day of activities for young and old alike.  It will all take place in Shepton Library, starting with a mass public demonstration at 10am. Many authors will be at the event and it is a very important opportunity to show your support for keeping this vital community service right in the heart of Shepton.  Please come and show your support!

Remember that the County’s consultation on the future of the library ends on 13th June. There’s still time to tell them what you think of taking the library away from the town centre.

______________

Garfield Kennedy and his team of volunteers are extremely busy making the final preparations for Collett Festival. This year it will be held over the weekend of 9th-10th of June. Collett Festival 2018 features the traditional Collett Day Fair followed by an evening music concert that goes “One Step Beyond” with the world’s leading Madness tribute act, Los Palmas 6.  It’s going to be a “House of Fun” and a great evening.  Advance tickets can be purchased at CollettFestival.co.uk or in person from the Tourist Information Centre.  Don’t miss out!

On the following day (Sunday 10th), we have the third Children’s Festival, where Collett Park will be filled with bouncy castles, amazing games, and again back by popular request, the Bubble Man - and it’s all free!

There is still time to book a stall or to volunteer to help us stage Shepton’s showcase event. Look out for the Festival Programme and Guide that will be dropping through Shepton letterboxes in the next few days.  It’s going to be another brilliant weekend, so come and enjoy the whole show.

I hope to see as many people as possible this Sunday at 10am at the library, and during the following weekend in Collett Park.

Chris Inchley, Chairman, Shepton Mallet Town Council

Have your say on the Library

Dear Editor

The future of Shepton’s library is once again being questioned by Somerset County Council.  The cash-strapped County authority is looking to save hundreds of thousands of pounds from its budget and sees libraries as an easy target to make cuts or closures.

Somerset Council has embarked on a public consultation process.  Residents have a limited chance to express their views in Shepton Mallet Library on Tuesday 27 February from 2.30 – 5.30pm.  For all who cannot make this time slot, you can also comment online at www.somerset.gov.uk/libraryconsultation

We believe the library should stay in the very heart of the town.

Somerset County Council’s own figures show that Shepton’s library is well used with 44,000 visits a year. To remove these thousands of visits would undermine the commendable work by local business people who are doing all they can to regenerate the High Street and bring life, footfall and vitality back into Shepton.

We reject the option to move the library to Mendip District Council’s SHAPE complex as we think this will suck the life out of our town centre. We also fear that a move to SHAPE could prove to be a slow path to eventual closure of any library facility in Shepton. If numbers of library visits fall after a move to the Mendip Office block, then it will be argued that the library is no longer needed.

We support the Town Council’s initiative to try and find a building in the centre of town that can rehouse a full range of library services. This could also become a community hub that could even house the Town Council’s own offices.
It is important that Shepton keeps a modern well-equipped library service, led by professionals, in a central visible and accessible location.

Our town centre library is an important community service for education, personal development, Internet access and events, and should remain in our town centre.

If you believe this too, then you must tell Somerset County Council before their public consultation ends on 22 April 2018

Letter to the journal, Library

At the recent extraordinary town council meeting, the councillors made some really important decisions in regard to trying to retain the library in the centre of Shepton.

Any decision to remove the Library from our town centre will damage the viability and vitality of its economic well being. We know that one of the problems Shepton has, is low high street footfall, I believe it is irresponsible of Somerset county council to take the 44000 visits to the library out of the town centre.

Our community supports the library with good visitor numbers, we have excellent professional staff that do a greatjob. I want the town council to help build on what is currently delivered, we should explore all options in the greatest details, unlike the county council’s light touch table top examination of premises.

It is clear that a modern high street must deliver a mixture of shops, businesses and community facilities, libraries should be in the heart of our community, delivering a wide range of services that meets the needs of our town.

The county council will be holding a library consultation in the new year and it is important that all residents contribute to this, we cannot allow deals behind closed doors to go unchallenged.

I’m sure the town council who unanimously agreed to undertake a study to try a town centre home for our library will work to deliver just that.

It will be for the town council to lead this process, but it is important that our community supports keeping the library in the heart of our town, councils have a duty for the economic well being of our town centres, I fear both the county and district councils are more concerned with financial transactions than delivering community services in the heart of our town

Shepton's health problem

It is a very real disappointment that the beds are be cut from our community hospital and the nursing staff will be deployed elsewhere.

I fear this decision has been coming for quite a while now, these decisions are not an act of God but a failing in planning and investment.

Shepton Community Hospital has not received the investment it deserves to upgrade the in-bed facilities, this despite a huge community appetite to see our local hospital grow and provide services that enhance the health and well being in our area. The NHS has failed to support many bids to improve our hospital.

There is absolutely no doubt that the staff at the hospital  serve our community and are brilliant professionals. It is also clear that there is a staffing crisis in the NHS, with more people leaving than joining.

The government enforced pay cap has seen the pay packets of nurses thousands of pounds worse off in real terms, with dramatically increased workloads, and as the RCN says “leaving staff feeling demoralised and disillusioned”.

The abolition by this government of the bursaries for nursing training to be replaced by £9000 a year loans has seen dramatic falls in those entering the nursing profession, deterring the very sort of people who have the empathetic skills. It is estimated that nationally the NHS has 55000 fewer nurses than we need.

We are also losing some European staff from the NHS, this since our decision to leave the EU.

It is patently obvious to anyone that our acute hospitals are going to be stretched to breaking point this winter, we know that community care in Somerset is not capable of delivering the support that many people need, this due to a mixture of underfunding by national government in relent years and a failure of effective planning by Somerset county council.

There is a need for beds for some local people in our community hospital, and I fear without investment in buildings and staff, Shepton Mallet will forever lose these beds. The choice for people in our  town is, are we going to except this? If you are not then we better say so and say so loudly.

Defining moments

The leader of a political party has many roles, the first is to lead, to articulate what the party is offering the electorate and what sort of country you wish to build. The leader also has to command the respect of their colleagues, creating a strategy and working together to win elections.

The current Labour Party has an important role to be Her Majesty's official opposition holding the conservative government to account. This requires around 100 MPs to fill all the spokespersons  roles.

Last year when Mr Corbyn was elected Labour leader, he knew that after years of disloyalty to the previous 5 Labour leaders he would have to reach out to create a team that could work to defeat the Tories, he sadly failed to do this.

Worse, his lack of leadership has been exposed time and time again, whether reshuffles that take an eternity and instead of government failure to tackle the flood become the story of the leader who cant reshuffle, or clumsy articulation of simple things such as comparing the democratic Israeli state with the barbaric entity that is IS, or the lukewarm support for the European Union or his apparent support of his own Party policy, offering free votes to allow him to behave as he likes, this are not actions of a future PM.

Too often his people complain about a hostile media, all Labour leaders live with this pressure, yet Mr Corbyn and his team muddle allow the media free rain, instead of a clear concise line that the Party can follow.

The last General election Labour's offer was too small, yes it was right to highlight the Bedroom Tax, of course it was right to highlight changes in benefit and it was right to highlight the NHS and changes to student loans, but the whole campaign lack a narrative that the economy should benefit all, every person in every part of this United Kingdom should be able to achieve anything they wanted, creating opportunity for all.

Instead Labour's message look to only help the poor, the offer for too few, not talking to the majority, lacking confidence in the Party ability to change this country.

Labour economic case wrapped up in the macro economic arguments, not about creating wealth, changing economically from making money from money to creating wealth from money, you can only pay your way if you create wealth, people whom earn money spend it locally creating communities.

The last election Labour went chasing the student vote on university fees, I am a great believer in attracting all to universities, but government should be about investing in the first 1000 days of a child's life, health workers, nursery and associated services, it is no surprise that articulate middle class parents have articulate children.

Likewise in health, our NHS is brilliant it does brilliant things every minute of every day, but we need to do so much more on public health, improved education and screening, disease prevention is better than treating disease. The NHS needs proper funding, of course it does, but money alone will not make us healthier.

Mr Corbyn has allowed the Tories the pitch for themselves and he has failed.

Labour now has a choice, continue with this conservative socialism or reach out to the majority and build a better Britain, if it cant then Labour doesn't deserve a future.

StrongerIN

Without a doubt the UK is better served remaining within the EU.

We live in challenging times and it is naive to believe we can solve the problems of our times without working with our partners and our European neighbours, the UK should be leading Europe not leaving.

The UK is an important partner in the EU with 3 million jobs depending on continuing membership, by being a member we can shape the rules of the single market, if we were leave we could still trade with the EU but we would have to agree to rules and tariffs set by foreign governments. We should not turn our back on free trade agreements.

Membership of the EU secures consumer protections that deliver lower prices at the supermarkets for families and we benefit when travelling in Europe with cheaper flights and phone calls.

The EU secures working protections for UK workers, safeguarding maximum working times, paid holidays and equal pay, securing parental leave and equal treatment for part time workers.

In an insecure world the UK has used it influence within the EU to make the world safer, we have secured greater intelligence sharing for security and the use of European Arrest warrants fighting terrorism.

Environmental problems do not respect national borders, this country's membership of the EU has been a crucial factor in shaping our approach to environmental protection, whether cleaner beaches, fuel efficient cars or holding government account on air pollution.

For the reasons above I will be urging everyone to vote to remain in the EU, together we are stronger in Europe.