HERNHILL NEWS
APRIL 2015
PARISH COUNCIL
Minutes of the meeting held in the Village Hall on Wednesday 25th March.
Present: Mrs H. Figgis (Chairman),
Mr G. Morsman, Mr M. Cooper, Mrs J.
Geliot, Mr A. Bowles, Mr G. Bobbin,
Mrs S. Muteham (Clerk). Also present
were ten members of the public. There
were apologies from Mr A. Chapman,
Mr M. Woodcock & Mr M. Woods.
The minutes of the meeting held on
Wednesday 25th February were taken
as read and signed by the Chairman
Matters arising: Millie Stevens made
a brief presentation on horse and rider
awareness at Staplestreet following
an accident last year. She made a request for road signs to highlight the
fact that there are lots of horse and
rider users of the road. All councillors
present were in support of the project
and the clerk will seek consent from
KCC for the project to progress. Mr A.
Bowles agreed to partially fund the
cost of the signs, with the remainder
to be provided by the Parish Council
and local fund-raising by Millie Stevens.
Planning: Paul Cohen of Warrens
Stores (Holdings) Ltd gave a presentation on the proposed housing development on the old Silversands site. A
planning application for the site has
not yet been submitted. Members of
the public had concerns about road
safety to the site, the ongoing cost of
maintenance at the site (to be covered
by management company fees), consideration of the method and frequency of sewerage disposal and the need
for a wildlife survey on the site.
15/501135/FULL - Proposed industrial
building comprising four units with associated parking at Lamberhurst
Farm. Local residents highlighted their
concerns over the size and location of
the proposed development. After discussion it was agreed that the Parish
Council would object to the application
on the following grounds: The proposed building would be sited approximately 5m from the boundary fence of
the neighbouring residential property.
With a proposed height of approximately 7m it would be overshadowing
the neighbouring property, thus creating an adverse impact on the property.
The proposed building would occupy
a prominent position on the hillside
against the backdrop of Victory Wood
and would be visible from a significant
distance. The development would be
contrary to the Swale Planning Document which recommends that developments in the area should, “avoid
inappropriate large-scale or obtrusive
Chairman: Helen Figgis 01227 751149
e-mail [email protected]
Clerk: Sarah Muteham phone 07740 706189
e-mail [email protected]
Swale Representatives: Andrew Bowles; phone 01227 752840
and George Bobbin; phone 01227 751388
KCC Representative: Andrew Bowles
elements on the visually sensitive high
ground”. The proposed application
suggests a change of use from B8 to
mixed use including B1/B2, however
there is currently no planning application to support that proposal. The Parish Council are concerned about the
business hours and vehicle restrictions for operations at the site and
would seek to ensure that the site is
subject to the same restrictions that
apply to other industrial premises at
the complex. The Parish Council
would prefer to see an application for
a smaller, lower building in a location
that is further away from the neighbouring residential property.
15/501084/FULL – Erection of two single storey extensions and internal alterations to the Village Hall. Mr P.
Rawlins gave a brief presentation on
the proposed extensions. After discussion it was agreed that the Parish
Council recorded no objection to the
planning application but would like to
see a few revisions to the internal
plans.
15/501597/FULL – Two storey front
extension, removal of existing rear
balcony and side conservatory, increase in roof height to include three
dormers,
Greenacres,
Monkshill
Road. The Parish Council recorded no
objection to the application.
Reports: Mrs H. Figgis reported a
large pothole at the bottom of Godfreys Grave. It was also reported that
the local authorities are aware of the
problems at Thirwell Farm, and that
Swale Borough Council Planning Enforcement team are dealing with planning issues surrounding the Pit-Stop
Cafe at Dargate and the Environment
Agency are continuing to be made of
aware of the problems with the digging
on the land behind the Pit-Stop Cafe.
Mrs J. Geliot reported that the water at
the bottom of Fairbrook hill continues
to be a problem and the Clerk is to
request a site meeting between KCC
drainage team and Councillors to
highlight the problems of apparently
blocked drains at Fairbrook, Godfreys
Grave, Kemsdale Road and Plumpudding Lane.
Administration: The Clerk commented that Parish Council election forms
are available and need to be delivered
by hand to Swale Borough Council by
Thursday 9th April.
The next meeting of the Parish Council
is to be on Wednesday 29th April at
8:00pm.
YOUR COUNTY COUNCILLOR
February has been very busy with
some real highlights. I spent the first
weekend in Warwickshire at the Conservative Councillors Annual Conference. We had a really good turnout of
speakers from the Cabinet including
David Cameron and Theresa May the
Home Secretary.
At the end of the Month members of
Faversham & Mid Kent Conservative
Association met to both listen to and
question the final four candidates who
were hoping to follow Sir Hugh Robertson as the Conservative candidate
for the General Election in our Constituency. Helen Whately emerged from
a strong field to secure the nomination. Helen is a Management Consultant specializing in the Health Sector
and is already hard at work across the
Constituency.
As I forecast last month, the Annual
Budget setting meetings resulted in a
1.99% increase in the KCC share and
a 0% increase for the fifth year running
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There being no further business, the
Chairman closed the meeting at
9.50pm.
from Swale Borough Council. Swale
Borough Council have had a reduction
in their grant from Central Government of some 40% over the last five
years. The ability to hold down the rate
of Council Tax has been achieved by
the judicious use of new homes bonuses on new housing developments,
the retention of business rates, raising
fees in line with inflation and most especially by increasingly delivering
services such as human resources
(personnel), audit, parking wardens,
close-circuit television and environmental health inspections in collaboration with adjoining boroughs. Kent
County Council had to find over 83
million pounds worth of savings for the
forthcoming year. This comes on top
of the 350 million pounds worth of savings already made by Kent County
Council. These savings have been
found by developing and transforming
the way that adult and children’s social
services are delivered and by buying
in more services from the private and
voluntary sectors.
Among the many meetings I have attended this month are Parish Council
meetings in Selling, Doddington,
Boughton, Ospringe, Newnham, Dunkirk and Hernhill. I have secured another meeting with the Leader and
Cabinet Members of Kent County
Council to discuss the vexed question
of home to school transport. I still believe the current policy is unfair to
those children (and their families) who
strive to pass the Kent test and
achieve acceptance for a Grammar
School Education.
Sittingbourne & Sheppey Conserva-
tive Association held a well attended
Annual Dinner at Hempstead House
where the guest speaker was Euro
sceptic Conservative M.E.P. Daniel
Hannan who spoke with great knowledge and passion. His speech was
very well received by local members
who included many candidates for this
May’s upcoming local elections.
An interesting and different style of
meeting was the Joint Scrutiny Meeting held at Maidstone. Here, back
bench members of the three Mid Kent
Improvement Partnership Authorities,
Swale, Maidstone and Tonbridge
Wells quizzed the three leaders and
three chief executives on the new joint
planning ‘back office’ service. Although this service suffered severe
teething troubles mainly related to the
IT services for registering and scanning new registrations, the figures for
the turnaround time of new applications are almost back to where we
would like and expect to see them.
The last Sunday of the month I attended Sittingbourne Scouts where I
judged their ‘arts and crafts’. Tremendous effort and no little skill had gone
into the entries. I was pleased to see
that Teynham Scouts, who not so long
ago were successful in bidding for a
grant from my local member’s fund,
were prominent amongst the entries
and prizewinners. After the judging, I
joined them for a ‘Founders Day’ service around the flagpole followed by a
welcome bowl of hot soup.
You can follow me on twitter ‘at Lambert Leese’.
Andrew Bowles
PARISH COUNCIL ELECTIONS
at the same time as the General ElecThere will be elections for the Hernhill tion.
Parish Council ton Thursday 7th May, If you are interested in local matters
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and would like to stand for election in the Village Hall.
Sarah Muteham at
please get in touch. The Parish
[email protected] or teleCouncil meetings are held on the last
Wednesday of each month at 8.00pm
phone 07740 706189.
VILLAGE FETE
There are a number of new attractions
this year including a demonstration
from ‘Joe’s Bows’, the YSM Steel
Band and ‘Cloud 9’ to provide you with
entertainment whilst browsing at the
bookstalls and enjoying a pint from
Ben’s outside Bar.
Hernhill School will be giving us their
traditional Maypole dance and we
hope to be able to run a fun dog show
along with Tug-o-War, if sufficient
numbers can be gathered together.
We have decided not to have stalls for
“nearly new” or childrens’ used toys;
so no donations are required this
year, thank you.
As ever, the organization, set up and
running of the event relies on a few
(and it’s getting fewer) souls. If there
are some strapping lads to help with
the building of the stalls in the morning
or breakdown in the afternoon or if
you feel able to help with the event
even for just half an hour or so, then
we’d be delighted to hear from you.
Contact: Rob Ward
01227 751252
CHURCH URBAN FUND
The fund is a non-profit organisation
working with local men and women for
the good of others in their community.
A very big thank you to all who emptied their loose change into Church
Urban Fund boxes...and to those who
didn't have any small change but gave
notes instead. Nearly £206 was the
splendid total. Well done and again
very many thanks for your help.
Barbara Taylor
WANTED - 100 SINGERS
As part of the celebrations to mark the
800th anniversary of the signing of
the Magna Carta in 1215, the Town
Council in collaboration with Faversham Music Club are setting up
'Faversham Voices'. We are looking
for singers of all types and all ages. If
you're a sing-in-the-shower enthusiast
or a seasoned choral singer, we'd like
to hear from you. You don't have to
read music, but there will be an oportunity to learn if you wish.
The choir is the brainchild of David
Knotts who moved to Faversham two
years ago and has 20 years experience of working with choirs and singers of all types and from all
backgrounds. David works with choirs
of young voices at the Royal Academy
of Music and succeeded Gareth
Malone as music director of London
Symphony Orchestra's prestigious
Community Choir. Rehearsals will be
held on Thursday evenings in Faversham's Assembly Rooms from 7.00 to
9.00pm. The Magna Carta Gala Concert will be in St Mary of Charity
Church on Saturday 6th June.
If you'd like to join 'Faversham Voices'
send an email to
[email protected]
If you don't have access to a computer, you can sign up in The Hat Shop,
110, West Street, Faversham.
FROM THE VICAR
rules for calculating the date of Easter
Easter is a movable feast, sometimes Sunday are complex. Easter falls on
it’s early, sometimes it’s late. The the first Sunday after the first full
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moon after the spring equinox. The
equinox can fall on March 21st so
Easter could be as early as March
22nd or as late as April 25th. However
the full moon is an ecclesiastical
moon which occurs in either a 29th or
30-day cycle, not the astronomic
moon we can all see in the heavens!
Some people don’t like Easter moving
around; it makes life unpredictable
and hard to manage. It makes the
school spring and summer terms vary
in length. Sometimes Easter falls at
the end of the school holiday, sometimes it has to be at the very beginning. Easter’s shifting around gets in
the way of our attempts to make life
predictable, manageable, and subject
to our human power to organize. For
this reason we sometimes hear pleas
to fix the date of Easter. This would
make life more straightforward, we’d
know when to book holidays or weddings without worrying if they clashed
with Easter, school terms would be
more even. Maybe the movable date
of Easter reminds us of God’s unpre-
dictability, sometimes we may want to
tie God down, know exactly what he
is up to, how he will act in certain situations but God isn’t a pet that we can
tame and cage.
In C S Lewis’ Narnia books the character who is the Christ figure is Aslan,
a lion. Mr Beaver told the children that
Aslan isn’t a tame lion, but ‘he is
good’. When we make the commitment to follow Christ we are opening
ourselves to God who is far bigger
than we can ever dream or imagine,
that may seem scary, it involves risk,
but we can also know, through Jesus,
that ‘he is good’.
God is love and God loves us. Life as
a Christian is unpredictable, exciting,
through God’s Holy Spirit we are being slowly changed into God’s image
rather than us trying to form God in
our image. Maybe this Easter will be
the time when you discover for the
first time, or discover afresh, God is
not tame but ‘he is good.’
A very happy Easter to you all.
Revd Jean Burrows
EASTER EGG TRAIL
The annual egg trail will be run at Mount Ephraim Gardens on
Sunday and Monday 4th and 5th April. There will be a mapped
trail around the gardens with an Easter treat for those who finish.
The Gardens will be open from 11.00am until 5.00pm. The
Crafts Centre and the Topiary Tearooms will also be open.
DOVE DOINGS
We still have some tables available for
Easter Sunday 5th April. On Monday
6th April we are holding the first of our
2015 ‘Classic Car’ events, with our garden bar/barbecue open if the weather
is OK. The refreshments will be inside
if it’s not.
Just a reminder for local artists that we
have our outdoor stage area. We
would love to showcase local talent
there; musical, poetic or even theatri-
cal!
‘Pie and a Pint’ is every Thursday
evening, featuring Ben’s wonderful
homemade pies and, of course, a good
pint to wash it down. (Other beverages
are, of course, available too.)
If you are looking for a cosy venue for
your party or reception, why not come
along and see what we can offer, both
inside The Dove and in our lovely garden for which we have a canopy should
the weather try to dampen your spirits.
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LILY BEETLES
My name is Richard Bucknall and I
am a researcher with ‘WyeBugs’. We
are a small company who specialise
in the rearing and supply of predatory
and parasitoid insects to botanical
gardens and producers of glasshouse
crops. As part of our work this year
we have again been asked to carry
out some research on the scarlet Lily
beetle (Lilioceris Lilii). At present no
cultures of this pest species are available in the UK and we therefore need,
as a matter of some urgency, to build
up a stock of several hundred beetles
for work to be carried out this summer.
I wondered if it would be possible to
request for the collection of any adults
that you may come across. The adult
beetles will most likely be appearing
in gardens towards the end of March
and will start to produce eggs at the
end of April.
We would ask that anyone finding
adult beetles collect them into a jam
jar with a small amount of lightly moistened kitchen paper and a paper lid
fixed with a rubber band and then
contact us. Please keep the jar in a
cool shaded place e.g. a shed. We
could then arrange either to pick up
the beetles or to send a pre-paid
package for postage. Thank you for
any help you may be able to provide.
Richard Bucknall
01233 813130 or 07754 069139
GOOD FRIDAY
Boughton Parish church
3rd April at 7.30pm.
The Boughton and Hernhill Festival
Choir's traditional Good Friday concert this year is a little different. Instead of just one work, they are
presenting a number of beautiful anthems appropriate to the occasion and
for congregational participation.
MORE LIVE MUSIC
Village Hall, Tuesday 12th May
Following a fantastic evening with
Steve Knightly, ‘The Band Company’
now brings you Miranda Sykes and
Rex Preston, one of the most sought
after duos on the English folk & roots
scene.
Miranda is known as the stand-out
double bass player and spine-tingling
vocalist who has brilliantly enriched
the ‘Show of Hands’ sound for the
past nine years while former ‘Scoville
Units’ band member Rex is recognised as one of the finest young mandolin players in the UK. For just a few
dates on their 2015 tour Miranda and
Rex will be joined by American guitarist, the internationally acclaimed
Grant Gordy.
For further information and tickets
please contact us; Liz or Gabi at
[email protected]
THE SPRING SHOW
The show was held on Saturday 21st
March. Entries were down on last
year, with 17 participating compared
with 22 last year. Entries last year
were 235, this year 161.
Prize Winners:
Mark James - Daffodil Shield,
Violet Croll - Vegetable Cup,
Violet Croll - Best Bloom,
Alison West - Home Economics Cup,
Photography Cup - Kath Stone,
Floral Art - Sally Bryce,
Children’s Prize - Eve Wallis.
The Horticultural Society would like to
thank the new members who support-
Admission will be free but a retiring
collection will be made in aid of organ
repairs.
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ed the show and put in entries and
won prizes.
Don't forget to bring any plants you
have spare to our stall at the fete on
Saturday 2nd May. Please ensure
that they are labelled.
Forthcoming Events: Friday 10th
April at the Red Lion Hernhill at
7.00pm, there will be a talk by Mark
James, head gardener at Mount
Ephraim. He will be speaking about
the estate through the ages. Please
try to attend as Mark has put a lot of
effort into collecting all the information
for this evening. Sunday 10th May
there will be a visit to Sandling Park
Gardens. Details will be in the May
news.
Peter Bentley 01227 276032
BIT AND PIECES
I’m afraid that I forgot to remind you
in the March issue. So! Who forgot
that the clocks ‘spring forward’ at the
end of March.?
Having buried a skeleton in Leicester
Cathedral with great ceremony, there
are still those who argue that it is not
King Richard at all. Even if you accept
that it is the king, there is still the
argument about whether he was a
good king or a bad one. It just goes
to show that you can put the bones
to rest but you will not be able to put
the arguments to rest with them. After 530 years it is all rather academic.
Far from academic are the terrible
problems in the Middle East. Just now
they seem to be getting worse and
now there are fears that horrific terrorism may spread even further. Europe
is not immune and there are real fears
that the isolated events in Paris and
Denmark may spread. We too are at
risk. The other worrying trend is the
rise of anti-Semitism throughout Europe and in the UK too.
Living where we do we can at least
find peace in the countryside around
us. The spring flowers are with us in
profusion with colour and scent to
help ease the stress of modern living.
Enjoy them as much as you can.
What does spoil one’s peace of mind
are the thefts that
persist
locally.
Between
17th
and 18th March,
items including a
'Henry' vacuum
cleaner were stolen from outhouses at Courtenay
Road, Dunkirk. Between 20th and
21st March, two Bosch strimmers
with a charger were stolen from a
shed in the Fostall. If you can help in
any way please contact the police but
in any case be alert to any unusual
activity.
ADT
To book the Village Hall go to www.hernhill-bookings.net
A copy of the Hernhill News and other local information can be found on
the Village website. www.hernhill.net
Alan D. Taylor
Yew Tree House, Dargate
near Faversham, Kent ME13 9HG
01227 751293
e-mail [email protected]
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NEXT ISSUE
Mon
27th
Apr
Thurs 2 Apr
7 00pm
St. Michael’s Ch
Maundy Thursday
Fri 3
2.00pm
St. Michael’s Ch
'Last hour’ Service
7.30pm
Bought P.C.
6 10am
St. Michael’s Ch
Easter Day
11.30am
Mount Ephraim
The Crafts Centre starts
Tues 7
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Green Bin Collection
Fri 10
7.00pm
Red Lion
Horticultural Soc - Talk
Sun12
8.00am
St. Michael’s Ch
Holy Communion
Tues 14
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Blue bin collection
Sun 19
10.00am
St. Michael’s Ch
Tues 21
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Sun 26
8.00am
St. Michael’s Ch
Holy Communion
Tues 28
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Blue bin collection
Wed 29
8.00pm
Village Hall
Parish Council
Sat 2 May
2 00pm
Village Hall
VILLAGE FETE
Sun 3
10.00am
St. Michael’s Ch
Tues 5
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Green Bin Collection
Thurs 7
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ELECTION DAY
Sun10
8.00am
St. Michael’s Ch
Holy Communion
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Sandling Park
Tues 12
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Blue bin collection
Sun 17
10.00am
St. Michael’s Ch
Sung Communion
7.30pm
Village Hall
Tues 19
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Sun 24
8.00am
St. Michael’s Ch
Tues 26
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Wed 27
8.00pm
Village Hall
Sun 31
10.00am
St. Michael’s Ch
Sun 5
Choral concert
Sung Communion, Church Meeting
Green Bin Collection
Sung Communion
Horticultural Soc Visit
Live music
Green Bin Collection
Holy Communion - Pentecost
Blue bin collection
Parish Council
Holy Communion - Trinity