BASCHURCH PARISH COUNCIL CHAIRMAN S ANNUAL REPORT 2017 The Parish Council is keen to keep you informed about its activities over the last year. Here is a summary of our main achievements and difficulties over the year, together with an outline of the possible focus for the next 12 months. Whatever your political views, one thing we can agree on is that everything is more challenging than it was a year ago. As a Parish Council, we are being asked to do more and more, I will go into further detail later in my report. Our Parish Councillors have continued to work hard over the last 12 months and there have been 20 full meetings. As was mentioned in my report last year, we are also working towards furthering the quality accreditation of the Parish Council and the Clerk has attended many training courses and gained qualifications that will assist us with the new challenges we face. As promised, the new Parish Council website is now fully operational and a schedule of Parish Councillors and their attendances is available to view on the website. Council meetings are open to the public and provide an opportunity to ask questions on any issue relating to the villages and surrounding areas. Agendas and minutes are posted on the notice board in Baschurch as well as on our website at www.baschurchpc.org.uk Mobile Phone Mast One of the highlights of the last year has been the work carried out in conjunction with Shared Access to bring a new mobile phone mast to Baschurch, located in the corner of the recreation field. Baschurch Parish Council were approached by Shared Access in March 2016 and following discussions and negotiations, a contract was signed in November 2016. The mast was installed in March 2017 and it is hoped that the mast will be powered up in the next few weeks. BT are making a site visit tomorrow to progress this. The mast will be 2G, 3G and 4G enabled and will give a very welcome boost to the mobile phone and broadband transmission in the area. 1
In return for leasing a small parcel of land for the mast for the next 30 years, Baschurch Parish Council has received a one off sum of 40,000. After deducting legal costs, there is a balance of 38,831, which has been set aside in a designated fund. As the mast has been sited on recreation ground, Baschurch Parish Councillors unanimously agreed that this money should be ringfenced to be spent on public recreation within the parish. We have already had some enquiries about what this could be spent on and we hope to bring some ideas forward in the next few months for the Parish Council to consider. Planning Applications and Neighbourhood Planning Baschurch Parish Council has no executive powers in deciding planning applications - this is the prerogative of Shropshire Council, which is the Planning Authority. However, it is mandatory for the Planning Authority to consult the Parish Council on all applications in its area. The Parish Council can then comment as it sees fit on any application, but the Planning Authority can disregard these comments if it considers them to be inappropriate. Your Council remains concerned with the number of houses and developments being proposed within Baschurch and Weston Lullingfields. Over the past twelve months, in total we have dealt with 39 Planning Applications and the Parish Council objected to 7 of those applications, with a further 7 either receiving a neutral or no comment response. I would like to take this opportunity of thanking my Vice Chairman, Cllr Bernard Leeden, who, as the Chair of Planning has worked tirelessly on our behalf, ensuring that every planning application is carefully looked into. Shropshire Council s SAMDev policy was signed off in December 2015 and has given planning officers more power to control unwanted development, with the majority of appeal decisions being granted in favour of Shropshire Council. However, to ensure the plan continues to be up to date and an enforceable policy, Shropshire Council is currently undertaking a Local Plan Partial Review, which will revise some elements of the plan and set out the aspirations for Shropshire up to 2036. A consultation has been undertaken and Baschurch Parish Council have put forward their views. Areas of particular concern were the removal of 2
development boundaries for all parishes and a blanket expectation that all community hubs will be expected to deliver a set percentage of additional dwellings, irrespective of the number of dwellings already delivered within these hubs. A copy of the response can be viewed on the Parish Council website. Baschurch Parish Council is very concerned about the impact this policy change will have and are looking at carrying out a full Neighbourhood Plan, which will bring together community views and will accurately reflect the aspirations of the Parish. Neighbourhood Plans carry significant weight in the planning process, but are costly and time consuming to produce. Baschurch Parish Council has deferred voting on a Neighbourhood Plan until the new Parish Council has been elected in May more about this later in my report. Delivering Local Priorities through Partnership Working The Community Infrastructure Levy, also known as CIL, has been in place for a few years now. A proportion of the funds raised by Shropshire Council is available for Parish Councils to spend on infrastructure projects. I reported last year that this process is vague and it still is! In addition to the CIL, we receive money from the Neighbourhood Fund and we have identified that this money will continue to be used to modernise our street lighting more about that later in my report. CIL is currently under review and it is not clear whether this will be replaced or removed altogether by central government to remove barriers for house building. Baschurch Parish Council is due to review its priorities for spending CIL in the autumn of 2017 and it is anticipated that this review will fall within the Neighbourhood Plan. Finance For the year 2015-16 Baschurch Parish Council received an unqualified audit return from the external auditor. The precept and Neighbourhood Fund was set in January 2017 at 59,129.10 and the budget has been agreed for the year 2017/18. We are only just at the end of the financial year and year-end figures for 2016/17 will be available shortly. As mentioned earlier, we continue to be very concerned with the significantly reduced services provided by Shropshire Council due to their 3
strict financial constraints, and the increase in work for this Parish Council from a budget that has not increased for eight years. As part of well publicised budget cuts, Shropshire Council has announced a number of services that they will no longer be providing, including provision of libraries, leisure centres and maintenance of some amenity areas. The message from Shropshire Council has been very clear Town and Parish Councils can take over the running of the services that Shropshire Council can no longer fund, or the services will be cut altogether. Baschurch Parish Council is seeking to take over the maintenance of the amenity areas in the parish to ensure that the appearance of the village can be maintained in areas that we are able to influence. Baschurch Parish Council will be responsible for the legal costs of taking on these areas and subsequently the contractors to carry out the maintenance plus the cost of any additional insurances required. For Baschurch Parish Council to be able to take over these services, an increased precept is unavoidable and we eventually settled on 29.4%. An increase of 29.4% may appear significant, but 29.4% of not a lot, is not a lot at all! In real terms Baschurch Parish Council will only receive about 9,800 extra to help fund cost increases as well as other exceptional items of expenditure. On average, the increase will equate to less than 10 per property per year and our precept is still lower than adjoining parishes. The additional funding generated from the precept increase will be used to fund street lighting maintenance, Neighbourhood Planning, which I have already mentioned, together with the cost of the Parish Council elections I will talk about these a little more later. Baschurch Parish Council boundary is quite extensive, with Baschurch itself being only a small proportion of the area that Baschurch Parish Council is responsible for. Baschurch Parish Council only has one employee, our Clerk, who is responsible for all aspects of keeping the Parish running smoothly. I would like to take this opportunity to remind you that Parish Councillors do not receive any payment, allowance or any expenses for their work or meetings they must attend; their contribution to the Parish is 100% voluntary. 4
Street Lighting The Parish continues to have a contract in place with High Line Electrical to service and maintain the street lights that the Parish Council is responsible for and the current stock maintained is 95 street lights. Some of these are beyond their working life and we have to refurbish and replace these, with the cost being born fully by this Parish Council; the cost of replacing just one of these is approx 3,000 plus VAT. The Parish Council continue to work with High Line Electrical to identify street lighting that needs updating or replacing and also looking into the cost effectiveness of updating the existing lamps with LEDs, which are more environmentally friendly and use significantly less energy to run. Highways One of the main functions of the Parish Council is to liaise with Shropshire Council Highways Department regarding numerous matters such as the cleaning of gullies, repair of potholes, overgrown hedges, dangerous road surfaces, speed limits and signage. I am pleased to report that we have a good relationship with the Assistant Divisional Surveyor and he does endeavour to prioritise our requests. A topic that dominated the discussions over the last 12 months was the build out north of the pedestrian crossing at Newtown. The crossing has proved to be a true Marmite loved or hated, with very little opinion in between. Following various investigations, discussions, public meetings and debates, the Parish Council narrowly voted for the removal of the build out, with the suggestion being submitted to Shropshire Council. The final decision on the removal rests with Shropshire Council. The Parish Council has been requesting changes to some of the speed limits in the village for a number of years and I am pleased to report that the reduced speed limits along Station Road and also Ruyton Road have finally been implemented. Baschurch Parish Council have requested a further extension to these speed limits and we currently await a response on that matter. The Parish Council and Cllr Bardsley continue to put pressure on Shropshire Council to renew the Vehicle Activated Signs within Baschurch village. This has been frustrating for all and is not currently being made available due to the current financial situation with Shropshire Council. 5
The Parish Council continue to see this as a priority and are investigating whether other funding can be obtained to pay for the signs. Last year, significant clearance and improvement works were carried out along the stretch of pavement along the Ruyton Road. This has allowed this footway to come back into regular use and the Parish Council are extremely grateful to all the agencies involved in getting this work completed. The Community Speed Watch for Baschurch, which is operated by local residents and supported by the Safer Roads Partnership team within West Mercia Police, continues to monitor and report speeding within the village and a number of offenders have been identified and received written warnings or visits from the police. Baschurch Parish Council is very grateful to this team of volunteers for the time and work they devote to this very worthwhile cause. Local Elections I mentioned earlier that Baschurch Parish Council has to fund local Parish Council elections should an election be triggered. For the first time in many years, more candidates have been put forward than there are vacancies on the Parish Council for the Baschurch Ward, so an election will take place on 4 th May. I would like to take this opportunity to thank the Parish Councillors who have served their local community over the last four years and wish them all the very best during the forthcoming elections. I would also like to thank our local member, Cllr Nick Bardsley, for all his support since he took up his post four years ago. The roles of both Parish Councillor and local member are thankless tasks and those that put themselves forward for public office should be commended for volunteering to give up so much of their valuable time to serve their local community. I would like to say a big thank you to Anne Howls, our Clerk. Anne goes above and beyond to ensure the smooth and effective running of the Parish and we cannot thank her enough for all the hard work she puts in over the year. Since I joined the Parish Council, Anne is the only one of us who has attended every single meeting and I am truly grateful for all the support she has given me over the last two years while I have been Chairman. 6
Lastly, my thanks go to all the local residents who provide much of the information about matters requiring the Councils attention. Should you wish to find out any further information about the Parish Council, please visit our website www.baschurchpc.org.uk where you will find all sorts of information, including previous minutes, annual accounts, details of the current parish councillors, together with details of the attendance record of each councillor. 7