The Monthly Meeting of the Parish Council took place in the Village Hall on Wednesday 10^th January 2007 commencing at 7.30 p.m.
The, Cllr Mrs M Metcalfe presided; present were Cllrs M. Day, S Gibbons, C Hill, Mrs J Nudds, M Stevenson and M Williams with G Russell in attendance. Also present for part of the meeting was County Cllr John Howell.

1          Apologies for absence
Apologies were accepted from the Chairman, Cllr K Bryan, who is on holiday, and District Cllr John Cotton who is attending the SODC planning meeting

2          Declarations of Interest
None.

3          Minutes of the Meeting held 13^th December 2006
These were approved and signed as a true record

4     Matters Arising from the Minutes
a. External hard drive now purchased for the Clerk’s computer and back-up procedures are in place giving a daily update of the reserve records.
b. The new Village brochures are still stored in the Village Hall lobby area.
c. Carbon Calculator: Cllr Mark Stevenson has prepared copy which has been circulated for approval to be included in Dorchester News. It was agreed that preliminary information will be published in the February edition and the Council will consider the matter in detail at its February meeting.
d. White Paper on Parish Councils: the Clerk said that there is some information about this in ‘Local Council Review’ but he has not been informed of any OALC briefings.
e. Cllr Bryan Ken has organised for the war memorial chain to be repaired.
f. The Clerk has told District Cllr. John Cotton that the Parish Council would like early warning of any proposals regarding land adjacent to the Cheshire Home.

5          County Councillor's Report
County Cllr Howell explained the background to the County’s review of the provision of primary schools. He stressed that the County has no wish to close schools down but that a ‘federated’ approach may be adopted in some cases, whereby schools share heads and/or facilities and/or governing bodies. Schools may also be given responsibilities to serve their wider communities, by providing ICT training for adults for example. The deadline for responses has been extended to the end of the month. Cllr Howell has written a letter to each of the Parish Council Chairmen in his division explaining this matter in more detail.
Cllr Howell reported that the rate of increase of the County’s share of council tax is being reduced to 4%, lower than all other counties in south east England.
The Queen Street flood prevention scheme has clearly not completely solved the problem. It was said that the soakaways around the Village Hall are being assessed during the current building repair programme.

6          Correspondence and Other Business
i). Sports Club Pavilion & Playground
The Council agreed to accept the quotation from Scion Estates for the installation of a disabled access ramp to the veranda of the Pavilion for £535 including the safety rail.
Total Pest Control has confirmed that its fee for controlling the rabbit population on the Recreation Ground will be £562 plus VAT and the Council agreed to accept this.
The work to level and strengthen the entrance to the Recreation Ground will be carried out on 17^th/18^th January.

ii). Footpaths;
Scion Estates will charge £520 to lay new gravel upon the paths along and across the Allotments, Malt House Lane, and between Belcher Court and Drayton Road. This quotation was accepted.
The Handyman will clear the overgrown path in Albert Place in the next few days. Mark Sumner has been reminded of the work which the County has yet to complete at Overy. The Council is supporting the desire of The Hurst Water Meadow Trust to ensure that there is wheelchair access to The Hurst.

iii). Cemetery;
IJP Builders have been called back to examine the stability of the tiles which cap the walls of the old cemetery gatehouse building.
There has been a major tidying up of the cemetery. Clearing away the turf that had overgrown the path had revealed a wider than expected area of hard landscape, which may be in need of repair. Whilst hired plant is working on the strengthening of the entrance to the Recreation Ground it will also be used to clear the bank between the Cemetery and the homes in Page Furlong. Cllr Williams asked if Councillors would inspect the work done so far in order to be able to suggest what further tasks should be carried out. The need to repair the catch on the Drayton Road gate was noted and BCB will attend to this matter.

iv). Allotments;
Nothing to report

 v). Hidden Britain;
The project team is pressing ahead with touch screens, orientation boards, finger posts, two more walks guides, the CD-ROM millennium album cover design and indexing.
Despite all this activity some under-spending is forecast, perhaps as much as £4,500, but it is important that volunteers are putting in sufficient ‘in-kind time’ so that the value of this contribution is equivalent to at least 24% of the claim, otherwise the grant received will not match the total outgoing cash expenditure.
One of the ideas for new expenditure is for a ticket booking/printing system. This would be used first by Dorchester Festival 2007 but the systems can be adapted for use in several different locations and by different village organisations. It was therefore agreed that ‘ownership’ of this facility should remain with the Parish Council. The Council noted that the data captured by the system has significant value.
It was agreed that local businesses which have been promoted by the new edition of the Village brochure will be asked to contribute towards its cost.

vi). Other letters to Chairman and Clerk
a. There has been an invitation to the Chairman and one other Council representative to a reception at County Hall on Wednesday 28^th February from 6-30 p.m. to 8.30 p.m.. A reply is required by early in February.

b. Oxford Green Belt Network has written asking if the Council would support OGBN as its representative at the EIP of the South East Plan. Written evidence will be submitted by OGBN by 22^nd January. The EIP meeting session on 28^th February commencing at 10 am in Reading Town Hall is the key meeting to discuss the future of the Oxford Green Belt and supporters should try to attend.
The Council would like to know more about the stance being taken by the Thirteen Parishes Group and whether it should be that Group which represents Dorchester or, indeed, whether neither organisation should do.
Councillors will ensure that Dorchester is represented at the forthcoming meeting of the Thirteen Parishes Group and review this matter again after it is known what the Group intends to say.

7          Planning
a)         P06/W1290 Rose Cottage, 13, Martin’s Lane; Single storey detached garden room to rear of back garden to replace existing shed.
The Council had no strong views about this application but asked the planners to ensure that, if the proposed works are carried out, nothing is done that interferes with the viability of the drainage ditch.

b)         Report on planning decisions, amendments etc
P06/W1134/LB Rose Cottage, 10 Wittenham Lane; Demolition of existing extensions & outbuildings, alterations & extensions to property.
Listed Building Consent granted 21^st December.

P06/W1135 Rose Cottage, 10 Wittenham Lane; Alterations & extensions
Planning Permission granted 21^st December.

Garage/boat store for The Manor
The Chairman had been asked by Mr Simon Broadbent what the Council’s attitude would be to an application for building a garage/boat store on the triangular piece of land between Manor Farm Road and the boundary wall of the village school. Councillors thought that this site is unsuitable for development of any kind.

The Clerk was asked to find out about ownership of this piece of land and the status of Manor Farm Road.

8          Finance

a). Bank balances
Current Account at 29^th December                     £6,598.28
Reserve Account at 29^th December                   £43,379.96

The following accounts were approved for payment:
Oxfordshire County Council                                                      £10,000.00
Thames Water (Allotments £50.50 Pavilion £29.07)                         £79.57
Scion Estates Limited (Pavilion Repairs)                                      £1,727.25
Transpiration Ltd (Park ‘n Ride services)                                       £337.81
Dorchester Abbey PCC                                                                    £9.57
GGD Russell – Clerk’s salary                                                        £401.82
Geoff Willis Handyman – 4 weeks - (December £305)                  £214.50
Notcutts Garden Centres (Christmas tree lights etc)                        £124.82<
Simon Ratliff (IT back-up and external hard drive)                          £150.00 

9          Car Parking & other Highways maintenance matters

The re—surfacing of the Bridge End Car Park is complete but the disabled parking spaces have not yet been marked out nor the turfing of the new grass area nor repairs to the grass damaged during the surfacing work. The top-dressing of Bridge End, which will include the repair of all pot-holes, is scheduled for summer 2007.

Cllr Mrs Metcalfe said that locating a cycle –rack at one end of the car park would be a useful service as well as providing a barrier to prevent cars parking on the grass. John King, County Highways inspector, has told the Clerk that the footpath between Meadside and Dorchester Bridge is not considered to be in need of repair and he had inspected it in the past few weeks. Mr King had reported at least 60 very large defects in Watling Lane but said that since this is classified as a bridleway the County has no resources to carry out any work. He has instructed colleagues to see what can be done about the pavement near the High Street bus shelter being damaged by tree roots.

It was agreed that the telephone and e-mail contact details for making complaints to County Highways would be published in Dorchester News and that, if sufficient volunteers could be found, there should be a traffic survey of Watling Lane, possibly during the Easter school holiday, to confirm the importance of that route.

10        Oxford University Archaeological Project

A meeting was held on 19^th December following which a letter has been received from Chris Gosden, Professor of European Archaeology at the University of Oxford. He has identified sites for survey in Dorchester on Thames including Parish Council owned land: the Allotments, Cemetery and Recreation Ground - not always digging, because other methods of survey are also used.

The team will need a site for camping and the Recreation Ground, with its access to Pavilion facilities, seemed ideal.

The Council agreed to all these suggestions but Cllr Hill was asked to obtain the consent of the Sports Club with reference to all matters on the Recreation Ground. The Club’s next committee meeting is on 14^th February. 

11        Precept for 2007/8

After studying papers prepared by the Clerk and the written comments of the Chairman, it was proposed by Cllr Day and seconded by Cllr Stephenson that the Precept should be set at £32,130. In percentage terms this is a larger increase than the Council has normally suggested in the past but in terms of absolute cost per household it is not thought to be an excessive amount. It has the merit of allowing the Council to carry out work and projects that it believes to be essential without putting at risk the Council’s reserves which will be maintained at a level approximately equivalent to one year’s precept income.

The proposal was carried unanimously.

12        Play Area Appeal

Cllr Gibbons announced that an additional grant had been offered, this time by WREN for £6,000. An article reporting on the success of the Appeal will appear in the next Dorchester News. It is hoped to order the equipment soon.

 13        County Review of Primary School Provision

This matter had been fully discussed during Cllr Howell’s presentation (Item 5)

14        Any Other Business
a. The Clerk was asked to request Richard Spratley to instruct contractors working on the High Street garage site to park away from the junction, for safety reasons.
b. Reports about recommended work on the trees in the Abbey Closed Churchyard have been received and will be discussed at the February Council meeting.
c. Lighting for bus passengers using the stop on the southbound side of Dorchester by-pass was again said to be an essential need. The Clerk will contact the County.
d. The damage done to the gates at ‘Blue Bridge’ and the nearby fingerpost has not been repaired. The Clerk will ensure that this is being progressed.
e. The date for the Annual Parish Meeting must be set by the February meeting.

 The next meeting of the Parish Council is due to take place on 14^th February but it was agreed to bring the meeting forward to 7^th February.

The meeting closed at 10.35 pm