An announcement from the organisers of the Holcot Hotspot games afternoons for adults.
CHANGE OF PLAN
1) Only a small number residents have confirmed that they plan to come to the Hotspot tomorrow, Thursday 16th May.
So – with apologies to those who were hoping to come – it’s CANCELLED.
2) We therefore ran a quick poll of residents who’ve attended since the sessions started, and the outcome can be summarised as follows:
– everyone really enjoyed the sessions they attended, and agreed that “Holcot Hotspot is a REALLY good and innovative idea which should be continued”
– however, “it’s definitely something for colder and darker days”, so the consensus was that it should only run in the ‘colder months’, eg from October to April.
Holcot Hotspot will therefore return on Thursday 17th October.
Sywell Road will be closed between the Washbrook and Car Boot site entrance from next Monday, for up to 11 days. Kier have now published this factsheet.
I have picked up on Sunday a bracelet on Moulton Rd, near Tithe Farm Entrance about 500 yards south, outside of Holcot.
It includes a charm split in half. The charm half has a love heart symbol next to ‘BE’, underneath it has ‘FRI’. Suspect the whole charm 2 halves would read ‘BEST FRIEND’ and therefore quite important to the owner? The bracelet itself is a coloured flexible plastic thin wire loops.
The Police’s national Action Fraud service is warning of a rise of fraudsters targeting WhatsApp groups.
WhatsApp group chat members are being warned they could be targeted by criminals, as Action Fraud reveals it has received 636 reports from victims of the messaging app this year.
The fraud often begins when a member of the group receives a WhatsApp audio call from the fraudster, pretending or claiming to be another member of the group. This is done to gain the individual’s trust, and often the scammer will use a false profile picture and/or display name, so at first glance it would appear to be a genuine member of the group.
A message from Citizens Advice offering free help claiming Universal Credit. See this poster or this website (the Leicestershire service applies to Northamptonshire).
Help to Claim is a dedicated service from Citizens Advice. Our service:
is free, independent and confidential
supports clients start a new Universal Credit claim through to the first full payment
helps us identify the right support for each client through individual needs assessment
offers interpreters where English is an additional language
WNC Children and Young People’s Services are seeking feedback on the Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) funding recommendations. This is a final stage of consultation before the WNC SEND funding changes in September 2024.
The details are here – closing date for comments is 2 June.
A consultation for carers and their supporters from WNC.
West Northamptonshire Council (WNC) are asking for local carers or someone supporting a carer to share their views and feedback on the newly drafted five-year Carer Strategy.
The draft strategy is for all unpaid carers that live in, or care for someone that lives in West Northants, and has been developed together with local carers, ensuring their voices drive forward progress over the next few years to provide the right support and information for them.
Chosen by our local carers, 17 priorities have been identified to focus on improving over the next five years as well as specific measurements to track progress which the Council would like to seek views on. Each priority has a set of actions that will support achieving the priority over the five year period. More details on each of the priorities and how they will be achieved can be found in the strategy.
West Northamptonshire Council (WNC) has launched a new grant scheme which aims to support local people to develop their learning and skills and help them get into work.
The Skills for Communities grant scheme is open to community, voluntary and social enterprise organisations that operate, or are prepared to operate, within the geographical area of West Northamptonshire and must be used to provide support to residents aged 16+ who are no longer in full-time education and who would like to develop existing or learn new skills.
Local voluntary and community organisations including registered charities, community interest companies and social enterprises are invited to apply for the grants of between £10,000 and £300,000.
Thank you everyone who came along to the APM yesterday evening. I hope you agree with me that the speakers did a great job.
The reports mentioned and/or presented during the meeting have been added to the meetings list on the Parish Council page. You will see my report, Cllr Warren’s report, two reports from Northants Police and the financial summary for the year.
Kier have this evening confirmed that the priority working feature (“chicane”) on Sywell Road will commence construction on 20 May, with Sywell Road being closed for up to two weeks.
WNC are promoting grants for energy efficiency and clean heating upgrades.
Low-income off-gas households with an annual income of £36,000 or less across West Northamptonshire are urged to find out if they could access essential funding to help them deliver energy efficiency upgrades and install clean heating systems.
The funding is made possible through the Home Upgrade Grant Phase 2 funding bid secured by West Northamptonshire Council (WNC). Responding to feedback and a thorough review of the program, the Department of Energy and Sustainable Net Zero (DESNZ) has increased the household income threshold to £36,000, up from £31,000, to ensure that more families can benefit from this vital initiative.
The expanded eligibility criteria are anticipated to increase the number of eligible households by approximately 19% nationally within the scheme. This means more families will have access to the support they need to improve energy efficiency, reduce fuel poverty, and contribute to the UK’s Net Zero commitment by 2050.
WNC is partnered with Agility Eco to be able to offer this scheme to the people of West Northamptonshire this opportunity by arranging and carrying out the improvement assessment and all the retrofit work. Local installers in each region will guide customers through the application journey, helping them understand and establish eligibility for the scheme.
West Northants Council (WNC) plan to host a programme of pop-up repair cafés during June and July within WNC libraries. They are planned to run between 10am and 2pm on Saturdays.
The events will be promoted to members of the public who have small broken electrical items e.g., soup maker, hairdryer etc who can bring their item along to see if it can be repaired.
We are looking for volunteers with suitable skills (and hopefully tools) to come along to the repair cafés to assess and, where possible, repair electrical items brought in by members of the public.
Whilst these events are one-off events, we hope to stimulate interest within local communities for running repair cafés on a regular basis which will help reduce waste and build local community resilience.
West Northants Council are promoting No Mow May and environmental awareness.
As we enter the spring and summer months, West Northamptonshire Council (WNC) is looking at ways it can help promote environmental awareness for the natural environment and gain further understanding on how people locally support national campaigns to enhance biodiversity.
Last year, WNC supported the national campaign run by Plantlife, No Mow May. The Council will again be supporting the campaign this year in May and will be enabling some of the green spaces it looks after to grow wildly for May, where safe and reasonable to do so.
People across West Northamptonshire are being asked to share their views on the national campaign and let the Council know if they take part in these, so that it can gain a better understanding of how West Northamptonshire residents positively impacted biodiversity.
This consultation is important as the final local plan will set the primary WNC planning and development policies through to 2041.
WNC says…
“The draft Plan sets out a vision and objectives for the area, its ambitions for new development and commitment to dealing with climate change. The Plan allocates land for housing and employment and contains a series of planning policies for these and many other topics such as leisure, transport, health and wellbeing, infrastructure and the environment, and where development can and cannot take place.”
For instance, potential local impacts in the Regulation 18 Local Plan document include a policy related to 2000 houses to be built on the west side of the A43 north of Moulton (page 118-) and a ring/relief road to the north of Northampton (page 255).
Comments have to be submitted by 2 June. At next week’s meeting, the Parish Council will decide the process by which it will respond.
There are public exhibitions to view the draft plan and ask questions. No appointment is necessary.
Location
Address
Date
Time
Moulton
Moulton Community Centre, Sandy Hill Ln, Reedings, Moulton, NN3 7AX
Thursday 18 April
between 1 and 5pm
Daventry
Daventry Leisure Centre, Saxon Suite, Lodge Road, Daventry, NN11 4FP
Tuesday 23 April
between 2 and 6pm
Wootton
Wootton Community Centre, Curtlee Hill, Wootton, Northampton NN4 6ED
Thursday 25 April
between 2 and 7pm
Brackley
The Old Fire Station Community Room, High Street, Brackley NN13 7DW
Wednesday 1 May
between 2 and 5pm
Northampton
Grosvenor Centre, Gather Unit, 1st Floor, Northampton, NN1 2EW
Thursday 2 May
between 12 and 5pm
West Northamptonshire Local Plan 2041
Regulation 18 Draft Consultation – April 2024
Town and Country Planning (Local Planning) (England) Regulations 2012 Regulation 18.
West Northamptonshire Council has prepared its new Local Plan, Regulation 18 Draft, which it proposes to consult upon for a period of eight weeks.
The Local Plan, Regulation 18 Draft (2024) and supporting documents are being made available for public inspection at locations across West Northamptonshire,
providing people with the opportunity to make representations for consideration as the plan progresses to its next stage.
Full details of the consultation can be found here.
The eight-week period of public consultation will commence Monday 08 April 2024 and run to 23:59 to Sunday 02 June 2024. Representations received after this time will not be accepted.
This notice outlines the documents which are available for inspection, their subject matter and the locations where they can be inspected. It also provides information regarding the process of submitting representations.
You will have seen that Holcot Parish Council has a vacancy for a Councillor. We also expect a second vacancy shortly.
I was asked for further information about the role of a Parish Councillor. The Good Councillor’s Guide is a great place to start.
In Holcot, Councillors are involved in representing and supporting many aspects of the community, from ensuring that the street lighting works, through dealing with West Northants Council highways, planning and other services. Councillors look after the playing field, maintain community communications through the website and newsletter, and help Parishioners deal with specific issues…. and a whole lot more.
Want to help lead Holcot’s response to the Green Hill Solar Farm? Road safety? Local massive housebuilding? Our response to climate change? Please consider becoming a Parish Councillor!
Information from WNC about cost of living and mental health support.
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Please find attached information on our Cost-of-Living Support Hub and NHFT/Mind Northamptonshire’s Mental Health Support Card, we have these available at our offices across the West to collect for distribution:-
The Abbey, St John’s Square, Daventry, NN11 4XG
Brackley Town Council, 20 High St, Brackley, NN13 7DS
The Forum, Moat Lane, Towcester, NN12 6AD
The Guildhall One Stop Shop, St Giles Square, Northampton NN1 1DE
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