Welcome to Broxtowe Enews, brought to you by the Liberal Democrats and edited by David Watts, on behalf of the Lib-Dems in Broxtowe. May I give a special welcome to the new readers that we have this week and may I wish everybody a happy New Year.

1. Council Funding
just before Christmas the government informed local authorities about the money that they will be getting next year. Notts County Council have had their grant cut from £194 million-£163 million. Broxtowe Borough Council have had their grant cut from £4.8 million to £4.1 million. These figures are not unexpected although they are very disappointing. In the early days of the coalition local authorities were told by the government that they would have to take an early hit on their finances but then they would be left alone. Sadly this is not proved to be the case and the government have continued to impose massive cuts. We will have to see how the consequences of this workout over the next few months, but it is not good news.

2. Consultation On Cuts
Following on from the last item Notts County Council have launched a survey seeking residents views about how they should make savings. This can be completed at www.Nottinghamshire.gov.uk and the survey closes on 5 February. Nottinghamshire police would also like your views about how they should go about making £12 million worth of savings, and you can complete their survey at www.Nottinghamshire.PCC.police.UK.

3. Town Centre Consultations
Broxtowe Borough Council are currently running a consultation asking residents, shoppers and business owners why they visit the towns in the Borough. The councils town centres at team, who managed development in Eastwood, Kimberley, Stapleford and Beeston, are running the consultation and people can have their say by visiting www.Broxtowe.gov.uk/towncentresurvey.

4. Refurbished Post Office
Nuthall is getting a refurbished Post Office which will open next week. The new shop will be in the Spar store at 401 Nuthall Road, and it will open on 15 January at 10 AM. The story is closed this week for the refurbishment to take place.

5. Improved Help At Stations
East Midlands Trains have launched an improved service for people who need help travelling on trains and through stations. The deadline for booking assistance at a station has been reduced from 24 hours before the journey to 12 hours prior to the journey. This is part of a series of upgrades agreed with the Department for Transport.

6. Recycling
Notts County Council has announced plans to reduce the amount of waste that goes to landfill by encouraging people to recycle more. The county is running out of space to use for landfill, and they aim to increase the recycling rate from the current 43% up to 52% by 2020. Where possible when waste cannot be recycled the Council will use it to make energy and will only use landfill as a last resort.

7. Robin Hood Cards
The introduction of the new Robin Hood Travel Cards seems to have gone well, although residents in Stapleford are understandably extremely disappointed that the scheme does not cover Stapleford. Both the borough and county councillors in Stapleford are calling for the cards to be extended. This is something I fully support.

8. Fracking
Warwick Energy have been granted a licence to explore underneath South Broxtowe with a view to introducing fracking at a point in the future. This has been supported by our Conservative MP and Council, but opposed by the Liberal Democrats and Labour groups. The decision is taken by the county council. They believe that there are large resources of gas under Beeston and Stapleford and that fracking is the best way to extract this. Personally I find it very strange that the government is trying to push fracking through at high speed whilst at the same time it is slashing the amount of funding available to encourage green energy. This seems to me to be an utterly backward step.

9. New Years Honours
Congratulations to Susan Jowett, the chief executive of Spencer Academies Trust, which runs the George Spencer school in Stapleford, on being made a Dame in the New Year’s Honours list. She was one of 19 people from the County to receive awards in the New Year’s Honours.

10. Kimberley Brewery
Planning permission has been granted by the Borough Council to convert a warehouse building at Kimberley Brewery into 31 bedroomed and one for bedroomed houses. Discussions are still ongoing about the schemes for the rest of the site.

11. Football Improvements
The Football Association is providing £750,000 worth of grants to improve grass-roots facilities in Nottinghamshire. A number of pitches in Broxtowe will benefit from this. Eastwood Community Football Club will be getting a new pitch, there are new goalposts for Awsworth Villa football club and new goalposts will also go up on playing fields owned by the Borough Council.

12. Cash Office Closures
The Conservative administration on Broxtowe Borough Council have confirmed that they will be closing the councils cash offices in Broxton from 1 April. These offices allow people to pay their bills directly to the Council rather than through banks or other organisations. The offices are in Beeston, Eastwood and Stapleford. 881 local residents have signed a petition opposing the scheme that the council have decided to push ahead with it.

13. Bus Changes
It was disappointing to read this week that a significant number of bus services to Beeston are to be cut. Five services are being scrapped or revised, which is a quarter of the bus routes that goes through the town. The Club Class coach service is being removed altogether, and the Indigo service will be reduced in frequency. The 510 service that went to Bramcote crematorium will no longer run to the crematorium, as unfortunately take up on that has been poor. Your Bus have axed the S1 and X36 services and Nottingham Coaches is cancelling its 17 service.

14. Aldi
The planning committee on Broxtowe Borough Council will decide on Wednesday whether or not to grant planning permission for an Aldi supermarket on the Pinfold Trading Estate in the town. The Co-op have objected to this is they believe that it will divert trade from the town centre. The council’s officers have recommended that planning permission be refused, although the Council have received 259 letters in support of the scheme.

As ever thank you for your support for this newsletter. Any feedback is gratefully received.

Best wishes

David
www.davidwatts.org.uk
www.broxtoweliberaldemocrats.org.uk
Follow me on Twitter @davidwatts12.

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