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Our aims
Are to keep local residents and other interested parties up to date with all community information, phone and internet contacts and any other local gossip and scandal that we can get away with!
CONTACT US WITH YOUR E-MAIL ADDRESS AND RECEIVE ALL LATEST NEWS, AND REGULAR E-MAIL UPDATES SEE contact e-mails
A fun evening was had at the 5 Ways sports club when a varied team of residents turned out in fancy clobber to take on the mighty 5 Ways at a 20 -20 match.
WE have all received letters from Thomas Vale instructing us that work commences in earnest on June 1st 2009. And affordable housing is, against all logic, going to be sited on green belt land.
We are utterly disgusted at our local representatives in recommending affordable housing on this unsuitable site despite the advice of planning officers. A site that is totally unsustainable in the small hamlet of Hopwood, another 20 houses in a small community of 60, and they say there is a need. How can a community of 60 houses have a need for another 20 with no facilities or amenities?
These officials are bending over backwards to appease their masters. Somebody is having a laugh at our expense and the sooner we get these overpaid bureaucrats out of office the better.
We have tried our best as a representative committee of Hopwood but it was not good enough in respect of the result that the affordable housing development in Hopwood has been given the go ahead due to the very blinkered attitude by Bromsgrove District Council and parish council and the Governments Secretary of State.
It all appears to come down to the Government giving directives to local councils to get on and carry out their wishes with the new flavour of the year topic that is, affordable housing to be built on green belt land.
There is one final thing we can do and that is to write to Dale Birch and his boss David Hammond, the planning officers at Bromsgrove District Council in charge of this proposed development, who carried out their duties within directed guidelines and followed all recommended policies.
They are the only people to have come out of this debacle with any credit and I suggest, unfortunately, that their jobs are totally worthless as nobody takes a blind bit of notice of them and they have no useful purpose at all and are a drain on our local finances!
Sorry guys, we appreciated your endeavours.
The fact of the matter is that over the years local government has changed so slowly that not many people seem to have noticed.
Twenty years ago the council was headed by a town clerk and its job was to serve the public. These days they rule us. Instead of a town clerk we now have an individual who wishes to be known as “the chief”.
With gold plated guaranteed pensions, a job for life, early retirement and wages higher than the private sector, you would think that these ruling elite would simply appreciate their good fortune and keep their heads down. Instead of which they delight in making life as difficult as possible for the peasants' who pay their wages.
So get out there today and vote them out!
TAKE CARE
PETER HIGGINS:- Has advised that the brook alongside the public footpath and the Rugby ground edge has been dug out and is 5 or more feet in depth and width now and could be dangerous to walkers and people playing sport.
just received a reply below on 27th May 2009 from Natural England .
Thank you for your email of yesterday, informing me that work involving machinery was being undertaken on the development site adjacent to your property. I contacted the Ecologists for this development and they visited the site yesterday, advising the contractors to cease work until they were on site to manage and oversee the work.
Natural England are currently considering what further enforcement action to take in this case.
PACT – Agreeing Local Priorities
PACT stands for Partners and Communities Together. It gives you the chance to tell your Local Policing Team, local authority and other partner agencies about the issues that are causing concern within your neighbourhood and which ones you want us to deal with as a priority. Once the community agrees on the top priorities, we’ll work together to address them.
The delivery of PACT is tailored to meet the needs of a community, but can include the following:
Financially not worth delivering the Redditch Standard to!
Sorry you can't have green waste recycled any more unless you pay!
A very expensive bus service every hour is adequate for you!
In fact Hopwood is so isolated and insignificant that it is not deemed viable to put any thing worth while there or to spend any money on at all!
EXCEPT FOR A RENDERING PLANT AND AN AFFORDABLE HOUSING DEVELOPMENT that nobody wanted in the first place apart from our splendidly performing Council who think its a spiffing idea!
Redditch beware now you have made the Chief Executive Officer of Bromsgrove's poorly performing Council your CEO as well, 2 jobs for the boys!
Perhaps they will share the head of Bromsgrove Council as well, then they will be in real trouble as we will have affordable housing right from Redditch to Alvechurch.
Mr Brown told council leaders in London yesterday(29th January 2009) that town halls had a vital role to play in getting Britain out of the recession. “In the past we have placed restrictions on local authorities delivering social housing,” he told a conference held by the New Local Government Network. “But, today, let me be clear: if local authorities can convince us that they can deliver quickly, and cost effectively, more of the housing that Britain needs . . . then we will be prepared to give them our full backing and put aside anything that stands in their way.”
There seems to be a pattern emerging across the corridors of power that has filtered down from the House of Lords and the House of Commons of late with financial remuneration being the only goal to which even our local civil servants aspire.
There appears to be hardly any democracy taking place within our electoral wards but just a constant and avaricious hunt by elected officers to find the biggest trough they can get their big fat noses in!
News You tell us and we will publish it,( within the realms of decency of course)
EVENTS Current and ongoing concerns and forthcoming events.
CONTACTS Where you can find local services contacts & information
HISTORY Past information about our once quiet Hamlet, plus local ancient History
and:-
Visit the Forum , join in the posts, post your own topic, ask some questions it might be fun!
The site has just become infamous! .....
the Lord Mayor of London has joined and made a comment on the Forum!, yes Boris Johnson has posted a comment!, Whats going on? take a look, the worlds gone mad!
The community spirit has been fantastic.... and hopefully is becoming stronger as we all communicate and get to know one another and combine our efforts to make the Hamlet a better place to live!!
We will be adding information, LOCAL PHOTOS , News and residents concerns about the local issues, as it is passed on.
In fact it would be fantastic to keep this site going for the community once we have attended to all immediate issues and hopefully resolve them with your already splendid support.
The Motocross was stopped and peace returned.
We all thought a smaller development would be built at the bottom of Smedley Crooke and in Ash Lane but the planning committee have OK'd the 20 houses even against the recommendations of the Planning Officer, MP, and 98% of the residents. (issues on this are still on going and we will post updated news as we go along) November has been mentioned for the start of building, its only hear-say thougH
Below is an outline of where the affordable houses are to be built, it just shows how irresponsible Bromsgrove's Planning Committee have been in allowing such a large piece of unspoilt Green Belt land to be gobbled up by developers, for 20 invisible homeless people in Hopwood!
click here
