WELCOM FORUM AGM, FRIDAY 8TH JUNE 2012
Present: Brain Martin in the Chair. 10 members of the serving Forum Committee, Local Councillors Barry Palmer and John Purkiss and 5 members of the local community.
Apologies from PCSO Karen Davies, Daphne Harvey, Kim Ford, Paul Robinson & Allen Jones.
CHAIRMANS REPORT
Brian Martin opened the meeting by outlining the work of the Forum which meets the last Thursday of every month at Linford Methodist Church at 7.30. These meetings are attended by our local PCSO’s who supply the local crime figures each month and our local councillors who are open to questions from all present. As a committee we have responsibility for the sports hall which opened some 5 years ago for joint use of the schools and the community. One of our members, Daphne Harvey, is the bookings manager for community use for the hall which can be hired for a reasonable hiring fee. The Forum is also responsible for the Youth Club which now meets in the Sports Hall every Friday. The Youth Club was started some years ago with funding from the Council which was withdrawn 3 years ago. The club originally met at the Village Hall at its height we had up to 50 – 60 children aged 7 to 16 years attending. Recently we have had to restrict the age range of the children to year 10/11 We pay a professional youth worker who with volunteers offer activities every Friday. We have discussions regarding local issues, one of our members, John Connolly is the volunteer warden for Linford Woods which is managed by Essex Wildlife who keeps us up to date with work carried out there. Other matters discussed have included street lighting, parking, lorry movements by Walsh. All our meetings are open to everyone and we occasionally have guest speakers. In the past we have had access to up to £8,000 each year from Thurrock Council but due to the cutbacks this has now been stopped we now get £475 administrations costs per year. We have been responsible for getting the village sign, bus shelters, notice board at St. Francis, seats, flower planters, new tables for West Tilbury Village Hall and a donation to First Responders at East Tilbury. One of our major outlays every year is the Community Fun Day conjunction with the local schools. This year we have changed the format slightly to an Olympic type sports showcase alongside the stage where there will be music and dance throughout the day, with the schools taking the major responsibility for all the organising.
The last AGM of the Forum was held on 5th June 2009 where amongst other topics discussed was the proposal to build 300 homes on the Bata Field. Although we protested against this when the new Secretary of State, Eric Pickles, came into office although he had advocated that local communities should have more say in local planning he had totally ignored our arguments and given permission for the development to take place. So far no developer has been found to fund and build these homes. The new Port at Coryton had also been discussed. There will be a problem when this is up and running as most of the freight movements will be happening at night thus cutting off East Tilbury as the level crossing will be closed for long periods.
TREASURERS REPORT
Copies of the accounts were distributed and the following were noted
At 31st April 2012 the Forum held £9,594.12.
This includes £3,000 from Cory Environmental towards the replacement of the stolen Bata memorial bronze flame. The money was not required for the flame but could be used towards the memorial renovation and replacing the Bronze mane plaques (currently in the museum) with granite ones.
£1,516.92 has since been spent towards the Linford Recreation ground play equipment which the Forum secured £25,000 funding from Veolia.
It has been agreed to give our local “First Responder” Geoffrey Crisp, £500 towards equipment including a defibrillator.
Dubai Ports (DP World) are promising to help fund local projects but have not allocated any cash to the budget so far.
The East Tilbury youth club are currently using the sports hall on Friday evenings but at the current rate of expenditure their funds will run out in 18 months to 2 years unless additional sponsorship can be found.
ELECTION OF OFFICERS
All stood down from their positions. As there were no other nominations all were re- elected unanimously for another year.
Brian Martin – Chair
Bob Kuyper – Vice Chair
Bob Kuyper – Treasurer
Marian Kuyper – Secretary
ANY OTHER BUSINESS
The matter was raised about the parking outside the shops at Linford there had been a nasty accident there this afternoon alledgedly involving a car and lorry. This matter has been raised a few times would it be possible to put a layby outside the shops, and perhaps double yellow lines or speed bumps down the rest of the road. It was felt that the cars parked there acted as a calming measure on peoples speed. It was agreed to invite a council highways officer to a forum meeting. Bob Kuyper reported that he picked up a lady from Merrie Loots rest home on a Sunday to take to Church by wheelchair and it was very dangerous crossing the road outside the home to the pavement the other side.
It was suggested that the Forum meetings be advertised in the local paper and local school magazines. Secretary to look into. We do have a website where all our meetings are advertised and the minutes posted
Councillors Barry Palmer and John Purkiss advised that Cory Environmental would probably be appealing once again regarding lorry movements for restoring the country park. At the moment all the infilling materials had to be bought by barge but Cory would be applying to have that changed so they could finish quicker by bringing in materials by road. It was discussed that Walsh had a mountain of top soil which could be moved to the Cory site without encroaching on the public roads and surely they could be made to purchase and use that. Barry Palmer pointed out that Walsh was conserving their top soil for their own infilling operations in the future. The new Visitors Centre on part of the new park will be open on 1st July but it could take up to 10 years to restore the rest of the land. Although it was possible that the fishing lakes could be open for community use earlier.
Brian Martin reiterated to all that there was a limited amount of money in the Forum funds and to let us know what you would like to see happen in the community.
There were still on-going problems with the ditch in East Tilbury, caused by local people dumping rubbish; in fact this has been a problem for the last 37 years.
Cynthia Adams pointed out that she had read a DEFRA report from 2006 in which it was stated that the only way to keep motor bikes off land was to metal barriers in not wooden ones. It was agreed that no matter what you put up the bikers will still find away through and it would cost a fortune to put metal barriers everywhere. Essex Wildlife is responsible for the security of the new country park and for keeping motor bikes off the land.
Marian Kuyper proposed a special thank you to our councillors and local police for their diligence in attending our Forum meetings there are a lot of other local forums which do not have this kind of support.
Rose Phillips asked about the possibility of getting new play equipment in West Tilbury Village and John Purkiss replied that this may be possible in the near future through Essex Community Trust.
Praise was voiced for the new bus service which is a non-profitorganisation which is in fact running buses on a Sunday. The bus company was open to suggestions from local people as to where they would like buses to run to, it may be possible to run a bus direct to Lakeside for the period before Christmas or an express to Basildon. They have some routes which are designated “R” which means the bus will stop wherever you want it to.
Simon Adams introduced the first ever lady football manager for Linford Wanderers, Renata Gully who will be the future Forum representative for that club.
The meeting ended at 8.45 the next Forum meeting will be on Thursday 28th June at 7.30 at Linford Methodist Church