I moved to the village about eight years ago with my long term partner Maggie. We live at the Old Post Office with our five pugs.
For the last twenty years I have been the director of a local charity in Leicester that supports women and young people who have been sexually exploited, involved in sex work or who are victims of human trafficking. I am a qualified social worker and psychodynamic psychotherapist and specialise in counselling sexually abused children.
Since moving to Rearsby, the village has become increasingly important to me and I would like to contribute what I can to our community.
My passions include laughing with my partner, walking my dogs, reading anything and everything and writing psychological thrillers. And I’m always happy to share a bottle of wine with friends.

Hello everyone

As the lockdown continues to ease, we continue to look forward to getting back to some form of normality in the village.

Parish Council business continues, with meetings being held in a virtual setting normally on the first Thursday of each month (next meetings September 3^rd & October 1st) and the main areas of focus are:

The Neighbourhood Plan (NP):

The NP has been an ongoing project by the PC and various other parties for some considerable time but unfortunately due to a variety of reasons seems to have lost the momentum required to see it through to a satisfactory conclusion. 

As Chair I feel (as does the whole council) that we need to urgently get this back on track and push to get this concluded as soon as possible, especially in view of the government’s plans to change housing development rules as we emerge from the Coronavirus pandemic. The council want to re-establish a working group to push this to a conclusion and I am appealing to individuals in the village to please join us on the working group to help and assist us to do so. If you are interested and can help, please contact Sue Norledge our Clerk, we would greatly appreciate your support.

Conker Field: 

The new kissing gates have now been fitted to the fence and enclosures at the two main entrances to the field. During the autumn months a new hedge will be planted along the outside of the new fence to enhance the view on Station Road.

Phase 1 of the tree work in the spinney and along the boundaries of the field has been completed with old / diseased trees being removed and others being cropped, trimmed, or reduced as required by the earlier survey. Whilst some of the debris from the work has been removed a lot of it has been cut and left has potential wildlife habitats within the spinney.

Phase 2 of the work will hopefully begin in September and will sadly include one of the horse chestnuts (conker trees) being felled due to decay and decease. 

The field may be partially closed on this particular day due to health & safety, but the tree surgeon will determine that once a full risk assessment has been done. 

We continue to chase the new waste bins which were ordered some time ago and these will be installed at each end of the field. The new sign for the Station road entrance is still being sorted along with other signage detailing such topics as dog waste / litter and no ball games as required under the section 106 agreement.

Rearsby Village News website:

The new website www.rearsbyvillagenews.co.uk continues to expand with news,  information and stories being added regularly but we would like to encourage residents to view the website and give us feedback on what other information / articles you would like to see. 

We would also like local groups to consider linking in with the website so we can eventually create a more user friendly, expansive site of interest to all of the community. If you have any articles you would like us to add please let us know via email councillor5.rearsbypc@btconnect.com .

Village Street Market:

It was great to see so many residents and visitors joining in the Street market on Sunday 23^rd August. With some 50 stalls it was a lovely way to spend the day with lots of people chatting and catching up (socially distancing of course) and enjoying the pleasant weather and fresh air, not to mention making some money for various charities. In these rather challenging times it was a great community effort and I wanted to say a personal thank you to all those who took part and particularly to Louise and Holly for their organising skills.

Willow Tree on Brookside:

Some residents will be aware of the large willow tree on Brookside losing a couple of its branches in recent weeks and parishioners may also be aware that ownership of the  tree and the brook banks have for many years been a topic of debate with no definite outcome to date. We can however confirm that following several conversations with CBC & LCC expressing our concerns over safety we did finally mange to get agreement for them to pollard the tree to reduce the risk of it falling in the future.

Speeding:

Residents will hopefully have noticed that the speed activating sign is now back up and running and is currently on Melton road.

I have a great concern about speeding in our community and the fact that many people pass through our village with little consideration of the limits or the welfare of other road users.

At the next PC meeting I have asked that we include an agenda item on speeding and we look at ways to introduce a viable speeding campaign within the community to try and help combat this increasing threat to our wellbeing.

I would welcome feedback through our Clerk from parishioners with ideas for consideration. 

Litter Picking:

I would once again like to express the councils sincere thanks to Ed Offer and his brother Sam for their excellent ongoing support to the community by carrying out a litter pick in different parts of the village each Saturday since early March. 

We estimate they have collected over 20 bin bags of rubbish over this time and this is very much appreciated, and we look forward to Ed receiving his DOE award as part of this service within the community.  

Coronavirus:

We continue to monitor developments with regard the Coronavirus regulatory changes and will implement relevant changes etc. when and where necessary.

Dog Poo

Last but not least, I come back to the topic of “Dog Poo” I don’t think I have to say much other than it is not getting any better and I would appeal to all dog walkers to watch your dog, pick up its poo, bag it, bin it! 

Please also remember you can report dog fouling direct to Charnwood Borough Council online at www.charnwood.gov.uk or on 01509 634564.

Don’t forget the next PC meetings (currently via ZOOM) will be held on the Thursday September 3^rd & October 1^st at 7.30pm for more details see www.rearsbyvillagenews.co.uk or www.rearsbypc.org.uk

Thank you & please STAY SAFE

Martin Cooke (Parish Council Chair)