Haddenham Liberal Democrat Councillor Pauline Wilson has erected home-made signs on a dangerous fen road where a grandmother died, because she is fed up waiting for the county council to take action.

Cllr Wilson fears more drivers could be killed this winter on the stretch of road at Grunty Fen which claimed the life of 59-year-old Margaret Thorne last February.

Mrs Thorne died when her car spun off the road at Witchford and landed in a ditch in dense fog.

“I am so incensed about this,” said Cllr Wilson. “I have been asking county council officers to put up a sign on this dangerous bend but they have taken no action. I am not prepared to sit back and wait for another driver to die before anything is done.

“This road is a cut through for people driving from Haddenham to Witchford and Ely and in the winter it is treacherous. Drivers take this road because they want to avoid the dangerous Witcham Toll junction where the county council has also taken no action.

“How many people have to lose their lives and how many families have to be torn apart before the county council comes up with the small amount of money needed to make drivers aware of the danger?”

Cllr Wilson raised the issue at the Haddenham Neighbourhood Panel, of which the county council is a partner, after it refused to spend money on road signs.

“They can afford to spend millions on a guided bus scheme,” added Cllr. Wilson, “but they won’t use some of our council tax to make this road safer. This is appalling.”

A controversial move to allow the 5,000 home Mereham new town to rise from the ashes has been attacked by East Cambridgeshire Liberal Democrats.

They claim a new bid for Mereham should never have been accepted by the East of England Regional Assembly.And they have accused the assembly’s chairman, Tory county councillor John Reynolds of naivety following his claims that “it might be a completely different project to the one that was rejected before.”Liberal Democrat leader, Haddenham Cllr Gareth Wilson said: “This is completely naïve. Even Hazel Blears said ‘No to Mereham’. What is it about the word ‘No’ that Cllr Reynolds does not understand?“

East Cambridgeshire taxpayers are still counting the cost of the Mereham fight which left the district with a £250,000 bill which it cannot claim back from the developer.“We have proved to the Government that Mereham is totally unacceptable and now, just two months after the appeal victory, we appear to be back to square one.“The Regional Assembly should never have accepted the submission of Mereham as a ‘new’ proposal as the definition clearly excludes proposals that ‘have previously been deemed by the Secretary of State to be inappropriate locations’”

The play equipment at the Haddenham Recreation Ground is in need of upgrading. The Recreation Committee has met and decided that it should be the next project.

Some of our Parish Councillors can remember playing on the equipment when they were children.

The new houses being built in West End has given us an opportunity to replace and upgrade the play area. “Section 106” money from the developer can be used for this purpose. We intend to apply for additional grants as well so we can do a really good job.

The first thing that is required is to know what the children would like.

I intend to make sure a survey of the children and young people is carried out. I hope that we can arrange for an online survey, questionnaires at the school and nursery groups, an exhibition of possible items of equipment and door-to-door survey forms.

Would you like to be involved? If so contact me at gareth.wilson@eastcambs.gov.uk.

Work is planed to start on November 3rd to level the Recreation Field. This will enable the football pitch to be moved towards the allotments and allow space for a cricket square. While it will cause inconvenience for the next few months it will be worth it in the end. We have managed to get grants from The Football Foundation, from Wren and from Haddenham Charities. Please stay off the area we are working on, particularly when the new grass seed has been sown.

The Tory County Council is planning to cut £300,000 from the budget to village buses. How can we be expected to use public transport when the bus service is so infrequent? So in the end, less people will use the bus and then they will have the excuse to make more cuts “because people are not using the service”.

A bid by East Cambridgeshire Liberal Democrats to kick-start the district’s troubled organic recycling service has been scotched by the Conservatives.
Despite hundreds of complaints from residents that they are not receiving brown paper sacks to recycle organic waste. The bulk of material is still being sent to landfill. The Conservatives rejected a move to solve the problem.
But they have agreed to spend £30,000 plus providing a year’s supply of black rubbish bags and clear plastic bags for recycling plastic bottles to every home in the district.
The Lib Dems supported the move in the hope that it would ease problems facing the service and suggested that, at the same time, four brown sacks should be delivered to each home.
But the idea, put forward by councillors Ian Allen and Dr Bob Stevens at East Cambridgeshire District Council’s environment and transport committee meeting was rejected.
A day later Burwell residents’ rubbish was collected late or not at all and in Witchford carefully sorted recyclables were mixed into a standard refuse truck, claim the Liberal Democrats.
Now they have accused the Conservative-run council of “gifting £30,000” to waste contractor Veolia without addressing the problem of recyclable organic waste going to landfill.
And they claim the council has broken the promises made in its corporate plan “to minimise the amount of waste to landfill with the promotion of recycling and home composting” and “ensuring effective and efficient use of resources”.
Cllr Allen said: “By including four sacks for each home with the year’s supply of black bags, we could have relaunched the whole service.
“But instead Veolia is making a saving of £30,000 plus when we should have been enforcing our contract with the company. All we are doing is propping up a poor service.
“Why should we be put into a position where we are asked to further reward failure?”
East Cambridgeshire District Council recycles only 36 per cent of its waste compared to around 50 per cent for other councils in the county.
“They seem to be more interested in making the Veolia contract profitable than in giving residents the service they deserve,” said Cllr Gareth Wilson. “Why is Veolia being given the opportunity to make more money from the contract when it is in clear breach of the contract requirements?”

Paul Buck and I have been working hard to get cricket back to Haddenham. The Recreation Committee agreed last year that we should try to get cricket back in Haddenham. The problem was that that since cricket went away to Ely; the demand from football has greatly expanded, particularly from the boys. The entire recreation field was covered with football pitches, leaving no room for the cricket square.

The only way to get more room was to level the field where it slopes away. This is a very expensive option. Although I warned of the delay in obtaining grants to fund it, a great deal of time was spent in trying to work out satisfactory layout options. It was only in early 2008 that Paul and I were set to the task of finding the cash. Paul has worked tirelessly in completing the forms and contacting the people concerned. The tenders came in far over the original estimate (£39,000 instead of £15,000). However by obtaining free sub-soil with the appropriate certificate (another delay) we look as if we might really get started soon.

Footpath to Aldreth

The Parish Council received a presentation from the Northstowe. They spoke of a footpath as far as Aldreth. Surely a further footpath to Haddenham would be better?

They were interested and have started to investigate providing a footpath and cycle track between Aldreth and Haddenham. They are looking to restore the portion that used to exist and to provide a new path for the remaining length.

The Parish Road Safety has been trying for several years to get a footpath but have been put off by County officials because it was too expensive. Perhaps we will now get a path. This will be of great benefit for Aldreth as walking or even cycling on the road can be dangerous with passing fast traffic and large vehicles.

We will let you know of progress.

Thank you to all of you who put up “Say No to Mereham” posters in your window or on billboards in your garden. Thank you to all the hundreds of you who wrote letters in protest. Thank you to all of you who manned stalls in Ely market or the Steam Rally to collect signatures for the petition. Thank you to the thousands of you who signed the petition to say No to Mereham.

Thank you to those of you who braved the cold to wave banners outside the Arkenstall Centre every morning and evening of those seven weeks. Thank you to all the organisations that use the Arkenstall rooms and were willingly inconvenienced by the weeks of Public Inquiry, to make sure it happened locally. Thank you to those who researched the details of the thousands of pages of evidence to present the best possible case. Thank you to those 75 of you who spoke at the Public Inquiry. Thank you to those who came and sat through the seven weeks of the inquiry to show how we all thought. Thank you to those who donated the money to pay for the posters and tee shirts. Thank you to those who delivered leaflets or knocked on doors to tell people about Mereham and collect support. Thank you to all of you who spoke to neighbours and friends to tell them about the awful effect of a Mereham on our doorstep. This was a community effort, a community campaign and it was the whole community that clearly said NO TO MEREHAM.