The parish council is working with local groups to ensure that the new play facilities for King George’s Field are built in the Spring of 2010. A new tennis court, multigames area and two play areas for different ages as well as a youth shelter are all planned, with much of the money already found from the Parish Council, £25,000 which your lib Dem councillors secured from the County Council, s106 money from local buildiong development and an additional amount of fundig from your County Councillors Neighbourhood budget. The remaining money is hoped to come from national grant schemes.

If you are interested in being involved in helping with the project please get in touch.

I have also requested the Parish Council to look at providing swings for the Abbey Road play area, which will be paid for from the money paid over by the developers of Paxton Mews/Court.

The police and communities meeting last night agreed to continue work to tackle speeding in Pity Me, and anti-social behaviour on Framwellgate Moor Front Street. In addition, larger bins are to be placed on Fornt Street as the work being done has been so successful that the bins are overflowing at lunchtimes.

An additonal five dog waste bins are due to be installed around the area after my discussions with officers and the local wardens.

Some of you may have noticed that there are four brick bus shelters missing in Framwellgate Moor and Pity Me. And unfortunately, nothing there in their place.

I was working with officers at the council to find out the cost of replacement, but somewhere down the line at County Hall an instruction to demolish them was made instead – without ordering any new ones.

Now as mess ups go this is a pretty big one, especially for everyone getting wet – including me as I have committed to using the bus more as part of the 10:10 initiative (More info here www.1010uk.org ) and the Pity Me stop is the closest to my house.

After my lengthy discussions with officers, which were partly centred around where is the money coming from to replace these stops, things are now moving forwards. I have been given a commitment that all four shelters will be replaced – and not with small, useless shelters. This will mean that we will have replaced and added a dozen shelters in the last year or two across the five villages.

The bad bit of course is that it witll probably take 6-8 weeks to get these ordered, made and installed, just at the time when the weather is turning awful. I can only apologise on behalf of the council – I guess this is one of the inevitable slip ups we were expecting during the transition to a new unitary council. Time to get out the umbrella and hope it isn’t windy for the next month or so.

At least by then we will have new shelters which don’t smell like a toilet!

Just a reminder that the PACT meetings are this Wed at 5.30pm at Framwelglate Moor Community Centre. I will be there from 5pm for a short surgery if anyone wants to see me in person. The PACT meeting will be attended by county andparish councillors as well as the police and community wardens. Following this meeting at 6.30pm is the Parish council meeting.

Last week I met with Lib Dem Shadow Chancellor Vince Cable and discussed the economic problems facing the North East. The Lib Dem proposals to  help take 4 million low paid people out of paying tax, including many pensioners is at the centre of our proposals for the next election, and I will be campaigning with your Lib Dem  Parliamentary candidate Carol Woods to get this message across.

It is a disgrace that someone on the minimum wage must pay hundreds of pounds in income tax and is an illustration of the Labour government’s failure to make our society fairer.

Lib Dem councillors Carol Woods and Mark Wilkes are proposing changes to speed limits in County Durham to help cut road deaths and serious injuries – particularly for children The motion will be out to full council on Wednesday 30th September and is hoped to have cross party support. The question is – will Labour see cutting road deaths and injuries as a priority or not. i will report back after the vote.

You can find the latest CAB outreach dates here:

http://markwilkes.mycouncillor.org.uk/cab-outreach/

CAB outreach is now guaranteed until Summer 2010 in all four villages!

If anyone would like to watch leader of theLib Dems Nick Clegg making his keynote speech it can be found here:

http://www.libdems.org.uk/news_detail.aspx?title=Speech%3a_Nick_Clegg_delivers_his_speech_to_Autumn_Conference&pPK=8751593d-e92b-47fa-b6d3-61cd48e7d55d

Our commitment to ensuring that those most in need in society are protected continues, with our commitment to lift 4 million low income workers and pensioners out of tax altogether. This is fully costed. More information can be found here with Vince Cable’s speech:

http://www.libdems.org.uk/news_detail.aspx?title=Speech%3a_Vince_Cable%E2%80%99s_speech_to_Liberal_Democrat_Conference&pPK=e3158112-08da-4f2d-89f6-be64f214ab85

Twenty Five years on from the closing of the Pit at Bearpark, we are finally moving closer to having a new home for one of the banners. Rev and I have made a donation of £1000 out of the County council members Initiative Fund to help with the building of a new case for the banner which is currently stored at Redhills.

Hopefully this wonderful piece of mining history will soon be on full view in the Working Men’s Club in Bearpark.

The War memorial in Framwellgate moor is finally looking much better. After a meeting I arranged with officers, the overgrown bushes around the memorial have been removed and the area seeded for grass. the footpaths have been cut back to their original widths and I hope to get the seating repainted.

Finally the area is starting to look as it should. I am working with the Parish council to arrange for the cleaning of the memorial.