Cllr. Robert Scott

Chairman’s Report – 2024

As Chair of Hockliffe Parish Council in my report this year I would like to highlight some of the activities carried out by the Council.

We have had another eventful year, In May we had the parish elections in which Richard, Rebecca, Peter and I stood uncontested. We saw the departure of Paul, David, and Pamela, and would like to thank them for their contribution as members of the Parish Council to the village.

This year included the celebrations for His Majesty King Charles III’s Coronation with celebrations throughout the village including coronation flags adorning lampposts.

Further work has been done with our plight that is the A5. This has included continued meetings between the Council, our MP Andrew Selous and National Highways. Finally, after continual requests from not only the council but also some villagers, National Highways agreed to install Average Speed Cameras through the village to address the speed of vehicles exceeding the 30mph limit, we must thank our MP Andrew Selous for his continued support to achieve this. The cameras were finally installed and switched on in October 2023 having a dramatic effect on the speed of traffic through the village.

Within the first month of operation the cameras caught 3545 people speeding. Not bad for a scheme that was originally dismissed by Martin Fellowes of National Highways as “not viable either side of traffic lights”. The level of speeding traffic has decreased month on month since October with January’s figure at 672 vehicles.

We continue our efforts on a longer-term solution to the volume of traffic through the village. This year Cllr Edwards has organised a petition with officers in the Houses of Parliament for a reduction in traffic on the A5 through Hockliffe. He then canvassed for volunteers from the village to go from door to door collecting signatures from residents. This was extremely successful with over 85% of residents supporting this initiative. This petition was then handed to our MP Andrew Selous to present in the Houses of Parliament.

The petition was observed by MP Richard Holden of the Department of Transport, the detrunking of the A5 through Hockliffe will now be considered in the next road investment period for 2025-2030.

This is a massive achievement for all those involved.

During the months of November to January we experienced night closures on the M1 for the installation of temporary safety barriers and signage for works to improve the motorway, this had a huge impact on the village with massively increased levels of traffic coming through overnight. Despite lobbying National Highways and Balfour Beatty no improvements were made to diversion routes and this will again be an issue when they come to remove the safety barriers later this year.

Residents may recall that I mentioned last year about the solar farm project on land off Church Lane where a sum of £5,000 per annum will be given to the Council for use in the village for the next 30 years. I am delighted to say that works has started on this.

Richard, Rebecca and I continue to work with others on the development of a Village Hall, this year the Parish Council have used S106 funding to enable the resurfacing of the tarmac in the Recreation ground, not only to improve this area for residents but also as enabling works for this project.

Remembrance was once again celebrated throughout the village with decorations put up by Blooming Hockliffe.

I would like to thank the Blooming Hockliffe Volunteers for their continued support to the village as their efforts make our village a more pleasant place.

Our Christmas Tree lighting ceremony went ahead as usual with Santa handing out presents at the Harvester, our thanks go to Natalie and the team who provided mulled wine and mince pies for the occasion and Roger and his band for the music and sing-along.

In March we welcomed two new co-opted Councillors to the Parish Council, Mike and Melanie who are a welcome addition to our group.

We continue to deliver the normal services of a Parish Council, including the maintenance of our recreation ground, cemetery, and churchyard. Our Clerk Colin Underhay has continued to keep us all inline this year and performs his duties seamlessly. This includes all our policies and procedures, and our financial reporting.

What another great year!

Looking at the year ahead, plans are being made for further tarmacking at the Rec, a Letter to Loved Ones Post Box at the Cemetery, a Remembrance Bench for the village and some replacement swings one of which will be inclusive, here’s to the next 12 months

Cllr Rob Scott – April 2024.

Chairman’s Report – 2023

This meeting marks another year I have spent as Chair of Hockliffe Parish Council. We have had an eventful year, which has included the celebrations for Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II Platinum Jubilee, with a highly successful event at Hockliffe recreation ground, led by Cllr Lisa Antonini and keenly assisted by the ladies of Blooming Hockliffe, the Church and other volunteers. A few months later, this was sadly followed by the death of our beloved Queen and a period of mourning followed.

Further work has been done with our plight, that is the A5. This has included meetings between myself, our MP Andrew Selous, and National Highways. Following a meeting that was held down a resident’s cellar with the aforementioned, National Highways have agreed to install Average Speed Cameras through the village to address the speed of vehicles once they have passed the lights and to slow lorries down at night which will hopefully stop our homes from shaking. Residents have now had a letter to confirm that work will commence on the 24th of April. Since the announcement we had an impromptu visit from the Minister for Roads, Richard Holden MP, Kevin Collins CBC Portfolio Holder, our Ward Councillor Mark Versallion, and our MP Andrew Selous all of whom championed the forthcoming installation and could also see our need for de-trunking although that is more of a long-term goal.

Residents may be aware of the increase in solar farms locally, we have been able to negotiate with a company who will be installing a solar farm this year on land off Church Lane a sum of £5,000 per annum for the next 30 years, this money is to be spent by the Parish Council and will help boost our funds.

We have recently welcomed Richard Alexander back to the Parish Council, and we are delighted that he has chosen to stand in our forthcoming election. Our other new member, Rebecca Reyland, who I am pleased to say is also standing on May 4^th. 

Richard, Rebecca and I are also Village Hall trustees and Richard is heavily involved in obtaining plans and a new quote for a village hall to be built at our recreation ground. This will also enable us to install much needed CCTV for the area.

Remembrance was once again celebrated throughout the village with decorations put up by Blooming Hockliffe. We also had the addition of a new “Women in War” metal statue alongside our existing Tommy.

Our Christmas Tree lighting ceremony went ahead as usual with Santa handing out presents at the Harvester. Our thanks go to Natalie and the team who provided mulled wine and mince pies for the occasion.

We continue to deliver the normal services of a Parish Council, including the maintenance of our recreation ground, cemetery and churchyard. Our Clerk Colin Underhay has continued to keep us all inline this year and perform his duties seamlessly. This includes all of our policies and procedures, and this year has seen a record return in VAT.

I look forward to the year ahead where we will observe the Coronation of our new King and see the fruition of some of our hard work.

Cllr Rob Scott – April 2023.

Chairman’s Report – 2022

During the last year we have picked ourselves up and dusted off lockdown restrictions and have been allowed to meet in person again.

We have had another successful year; some highlights are:

• We now have a new Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group made up of residents of the village and led by Richard Alexander.
• We have had works done at the park, thanks to Colin’s perseverance and partially paid for by a grant awarded to us by Cllr Mark Versaillion; this included, removal of the old football fences and replacement of the climbing frame and rockers and repair to other items of equipment including the much loved zip wire.
• Following the lifting of restrictions, we were able to have our usual Christmas Tree lighting event hosted by the Harvester. Natalie and her team provided mulled wine and mince pies whilst more children than ever before visited Father Christmas and his Elves in his grotto free of charge. This event was organised by Cllr Antonini and volunteers. They did us proud.
• Blooming Hockliffe continue to do valued work around the village the details of which are to follow.
• We have had meetings with a company who are constructing a solar farm on the outskirts of the village who have agreed to pay us £5,000 per year (30 years) to be spent by the Parish Council.
• The A5 continues to be a thorn in our side. Some improvements have been made and hopefully others to follow.
• Our amazing Clerk has tackled a difficult VAT claim that pre dates his time in the position. Well done Colin.
• We have the Platinum Jubilee Celebrations to look forward to, which is being organised by Cllr Antonini and her merry band of volunteers.

All in all, a very successful year.

Rob Scott

9th May 2022

Chairman’s Report 2021

It’s been two years since the last Annual Parish Meeting. In this time, covid has caused the world to change. We are still only allowed to meet virtually.

Luckily, during this time, we have appointed a new clerk – Colin who has seamlessly guided us through these changes. Colin has also overseen the building of our new website and Facebook page, claimed back many years of VAT, updated our policies and procedures, and archived hundreds of years of paperwork!

Since the last meeting, we have had an election which has seen Rachel, Paul, David, and myself uncontestably elected as parish councillors. We have subsequently co-opted Pam and Annie and more recently Lisa as parish councillors and for the first time in many years have a full council.

These two years have also seen many other successes and actions by the parish council. To highlight a few of these: –

• • Reduction of the speed limit on the A5 from 40mph to 30mph and continued work with Highways England, Councillor Mark Versallion and MP Andrew Selous with our aim to have the A5 ‘De-trunked’ through the village.
  • The implementation of the Speedwatch scheme will be ready to go once the covid restrictions are lifted.
  • Village Garden Services was appointed to our grounds maintenance contract and subsequently replaced this month with Goldleaf who I am certain will do a fine job going forward.
  • The sale and removal of the containers on the recreation ground.
  • The appointment of a new village handyman.
  • The improved colour version of the Hockliffe Herald and reduction in the cost of printing.
  • The replacement of the church gate and repair to the existing cemetery gate.
  • Funding the volunteer work that has been done by Blooming Hockliffe for the remembrance display and subsequently the flower displays around the village.
  • The creation of a new Neighbourhood Plan steering group and commitment to work with them on a new plan for the parish.
  • The erection of a Christmas tree despite covid restrictions which was almost an Easter tree by the time the restrictions eased enough for us to remove it
    safely.
  • A covid safe Father Christmas around giving presents to the children of the
    village proving to be a great success thanks to the dedicated volunteers.

Moving forward, we have just had a tree survey and will look to have works done in our Recreation ground and Churchyard.

12th April 2021