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Chairman’s Annual Report for 2012/2013 to the Boxley Parishioners


The parish year, May 2012-13 was not an easy year for anyone, your parish council included. We seem to have spent much time and effort facing up to a succession of problems in defence of the interests of our residents, particularly significant planning and financial issues. But aside from these, the day-to-day business of the parish continued, as reported on our website and the monthly parish page in the Downs Mail, which all residents receive.


We continued to support, both financially and otherwise, the Vinters Valley Nature Reserve, the Walderslade Woodlands Group and the recently formed Friends of Boxley Warren; together with village halls and local and national charities and organisations serving our communities. Most of these bodies were represented at the opening last May of the Weavering Diamond Jubilee Orchard by TRHs The Earl and Countess of Wessex – possibly the first royal visit in Kent hosted by a parish council and certainly ever-memorable by the 1,500 or so residents who attended. Thank you all.


While many people tend to relate the parish council to planning applications and the built environment, we are also dedicated to protecting the rural surroundings that make all parts of the parish such a pleasant place to live. It is therefore pleasing to record that we have at last achieved Village Green status for the main surviving area of woodland in Walderslade. This will protect it from development in perpetuity. Meanwhile, in the extreme south-west of the parish, we have been assisting local residents preserve areas of Cuckoo Wood.


Another significant achievement during the year was the purchase of a plot of land south of Boxley village to protect it from possible development. The parish council recently finally decided that this should be used for allotments. These are a much-needed and long sought-for amenity in the parish but affordable land could not hitherto be


found. Legal formalities and infrastructure work are incomplete, but we hope to make further announcements shortly.


Back in the office, we have been bombarded by numerous changes in legislation, both proposed and actual, as reflected in the frequent consultation and guidance documents received from government ministries, KCC and MBC. The consultations ranged from speed limits on rural roads to full access to internet banking by parish councils (incredibly enough, still not allowed). Drafting a response to MBC’s consultation on its Core Strategy proposals occupied a great deal of time, as well as a well-attended public meeting. At the same time we have had a major, and on-going, exercise in preparing a neighbourhood plan covering each of our communities as required by the new National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF). In addition, we now have on our hands a high- priority exercise in commenting on MBC’s Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment (SHLAA) with a tight deadline.


At a more local level, we have, with varying degrees of success, expressed our views to MBC on a vast number of planning applications ranging from the very large developments in the south of the parish to front porches and individual trees in Walderslade and Sandling. The parish council may be a small voice in the overall scheme of things, but it has a statutory right to be heard – a right we shall continue to exercise in whatever way thought best in the general interest of our residents.


All this extra work, and the ever- growing popularity of Beechen Hall as a venue for community, commercial and family events and activities, has over- burdened our hard-pressed parish clerk, Pauline Bowdery, and the assistant clerk, Melanie Fooks. We have therefore recruited a temporary office assistant and two assistant caretakers, all part- time. This is a necessary expense if we are to continue to provide the service


level of a Quality Parish Council and as expected by our residents.


This leads me into financial matters. Setting our budget for the current financial year was dominated by the loss of the MBC concurrent functions grant (CFG) which, in three years, shrank from over £50,000 to zero (albeit now mitigated by an award of £12,000 from the new parish services scheme). We worked on the assumption that residents would not want the consequential diminution in service if it could be avoided; and that it would be imprudent to draw down from unallocated reserves now when worse could be waiting round the corner. We therefore decided to make what savings we could to meet the accumulated effect of three years of inflation and a higher wage bill, and then fill the remaining shortfall by, reluctantly, increasing the precept. This increase, the first in three years, amounted to approximately £5 per year (10p per week) for an average (Band D) property. This matched precisely the reduction in funding received from MBC and, while regrettable, still leaves Boxley with the second lowest precept in the borough.


A busy year – and for me as a new chairman, one continuous learning curve. That I have managed to negotiate safely (most) of the more dangerous pitfalls is entirely due to the help and support I have received from the chairs of the environment and estates committees, Wendy Hinder and Vic Davies, the vice-chairmen (including Kevin Perry who has now sadly left us), other fellow councillors and, last, but most certainly not least, the staff. To them but to all our residents I extend my best wishes for an ever-better Boxley in the coming year.


Ivor Davies. Chairman 13 May 2013


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