Broxtowe Enews 17th March 2013

Welcome to Broxtowe Enews, brought to you by the Liberal Democrats and edited by David Watts, the leader of the Lib-Dems on Broxtowe Borough Council. May I give a special welcome to the new readers that we have this week.
1. Broxtowe Budget
Broxtowe Borough Council met last week to agree a budget for next year, and again it was a near unanimous vote. The headline figures are that Broxtowe council tax will not go up, council house rents are kept down, and there are no cuts to front line services. All the savings are being made by operating more efficiently. This is the third year in a row that there has been no increase in our council tax. There will unfortunately be a slight increase in council tax overall because the police commissioner has put up the police element of the council tax. I read also that Nottingham City (Labour) have put up their council tax by 1.9% and Rushcliffe (Tory) have put theirs up by over 4%, so I hope people will agree that they have got a good deal from Broxtowe. The only person not to support it on the council was one Labour member.

2. HS2 meeting
There will be a meeting at Beeston Town Hall on Tuesday evening at 7.30pm for local residents to raise any concerns, ask questions about or express views on HS2. Everyone is welcome to attend. I will be chairing the meeting and I hope that we get a good turn out. The town hall is on Foster Avenue and car parking is available free at that time of day.

3. Chilwell Road Street Party
As regular readers may recall Chilwell Road in Beeston will be closing on 25th March for 12 months. Traders there have organised a street party to promote the businesses there, which will remain open throughout. This will take place on Saturday March 30th from 11am to 4pm, and will include street entertainers, face painting and live music. Congratulations to Matt Goold, editor of the Beestonian, for organising this.

4. Chilwell Road Waste Collection
Sticking to the theme of the tram works disruption changes have to be made to refuse collections to cope with the work as well. All residential properties in the affected area will now be collected on Wednesday’s, which is a change or some properties. Glass collection  will remain as it is now and for garden waste contractors will collect bins and move them to and from the edge of the works.

5. Beeston Bus Services
 A range of new routes for buses come into effect around Beeston next week as wel to cope with th closure of Chilwell Road.  New leaflet is available with detail of these and I’ve put a copy on the Broxtowe Lib-Dem web site at www.broxtoweliberaldemocrats.org.uk. The link to it is on the front page of the web site. Amongst the changes is a new free shuttle bus for the duration of the roadworks.

6. NET Schedule
Finishing off the NET items for this week, they have released their latest timetable of works for the next six weeks and again this can be found via the front page of the Broxtowe Lib-Dem web site.

7. A610 Lane Closures
Over the next six weeks barrier repair work is being undertaken along the A610. This will necessitate some lane closures but to minimise inconvenience to road users the council will be carrying out a litter pick at the same time, which avoids having to have lane restrictions in place on another day for this to be done. (It also saves the council something like £12,000 in admin fees to the Highways Agency.)

8. Apprenticeships
One of the Lib-Dem commitments when we came into Government was to increase the number of apprenticeships available for young people. This has been an unqualified success and results last week showed that in the East Midlands the number of apprenticeships available has increased by 174% over the past year.

9. Adoption and Fostering
Notts County Council are looking for 40 additional foster carers and an extra 60 adoptive families. They have had a 22 per cent increase in the number of children in care over the past two years and desperately need more help. If this is something you might be interested in please ring 0845 301 8899 for fostering or 0845 301 2288 for adoption to get more information.

10. Victorian Themes Tours
The DH Lawrence Birthplace Museum and Heritage Centre will be running Victorian themes tours next weekend in Mansfield Road and Victoria Street in Eastwood. The tours will be on 23rd and 24th March starting at 1.30pm. For more information please ring 01773 717353.

11. Kimberley Cemetery Chapel
Kimberley Town Council are seeking the views of local residents about the future of the chapel at the cemetery.  They have an online consultation running this week at www.surveymonkey.com/KimberleySurvey.

12. Money for School Sport
The Government has announced that Broxtowe’s primary schools will receive an average of £9,000 extra each to spend on improving their sport provision. This is part of the legacy from the Olympics and is very good news indeed. It will be up to each school to decide how best to use the money, provided that it is spent on improving sports.

As ever thank you for your support for this newsletter, and any feedback is gratefully received.
Best wishes
David
www.broxtoweliberaldemocrats.org.uk
www.davidwatts.org.uk
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