
Blog
Timberscombe 100 Club – May Draw Winners
1. Brian Milligan £25.00
2. Ellie Bishop £15.00
3. Harry Crawford £10.00
House to let
Please accept this email as official notice that Magna Housing Ltd has received 4 weeks’ notice of termination of tenancy for the following address within the Exmoor National Park;
Address: 8 Meadow Close, Wheddon Cross, Minehead, Somerset, TA24 7AU
The property is due to become void on: 20.06.2022
This property is subject to a S106 local restriction.
This property will be advertised to let with the local restriction on the Somerset Homefinder website.
If you are aware of anyone who has a housing need and meets the local connection criteria, please advise them to contact our lettings department on 0800 3586025 as soon as possible.
Upon the expiration of a period of 28 days from this notice, this property will be let in accordance with the Cascade Provisions for Registered Social Landlords with the order of priorities set out in the S106 legal agreement (summary attached) without further notification or delay.
Updates
Dunster Benefice Newsletter 27th May 2022
Timberscombe School Friday News 27.05.22
Update by WS and T Council on the £150 rebates from the government:
We have now made 36,174 (out of 55,390 ) energy rebate payments. These will appear as ‘ENERGYREB’ on bank statements.
All households where they pay their Council Tax by DD (provided we are permitted to automatically pay), will have received their £150.00 rebate payment already or will do by 9th June (if their first Council Tax DD payment is made on 15, 20 or 23 May).
Those that will not have received a payment by 9th June will be required to submit a claim form for the rebate. This will include households that don’t pay their Council Tax by DD as well as those who do, but their bank account name does not match the name on the council tax bill or because they will not have made a DD payment in April or May.
The claim form will be online but will also be able to be completed on the customer’s behalf where they telephone us. It will ask for the customers bank details and we will make payment into their bank account. We cannot make payment by cash or cheque.
We will start writing to these households in early June; a little later than we had originally planned, but we have needed to undertake some additional technical security changes before our claim form can go live. We are working toward the online claim form being available on our website on 8 June. Once the online form is live it won’t be necessary for customers to wait for the letter to arrive before a claim is made.
Changes to waste collection due to Jubilee Celebrations
The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee celebrations are fast approaching and with them an extra bank holiday which means changes to Somerset Waste Partnership’s usual recycling and rubbish collection schedule.
This always happens over bank holidays, but the Jubilee is a little more complicated because of the extra bank holiday on Thursday 2 June and there will be collections on two consecutive Saturdays.
- No collections on Thursday 2 June. These collections will happen on Saturday 4 June.
- No collections on Friday 3 June. These collections will happen on Monday 6 June.
- All collections for the week beginning 6 June will take place one day later, including Friday 10 June collections happening on Saturday 11 June.
Please make sure you know your revised collection day and put your recycling and/or rubbish out on the right day before 7am.
This is the perfect excuse to use the My Collection Day feature on the SWP homepage somersetwaste.gov.uk
You can use it to download your collection days into the calendar on your laptop or mobile device – it works for Apple and Android devices and sets up automatic reminders, so you need never miss a collection again.
Or you can use the same feature to just check your days online or download a printable copy of your collection day calendar.
You can also check the 12-month calendar that was sent to all homes as part of the roll-out of the new Recycle More service. In some parts of the county, the calendar will cover the Jubilee changes.
Anyone organising a street party on Saturday 4 June, should check if they are due a recycling and/or rubbish collection on that day and ensure crews can still get access to collect their waste – remember, collections usually due on Thursday 2 June will happen on Saturday 4 June.
Are you eligible for the Boiler Upgrade Scheme?
From 23 May 2022 a new grant scheme for homeowners upgrading from gas boilers to either an Air Source Heat Pump (ASHP) or a biomass boiler may be eligible for a grant of £5,000, or £6,000 if upgrading to a Ground Source Heat Pump (GSHP).
The government is providing grants to encourage property owners to install low carbon heating systems such as heat pumps, through the Boiler Upgrade Scheme (BUS). These grants will help property owners overcome the upfront cost of low carbon heating technologies.
The scheme is open to domestic and small non-domestic properties in England and Wales. It is running from 2022 to 2025.
Please click here to find out more.
New COVID-19 Dashboard
As a result of recent changes to policy, the number of detected cases alone no longer provides an accurate or consistent indication of the prevalence of COVID-19 in our community.
As a result of this, detailed cases data such as the map and district level figures have been removed from the SCC and NHS in Somerset Dashboard. Cases are still shown on the chart; however, it now includes additional information (ONS Prevalence*) that may give a better indication of the actual number of people with COVID. Testing data has also been added to provide further context.
The hospital admissions data also now includes mechanical ventilation bed patients who are positive as a better indicator of serious illness being treated. The OPEL level on this page provides a snapshot of how the health and care system overall is managing.
The vaccination page now provides more overall strategic vision of how the vaccination programme has been implemented and provides an indication of the effective level of immunity provided to our community by boosters and third doses.
The current version of the dashboard can be accessed at any time here.
Pick It Up
I have, once again, received complaints from residents about people failing to pick up after their dogs. OF particular concern are parts of Great House Street, Willow Bank, Willow View and the roadway near holes square.
Their simple request is – If you have a dog please pick up after it.
What does the Parish Council Do?
At the Timberscombe Annual Parish Meeting the Chairman of the Parish Council, Peter Pilkington, presented his report for the last year.
Last year we welcomed two new councillors, Allan Sutton and Kathy Walker, to the Parish Council. Allan has taken on supervision of the footpaths in the parish and Kathy is looking after the Play Area.
The Council responded to 11 planning applications in the last 12 months: The Old Dairy, Owayview, 1 Forge Cottages, River Steep, Bougham Farm, North Hawkwell Farm, Totterdown Bungalow, Embellewood, Beasley Yard and Allercott Farm (2). We also reported an apparent breach of planning, which a parishioner brought to our attention.
We have been working hard to make Timberscombe a more Eco-friendly village. We joined the No Mow May campaign and with help from many volunteers planted hundreds of wildflower seeds and plants around the village. We hope to see the fruits of our labour soon. The councillors have also planted free trees around the parish.
Councillor Cait Collins was instrumental in setting up the Eco Timberscombe group. She also managed to secure the council a grant to cover the cost of a biodiversity survey of the parish, which should be available to view shortly. A presentation of the findings was given in the village hall on 21st February.
The village hall was also used to host the West Somerset Together meeting on wildlife friendly gardening. The presentation was very interesting. The wildlife survey, giving ideas on how to make your garden more wildlife friendly, is available on the Somerset Wildlife website.
Throughout the year the Parish Council organised village maintenance including cutting hedges and grass, tidying the bank by the Village Hall, cleaning the telephone box/defibrillator interior, clearing/relaying of the gulley by the chapel.
Cllr Sarah Campbell has temporarily taken over the guardianship of the village defibrillator and we would like to thank Mr Ware, who has kindly agreed to clean the phone box regularly. We urgently need to find somebody who is willing to take on the longer-term guardianship of the defibrillator.
We contracted the dog bins and rubbish bins to be emptied and the salt bins to be refilled.
Numerous blocked drains, potholes, damaged signposts and gates were reported to SCC for repair and the vast majority of them have now been mended. The parish now has a Parish Paths Liaison Officer Garry Southon. He can undertake minor repairs and clearances, but repairs should first be reported to Cllr Allan Sutton so that he can complete online reporting of the issues.
We have had less success with the water in Great House Street, which was reported to Wessex Water and SCC. Wessex Water have tested the water and confirmed that it is natural spring water and not a burst pipe.
The Parish Council liaised with County Councillor Frances Nicholson to get white lines painted outside the Post Office, to help those with limited mobility access the Post Office. 20mph flashing signs were also installed near the school. The Parish Council donated £300 to St Petrock’s Church to help towards grass cutting in the graveyard.
As you may be aware, Somerset will shortly become one unitary council. The parish councillor representatives met with Somerset Highways at Timberscombe to discuss new ways of working.
As trustees to the JAPF the council has overseen repairs to the Play Area, including a new fence dividing it from the football pitch.
We have responded to parishioners concerns regarding the dangers on a bridleway close to a farm and access to a field on the A396.
The Parish Council wrote to Magna regarding concerns about the closure of The Old Dairy and also about the lack of support for their residents during the recent power outage.
Mr Wood, from Magna, was invited to attend the April meeting to answer the Council’s concerns regarding the lack of support for residents during the recent storm. Magna were, apparently, unaware that the Timberscombe residents were without power for a prolonged period!
Cllr Pugsley commended the work done by Timberscombe residents at this time, particularly the Timberscombe Good Neighbour (TGN) volunteers under the guidance of Joy Booth. TGN are looking to purchase emergency items such as hot water bottles, torches, flasks, etc. The Village Hall committee will be looking to buy generators to use in the Hall in a power outage for hot water /food. The Parish Council will support this work whenever possible and have asked Mr wood back to our June meeting to feedback on the concerns expressed at the April meeting.
The Parish Council has repeatedly voiced displeasure to County Councillors about the recent chaos with “emergency” road closures where diversions direct the public to closed roads, signs were left up too long after the work was finished, signs stated that the road was closed when it wasn’t, and publicised closures didn’t happen. We hope that the new Somerset Highways structure will be able to improve these problems.
Cllr Kathy Walker has volunteered to be the parish representative on the Somerset Bus Partnership Forum.
The Parish Council was delighted to host a presentation to Cllr Sarah Campbell, on behalf of the village, to say thank you for her efforts in the Post Office during the Covid pandemic. Her support for villagers has been very much appreciated. The Parish Council added its thanks to her for her work in the Post Office.
We hope that you have signed up to receive the regular website news bulletins, provided by our clerk and others in the village. You may not be aware that the Parish Council pays for the site hosting.
And finally, the Parish Council will be supporting the Jubilee Celebrations on 3rd June. We have purchased 72 Jubilee mugs to be presented to all the children in the village and the surplus to be sold.
Peter Pilkington, Chairman Timberscombe Parish Council
