Notes of the Maresfield Parish Annual Assembly held on Friday 18^th May 2007 at 7.00pm in the Village Hall, Maresfield

Present:          Cllr K Ogden (Chairman), Cllr W King, Cllr D Finch, Cllr P Harris, Cllr R Galley,

Cllr D Barlow, Cllr R Street, Cllr Mrs V Taylor, CCllr F Whetstone, CCllr T Reid, Mr T Allen (Clerk) & Mrs C Goossens (Asst Clerk)

Approximately 40 members of public were in attendance including the following:

Mr & Mrs Jock Compson, Mr M Wheeler, Mr D Thompson, Mr & Mrs J Handley, Mr P Tester,

Mr & Mrs R Tester, Mr G Hardy, Mr & Mrs J Smith, Mr G Allt, Mr F Taylor, Mrs G Allen,
Mrs A Finch, Mr B Keeys, Ms J Best & Mrs P Street.

Apologies for absence were received from Cllr Gutteridge, Cllr Stevenson and
DCllr Mrs S Martin.

The Chairman welcomed everyone to the meeting.  He continued by saying that the recent election has resulted in some changes in the Parish Council with regards to Councillors and four extremely long serving members have now retired.  Cllr King is now Vice-Chairman and Cllr Ogden has taken over the Chairmanship from him.  The Chairman then went on to introduce new and existing Councillors to the members of the public.

The Chairman asked for questions from the floor relating to the Council’s activities in the last year:

Mrs Allen expressed concern about the possibility of the Nutley Post Office being lost and enquired as to what action is being taken to prevent this from happening?

Cllr King reported that he has been speaking with the Post Office in this regard and also with the existing sub-postmaster at Nutley.

The Post Office reports that it has no plans for rural Post Office closures.

The Post Office has been in touch with a potential operator for the Nutley PO and one option is that it could be operated as an outpost of another Post Office e.g. Maresfield.

It is likely that a Post Office facility will continue to be provided in Nutley Village although there may be a temporary break in operations.

Mr Wheeler enquired in relation to the accounts, specifically re. note 4 “projects”, why £7,000 of allocated funds were not spent.

Cllr Street explained that this related to money set aside for projects and not spent last year. Furthermore, he confirmed that this money will not be carried forward into the next financial year.

Cllr King noted that particularly with regard to “youth” the money had not been spent due to a lack of volunteers to help establish and run various youth activities and that this was a major hindrance.

Mr Compson enquired as to the outcome of bids for funding as made by Parish groups last Autumn.

The Clerk explained that the Council’s process in this regard is a lengthy one.  Only in May of this year has Council started to pay grants and donations for the financial year 2007/08, some months after the deadline of end September 2006 for applications.

The following points were noted in discussion relating to the benefits and disadvantages of additional housing in the Wealden area:-

o             The lack of infrastructure and additional traffic are key concerns.

o             Mr Allt expressed his concern regarding the existing provisions particularly in relation to NHS services and how these will be further affected/stretched with increased housing in the Wealden area.

o             Cllr Galley noted that the national push in the NHS is to specialise and reduce.

o             We need to make our voice heard if we are to preserve services which are accessible for us.

o             Cllr Street highlighted the need for Affordable Housing in this area together with the need for proper forward planning and consideration for schooling, policing, sewage, water provisions.

o             Mr Wheeler noted that during the Local Plan process local water authorities were asked if they could supply the increased demand and they all said they could.  It is a similar situation with regard to Schools.

o             Mrs Compson suggested that Parishioners may be able to take a certain amount of control over the situation by forming a Community Housing Association.

o             It was noted that any Affordable Housing needs to be permanently affordable i.e. remain so eternally.

o             There is currently insufficient land available to build affordable housing under the current rules / policy.

o             85% of houses sold in the Wealden area are sold to people from outside the area.

o             CCllr Reid confirmed that there is a move afoot to take on board the views and wishes of local people.  The future is in our hands.

o             Grampian is a “brownfield” site and Central Government would argue that this should not count towards the annual housing allocation requirement for the area.

o             Over £300,000 will be derived from the developer of the Grampian site for the community to spend.  It is encouraging to see that some of those developments which are inevitable are bringing with them some balance i.e. benefits for the local community.

o             Cllr Mrs Taylor noted that the development at the Grampian site is an excellent example of how we need to be in discussions regarding future developments right at the beginning so we can relay to the developers exactly what we want.

o             Mr Thompson noted that the LDF should particularly take account of the impact of development on the traffic through the villages and how we deal with the whole question.

o             Cllr King stated that the Local Strategic Partnership is responsible for pulling everyone / everything together and they are working hard to do just this.

o             Mrs Allen congratulated the Parish Council for getting things done with regard to speeding noting in particular that there has been evidence of regular Police speed checks recently in Nutley village.

o             Sussex Police are actively working towards reducing speeding.  There is new equipment on order and new staff rotas which mean that there will be more police on the roads and new powers for local police will mean greater enforcement.

o             CCllr Reid noted that largely through the efforts of this Parish Council the police are now concentrating more aggressively on the issue of rural speeding.

o             Cllr Finch highlighted the need for more energy for any additional new houses.

o             CCllr Reid stated that 5% of Sussex electricity demand will be generated by the Newhaven incinerator.

The meeting closed at 20.55.