New Councillors Required

If you live within the boundaries of Hepscott Parish Council your community needs you.

Parish and Town councils are the first layer of government in our political system, and depending on their size they provide a range of services. Hepscott is a small parish in terms of numbers of residents, but it is spread out from Clifton Lane to Hepscott Village then Southfields and Barmoor and Catchburn, with small groups of houses dotted between these areas.

Our Parish Council has nine Councillors representing us, some of whom have been involved for decades and provided sterling service. In May, we are holding our Annual Parish Meeting and we have an opportunity for more residents to join us as Parish Councillors. We will have five vacancies, and would love to invite you all to consider whether this role could be for you.

We meet six times a year, at Hepscott Parish Hall. We are a friendly and supportive group of independents. We work for our community rather than any political party and we have a range of backgrounds and experiences which we bring to our roles.

The most important qualities you will need to be an effective representative for your community are; the ability to attend our meetings, the ability to listen to all views and the willingness to work to improve the area for the benefit of all.

Recent improvements we have made to the area have included placing extra grit bins and extra litter bins on Southfields Estate, work around flood prevention and flood control in the parish, speed reduction measures in Hepscott Village and responding to planning applications which impact on the community.

We discuss our priorities each year and we are very much focused on trying to develop a site for allotment provision in the parish. As most of you will probably already be aware, there are no council owned allotments available currently for Hepscott parish residents, and residents are not eligible for Morpeth allotments. We would like to be able to change this, so if this is something you are also passionate about then why not bring us your ideas and help us achieve our aims?

Road safety is a priority for us, and we monitor speeds and accident rates in the area. We are aware of some reckless driving at excessive speeds on the A192 and we are hopeful of working with the county council to improve safety measures here.

We welcome people of all ages and abilities as long as you are at least 18 years old and have a genuine interest in working in a voluntary capacity on your local council.

In May we will be saying farewell to our current Chair, Andrea Ranyard, long standing Parish Councillors Malcolm Paton and Fred Dye and Parish Councillors James and Jessica Ellis. We would like to take this opportunity to thank them for their hard work and selfless public service. If you feel you would like to take their place please email our parish clerk Sylvia Johnson at sylviajohnson04@aol.com expressing your interest and you will be advised as to how to proceed. It is very straightforward, involving very little paperwork.