What the world needs now is love, sweet love. It's the only thing that there's just too little of. That and Town Council Watch of course. But don't worry. After a two month break, this column is back, like a guilty husband bearing flowers and promising to do better, by covering two full council meetings in one bumper article. So dim the lights, put on some Barry White, it's time to get all hot and steamy with the monthly love-in that is Wymondham Town Council.

Carving Initials In The Bark

At December's meeting, the bonhomie started early when Cllr Kathryn Cross (Con) praised the quality of the market place Christmas tree put on by the council: "I think it looks fabulous… it’s a great height and width.” “So whoever ordered that, I think it looks spot on.”

A gushing Mayor Kevin Hurn (Con) agreed: “I think we can commend Mr Gurney for the ordering process”, dotingly referring to the council's clerk to his left: “For it was he, who ordered the tree”, he swooned further, now in rhyming couplets.

The YouTube resolution wasn't high enough to detect a reciprocal blush.

Spreading The Love

The first real bit of new business was to approve a Town Council donation of £2500 to the Wymondham Fuel Allotments charity, which distributes local supermarket vouchers to pensioners in financial need over the Christmas period. It was a cause that united all councillors in its worthiness, at a tough time for many.

As a trustee of the charity, Cllr Robert Savage (Con) was unable to contribute to the debate or vote on it, due to rules about conflicts of interest. But he could rest easy, as the council’s Clerk was able to demonstrate an impressively intimate knowledge of the charity's workings in his absence, all the way down to the outcomes of the trustees’ most recent meeting. At one point the Mayor even inadvertently addressed the impartial paid member of staff as “Councillor Gurney”.

Oopsie. Our friend Councillor Freud might have found that slip interesting.

Cllr Tony Holden (Con) supported the donation but did query why the proposal wasn’t following the council’s usual detailed grant application process that other charities had had to follow.

Cue the Clerk to explain all:

“The reason this is not a grant application and not being dealt with as a grant application is because simply this particular charity has not applied for a grant application to this council. This is an initiative for the council to give funds and using this charity as the outlet for distribution.”

Well that clears that one up then.

A supportive Cllr Suzanne Nuri-Nixon (Lib Dem) wanted to know which budget this would be coming from.

“There’s no specific budget allocation for this so at the moment it’s just coming from the general reserve” answered Cllr Gurney the Clerk, showing off new Kamasutra levels of flexibility for Wymondham Town Council in supporting worthy causes.

The measure was passed unanimously by the remaining councillors not on the charity's board. All eyes turned expectantly to the next worthy cause…

Sweet Nothings for Youth Mental Health

The council swiped left and rejected the next proposal, to fund 20 sessions of mental health therapy for up to 10x Wymondham youngsters at a time, via local not-for-profit organisation Cup-O-T.  The scheme aimed to identify struggling 7-16 year olds in the town to support their mental health and work to build up their confidence to join other local youth organisations.

With no councillors on Cup-O-T’s board, all were free to take part in scrutinising the proposal, with a rapidly rekindled lust for process, budgetary restraint and detail that included a 15-minute questioning for founder and occupational therapist Catherine Gray.

Among other things, the inclusion of providing refreshments to young 'uns at the site in the request seemed to stick in the gizzard for many councillors.

Said Cllr Julian Halls (Lib Dem): “there's an awful lot here in relation to general administration costs of the organisation, including refreshments which I find rather odd to be honest.”

Treat 'em mean, to keep 'em keen, I suppose.

“These are actual costs for running the service, it’s not for Catherine and her team to go and buy doughnuts when they could be buying bourbon biscuits.”  countered Cllr Kathryn Cross.

With a £2500 charity donation approved off the back of half a sheet of A4 moments before, Cllr Cross then suggested maybe this 7-page proposal had been a victim of its own high levels of detail:

"I think we've got so much information here that might be putting people off slightly but I think we're quite lucky to have such a good breakdown because I don't think we normally get that sort of information."

Costing £4937, the measure was to be paid for out of the council’s Youth Support reserve, which was flush with over £10k, thanks to the council putting forward no measures for youths in over a decade. The fund had been raided for £16k in 2019 though, to put towards the council’s new £2m office building.

Well if you don't love yourself, who else is going to?

The proposal was rejected after Conservatives Yvette Astley, Peter Broome, Kevin Hurn, Robert Savage, and Lib Dems Julian Halls and Suzanne Nuri-Nixon raised their hands to vote it down.

A New Flame Has Come

Onto January’s meeting, and we were updated that a new Town Coordinator has finally been appointed and will begin work this month. Corinna Pharaoh will work with businesses and residents to coordinate things like events, leisure and tourism in the town.

Town Council Watch hopes it’s a match made in heaven.

Shaping Up The Town Centre

By far the biggest item on the January agenda was a proposal to set aside £200k to spend on future improvements to the high street. Added to an existing £50k and a mooted £750k top-up from South Norfolk Council, the move could see £1 million of investment into the town centre. The proposer, a suited and booted, dressed-to-impress Cllr Tony Holden, hailed it as a “once in a generation opportunity”.

The measure certainly drew a crowd, with nine speakers in the public participation section, including South Norfolk councillor, Cllr Jack Hornby (Con), one of the Town Council’s estranged exes, who resigned two years ago. 

It’s not me, it’s you.

A prenup was on the minds of some of the more distrustful councillors. Cllrs Suzanne Nuri-Nixon and Robert Savage wanted to know how the Town Council could guarantee South Norfolk would hold up their side of the bargain and cough up the £750k?

Be gentle with us. We’ve been hurt before.

While Cllrs Halls and Savage saw future squabbles on the horizon over what specifically to spend the money on.

Cllr Holden had soothing words and a back rub for them all, re-assuring that this wasn’t actually spending the money now, merely setting it aside, and that extensive public consultation would take place before any decisions were made.

After a bit of a public lovers’ tiff between Cllrs Holden and Savage, seemingly triggered by the former submitting his written proposal before the latter could submit a similar paper, all councillors present voted to approve the measure.

All’s fair in love and war.

Kiss Of Approval

Next up, the council approved an increase of 5% to its precept (the Town Council’s share of council tax), which members compared favourably against inflation running at around 10%.

A question from Cllr Kim Carsok (Con) did reveal a 26% increase in admin staff salary costs though. Was this to accommodate the new Town Coordinator, asked the 'relatively-new' councillor. Not so. The Clerk confirmed the 26% covered pay rises last year for existing admin staff only, “with a consideration for a pay rise this year”.

Very nice too. Do remember to instruct your employer to put some money away for your inevitable pay rise this year, dear reader.

Not Puppy Love

A poem:

Roses are red. Violets are blue.
The Clerk’s latest risk assessment of Town Council public areas and activities highlighted an abundance of dog poo.

It was apparently becoming a problem in the cemetery. But cometh a problem, cometh an ACTION PLAN. The council could consider banning dogs there, said the report.

“Does that mean banning all dogs, or just offending dogs?” queried the voice of Wymondham’s canines and Centre Paws owner Cllr Kathryn Cross.

It was merely something to consider, in the face of irresponsible owners letting their dogs run off the lead and out of sight, came the response from the Clerk: “they can’t possibly see where they’re defecating and they make no attempts to clear it up.”

Hmm. Town Council Watch has always thought Kett’s Park would be a nice place to walk a dog.

Love Shine A (Xmas) Light

After that, the council agreed to take on the financial cost of purchasing, storing and maintaining Christmas lights for the town centre - meaning this will no longer fall on the shoulders of the independent voluntary groups Town Team / Light Up Wymondham.

The volunteers will continue to hang the lights though, even if Cllr Astley did baulk at the thought of non-professionals risking their lives up ladders.

Sssshh. No one tell her they’ve been doing it for the last 8 years.

Caught On Camera

Chip eaters of Wymondham need never feel lonely again, with new CCTV to be installed on Market Place looking fondly over them. The council voted to accept a quote for a camera system in the area, to deter anti-social behaviour.

Public toilet champion Cllr Robert Savage also requested that the outside of the oft-vandalised town centre conveniences be covered by CCTV and an accommodation was made to allow this to happen.

Well. There will be no jokes linking the topics of romance and public toilets here. This is a family publication.

And with that, the Town Council and its residents walked off into the sunset, hand-in-hand, to live happily ever after.