Hythe Rotary Club Joining Rotary

Hythe Rotary Club

4 Have you thought about joining Rotary? 4 Do you want to get involved with the local community? 4 Do you enjoy socialising, making friends and working with other people? 4 Do you have ideas and a desire to take action to help others?

Hythe Rotary is an active club which is committed to helping those in our community who need our support, but we also know how to enjoy our time together as friends. There is no complicated joining process and you can meet us socially before we welcome you to any of our meetings. To make contact please ring, or email: Email: john@wren.cc Tel: 07787 517189

What’s your retirement game plan?

Understanding your options and managing your income are no longer ‘one-off’ decisions

After the introduction of Pension Freedoms in 2015, retirement choices fundamentally changed. Restrictions around access to de昀ned contribution pensions were lifted and retirees gained more 昀exibility. You can choose to stay invested, decide your own level of income, or even withdraw the entire pot. Purchasing an annuity is now another choice, rather than a necessity .

Greater freedoms also bring greater responsibility to ensure retirement savings last. Nobel Laureate William Sharpe describes turning your retirement savings into income as ‘the nastiest, hardest problem in 昀nance’. And it’s no wonder, when you consider how many options are now available.

Many people 昀nd that the countless choices at retirement are overwhelming

The cliff-edge idea of stopping work at 60 or 65 and ‘being retired’ are fading into obscurity. People today are adopting a phased approach, transitioning from working and saving, and moving towards leisure and spending over a period of years. This is all done on their terms, in line with their own life plans, rather

than restricted by a pension scheme, or an employer.

Ask yourself, what does retirement look like? How can I make it a reality? If you’re ‘retired’ already, is it as you imagined? Being ‘in retirement’ is much more than simply drawing an income. You’ll need to think about an ef昀cient home and use for your tax-free cash (considering how poor savings rates are), create a sustainable income that will last your lifetime, and manage your retirement capital.

With no de昀nitive retirement age anymore, and different pressures on supporting older and younger generations, a rethink is needed on how to make best use of your retirement savings. This means considering other assets and sources of income alongside your pension, in such a way to adapt to your changing needs over time.

This new found 昀exibility is not without its risks. Accessing your pension pot can present very different issues compared to building your pension wealth. If you have chosen to remain invested in retirement, there will be challenges that you will need help and advice to navigate.

For example, stock market volatility can potentially bring with it sequence of returns risk and reverse pound cost averaging when drawing an income, which is an added layer of complexity when establishing a retirement income strategy. A problematic issue in retirement is underestimating how long your money needs to last. The 100-year life is fast becoming normal, with more of us living much longer, more active lives than ever before.

Expert advice is key as your retirement could last 30 years and require many short- and long-term decisions

The value of advice comes from building a strong relationship over time, to understand you and your family’s needs. Our expertise in understanding the intricacies of a modern retirement means you can worry less and focus on the important things in life.

The value of an investment with St. James’s Place will be directly linked to the performance of the funds you select, and the value can therefore go down as well as up. You may get back less than you invested.

Equities do not provide the security of capital which is characteristic of a deposit with a bank or building society.

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Community Feel A Real

by Chris Turnbull

Readers will be aware from previous articles in this magazine, that Hythe Environmental Community Group (HECG) has a number of subgroups organising activities around particular themes: Energy; Waste; Food; Flora and Fauna; Hops.

These activities are run as regular activity cycles, while others are more ad hoc as and when needed. This means there's an opportunity for anybody to get involved, regardless of the amount of time they wish to commit or the particular activity they're interested in. Read on for how our network is growing from a small group project to a complex community, linking individuals from all walks of life who wish to make a difference within our beautiful corner of Kent. The Gleaning “circuit-board” HECG Gleaning involves harvesting surplus or otherwise unusable fruit and veg from farms, and delivering it to more than 20 charities, foodbanks, schools and other organisations caring for folk with different challenges. Through our work here, we hope to make a difference in the lives of those in our local community and touch those who might need it most.

One major gleaning “customer” is the Shepway Foodbank, with locations in Folkestone, New Romney and Lydd. With the friendly support of the Foodbank manager, the gleaned produce is shipped out from the Hythe warehouse to all locations, using the Foodbank van and dropping off gleaned produce to our school customers on the Romney Marsh as they go.

We also deliver to the refugees housed at Napier Barracks and have recently welcomed a small group of residents into one of our gleaning teams. Not only does this benefit the wider team, but for our new recruits it means a greater sense of wellbeing and an opportunity to play an active role in the wider community.

Community groups with a mission to enable the young and/or disadvantaged to experience and benefit from working and playing outdoors may not be customers for our gleaned produce, but

have become part of the virtuous circle which benefits more than just the individual parties. “Muddy Wellies”, a local charity-run community garden, needed to provide a major dose of TLC to their cherry trees and approached us to see if we could help. Cherry tree pruning expertise is not something that we have within the group. However, we had gleaned cherries from a wonderful orchard in Wingham and the top fruit farm manager, whom we know well from visits to the farm, was glad to give his time on a Saturday morning to instruct, demonstrate and guide creation of a more controlled and manageable cherry orchard for the charity and create a much more competent group of HECG cherry pruners!

We deliver to nearly 10 schools in Folkestone, Hythe and surrounding villages, and a number of these have also made use of our community owned fruit press to run apple pressing days at the schools! These are real fun as well as being educational. In some cases, the relationship has expanded to assisting and advising on the establishment of plant and veg growing areas for the children. Hops and other plants that “get around” Our community hop farm now has over 200 members and is growing from strength to strength with valued membership of some excellent community gardens and spaces including, Hythe Green Preservation Society, Sandgate Community Garden and Romney Marsh Community Garden (adjacent to the KWT visitor centre). Links with one of our members who has created a Forest Garden on Romney Marsh has resulted in the provision of willow whips to The Hythe Triangle Community Garden

to form part of their entrance archway. Another fantastic community group where our relationship has blossomed is "Led by The Wild” in Aldington, which engages child and adult learning through the enjoyment of woodland and nature-based experience. They are now growing our hops as well as joining us to host some of our bird walks and moth discovery evenings in their woodlands. HECG has supported the Bumblebee Conservation Trust for some years, both through donations and volunteer hours. Our local brewer partners, Docker and Hopfuzz have both generously made donations to BBCT in return for the hops donated by us for their brews. In return, the team from BBCT has supported our activities in a number of ways including donation of native wildflowers and bee homes for the Community Orchard which we are developing on Eaton Lands together with Hythe Civic Society.

HECG’s regular seed and plant swaps in Hythe (Spring and Autumn) are lively events in themselves and there is a bustle of chatter and activity as plants are offered and swapped. Any plants that don’t find a home on the day will be offered to like-minded contacts such as New Romney and Sellindge community gardens, thus avoiding waste and preserving nature. The event this April will also be used to collect native wildflowers donated by the public for use by BBCT to improve the local habitat for pollinators (including bumblebees).

There are so many good initiatives underway in this area, it’s a privilege to be able to make connections with as many as possible. Once started, these mature into relationships linking people and groups to develop a more closelyknit community.

We deliver to nearly 10 schools in Folkestone, Hythe and surrounding villages, and a number of these have also made use “ of our community owned fruit press to run apple pressing days at the schools! ”

40 Years of Friendship

by Kevin Howell

This year, Hythe Twinning Association marks its Ruby Anniversary - forty years of promoting friendships and cultural links between Hythe and its twin towns of Berck-sur-Mer in France and Poperinge in Belgium.

Developing from an idea put forward for the Queen’s Silver Jubilee, the Association is one of Kent’s longest-running active twinning groups. Even over the past two years our hundred or so members have stayed in touch and we were able to restart our social events in Hythe last year.

Berck-sur-Mer is located on the Cote d’Opale just south of Le Touquet, one of Berck’s big attractions is the beach - there’s none much bigger within easy reach! The wide expanse of sand is ideal for land-yachting, moto-cross, the creation of sandcastles and sculptures,, and for staging one of the world’s biggest annual kite festivals every April. If it can be made into a kite, it’ll be found here! The town is also frequented by painters who love the light – just have a look at the pictures by Jan Lavezzari that hang in Hythe’s museum. Given its First World War links, Poperinge will be known to many people. In fact the link with Hythe stems from Talbot House, a social centre for soldiers of all ranks when they were rested away from the front line. The house was given to TocH, the charity which still runs it, by Lord Wakefield of Hythe. Our main friendship links today are with members of the St. Cecilia Band who have visited Hythe regularly, especially for the Hythe Festival. Poperinge is in the heart of Belgium’s hop-growing and beer-making area, “Hommel” being the local brew. The hop is celebrated every three years with a weekendlong festival. Music, parades and a fantastic welcome attract beer fans from across the globe (roll on September 2023!).

People have joined us for a number of reasons, most notably the range of activities and opportunities we have to offer. Some simply take the chance to practice foreign language, others love to explore what's on offer across the water, and most love the social aspect of the association. As we approach our fortieth year, we hope to more of these exciting activities and look forward to more as we plan to attend Berck's Kite Festival in April, organise an anniversary exhibition in Hythe High Street on July the 9th and enter the Venetian Fete in August. exchanges and visits - schools, clubs & societies, professional groups, sports teams. We often simply act as an information and contact point but sometimes may be able to provide some seed funding to get a project off the ground. Sometimes people just want to know where they can find a good lunch! So if this has whetted your appetite, have a look at our website www.hythetwinningassociation.com, contact our secretary Pat Bell bellevue45@gmail.com , or come and have a chat with us at the Undercroft in the High Street on July 9th.

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Anna Lindley

(RVN, Dip.A.Physio)

• Offering physiotherapy assessment and treatment of dogs, cats and small animals. • I use a combination of manual therapy, laser, ultrasound therapy, TENS, kinesiology tape and exercises to rehabilitate your pet depending on your their needs. I also address environmental and exercise factors that can help your pet with their condition. • I now have a NEW treatment room where I can offer further assessment of your pet using a stance analyser.

This identifies the mildest of lameness and addresses areas of compensation. I also offer home visits. • Physiotherapy can help with arthritis and the ageing pet, post operative orthopaedic surgery, neurological, spinal conditions and many more conditions. • I am fully insured with over 15 yrs experience working with animals. I am a member of the International

Association of Animal Therapists (IAAT).

For more information please visit my website: annasanimalphysio.co.uk or feel free to contact me on 07944 606453 or anna@annasanimalphysio.co.uk

Dr Harriet Lane Child and Adolescent Psychotherapist

Therapy for emotional and behavioural difficulties

• Psychotherapy for children and young people aged 025 • Therapeutic support for parents • Supervision for professionals