Issue 93 Spring 2018

Everyone will know by now that David Piggott, our former Station Master at Meldreth, died on January 30th. He was a very remarkable man who is sadly missed (see page 5).

What a relief it is to see spring appearing in the countryside and in our gardens, always welcome after a long dark winter.

This September it will be 50 years since All Saints Playgroup began and a reunion is planned of those who attended or were connected with the group. If you have a contribution, a photograph or a memory then please phone one of the numbers given (see page 8).

Congratulations to Melbourn Village College governor Katharine Carruthers on being awarded an OBE for her efforts to introduce Chinese to schools in England. MVC is one of the first schools in the country to teach Mandarin and Chinese culture (see page 23).

This year the Village Fete returns on June 23rd, and we look forward to this after a pause last year. Lots of fun is planned is planned as usual! (See page 6).

There are of course many events taking place over the summer, so do enjoy as many of them as you can, we are very fortunate to have so many people who are willing to give up their time to work for the village. Many thanks!

Finally a very happy Easter to you all – details of services for our three churches are given in the Diary and in the Churches Together section (see page 37).

Front page photograph, ‘The Good Life’ – Melbourn Community Allotment see page 15

Melbourn Magazine is Independent of the Parish Council

NO public money is used. We would like to thank TTP for their continued sponsorship of the magazine. Melbourn Magazine is printed quarterly and delivered free to every household and business in the village. All work on the Melbourn Magazine, including layout and design is produced by volunteers. The cost of printing comes entirely from advertising and sponsorship.

you would like to advertise in the Melbourn Magazine see page 63 for details

Village news

Parkinson’s & The Tango Effect

Melbourn Fish and Chip Shop

The importance of Melwood in the wider countryside

Village information

Bin collection day

Melbourn and Meldreth Infant Welfare Centre

Churches Together

Review

Literature & Film: A Love Affair

Stick Out Your Tongue

Heritage Buildings’

The Fight for Beauty Our Path to the Future

Sports & Clubs

What’s On

MADS Charity fundraiser

Home Start - Ceildh Evening

Royston Choral Society

Ashwell Music Festival 2018

Literary Lunch

Cracked Voices

melbournmagazine@gmail.com

Village news

Village & Community news

David Piggott

Melbourn Fete 2018

Turn On To Christmas 2017

Melbourn Singers

Melbourn Local Access Point

Melbourn & Meldreth Women’s Group

Short Story Reading Group

Melbourn Women’s Institute

The Eleventh Safari Supper

Melbourn & District Gardening Club

The Hall for All 7

All Saints’ Play Group 50th anniversary

Melbourn Cinema Event

Relate Cambridge

From Melbourn Parish Council 13 County Councillor Susan van de Ven

David Piggott

It is with great sadness we announce the death of David Piggott on 30 January 2018.

David’s earlier life was spent as a teacher of Spanish and French, but he became a well-known local figure in his role as Station Master at Meldreth. He always went that extra mile for his customers and was very well liked and admired.

A very erudite man, David was a contestant on both Brain of Britain and Mastermind. He enjoyed many a quiz night and I was very happy to be part of a team with him.

In latter years sadly, ill health saw him move from Melbourn to Margaret House in Barley. He bore his illness with great courage and still tried to enjoy life. David was a real village character, known by almost everyone. He will be very sadly missed by his family, friends and all that had the privilege of knowing him. Kimmi Crosby

From ‘Memorable Moments with David Piggott’

Library – LAP (Local Access Point)

Library opening times

Monday 2.30 to 4.30 pm

Tuesday 2.30 to 4.30 pm

Wednesday 2.30 to 4.30 pm

Thursday 2.30 to 6.30 pm

Friday 2.30 to 4.30 pm

Saturday 10.00 to 12.00 am

“I used to catch the 07.09 train from Meldreth to London some years ago and David knew me as a ‘regular’. When disruption occasionally hit the service, David would phone me at home to tell me what was happening and what alternatives I may have. This was entirely his own initiative.

“A French friend staying with us a few years ago went down to the station to enquire about trains and came back completely amazed that at a village station he found someone in the ticket office reading a book in Spanish and able to converse in fluent French.

“When the new school year starts, David goes up and down the platform with a clipboard, asking the students to write down their names and telephone numbers and the train they usually catch to Cambridge. When the train is late, he telephones each student to let them know of the delay.”

If you would like a copy of ‘Memorable Moments with David Piggott’, please contact Susan van de Ven email: Susanvandeven5@gmail.com – Telephone 07905 325574.

Melbourn Fete 2018

Ideas and plans are quickly formulating for this year’s Fete. It has been 2 years since the last Fete and the organising committee has started its preparations. This year we will be having a very popular spectacle of BMX bikers performing stunning tricks and demonstration of their skills. Elsewhere we will have a large gathering of classic vehicles and bygone artefacts. We will have a mini fairground with attractions for our younger visitors. The Zorbs will return along with Crazy Golf. Also planned is a magician who will perform in the arena and in addition walk around to perform to smaller groups of our visitors. High quality local produce will be available as always from our barbeque and of course the bar will be serving alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks. Tea and cakes will be for sale in the pavilion.

As more arrangements are made we will update details through our website, www.melbournfete.co.uk and on Facebook.

As always we are would be very grateful for volunteers to help us on the day, please contact us through the website.

We look forward to seeing you at the Fete on Saturday 23 June, it opens at Midday.

Turn On To Christmas 2017

The first Christmas Tree switching on event, Turn On To Christmas (TOTC), took place on 2 December last year at The Hub. The attendance levels were well in excess of what we were expecting and created a fantastic start to the festive period. The event was funded by the Village Fete and organised in collaboration with The Hub.

Volunteers from both the Hub and the Fete worked together for the first time on a joint event and everyone’s efforts were well rewarded with a memorable inaugural event. There were some elements of the event, mainly due to how many people came along, that we will learn from and improve on for this year TOTC but there was little doubting that this is a well-received addition to the village calendar.

This year because of a conflict with another village based event we have moved the TOTC to Saturday 8 December, more details will be published nearer the time.

Melbourn Singers

The Melbourn Singers will be performing as part of the Cambridgeshire Choral Society (CCS) on Saturday 7 April at the University Concert Hall, West Road, Cambridge. The concert is made up of two very different settings of the Mass – Dvorak’s Mass in D major and Puccini’s Messa di Gloria. Dvorak weaves beautiful music with consummate ease whilst Puccini, writing in his early twenties, produces a Mass which often sounds more like an opera than sacred music. Puccini’s work was first performed in 1880 whilst Dvorak’s was first performed in 1888. It is interesting to hear two works with the same words but totally different music but written in the same decade. Tickets are available

from choir members or through the CCS website. www. cambschoral.org.uk

I hope you will be able to support your local choir, performing before an audience of friends is always a delight, and I can guarantee you will enjoy the music.

Jane Stevens

Melbourn Local Access Point

The Library continues to be an important part of the Hub. A steady flow of villagers from Melbourn and surrounding villages come each weekday afternoon and Saturday morning to return books and to take out new ones. Our stock is constantly being increased and updated with current best sellers and other books donated by members. We buy our own books and so have control over what is bought and when. This makes our library particularly vibrant and popular with everyone from babies to those of mature years. If you are not yet a member, pop in and register for free, all you need is a proof of residence. Then not only can you borrow books from the Melbourn library but you can reserve any book held in the Cambridgeshire Library Service catalogue.

Jane Stevens

Melbourn & Meldreth

Women’s Group

We are a small friendly group and we meet on the 4th Tuesday of the month except in December, we vary our venue between All Saints Community Hall in Melbourn and Holy Trinity Church Meeting Room in Meldreth. We

either have a guest speaker or in house entertainment followed by tea/coffee and biscuits. There is a fee of £1 on the evening and a chance to make a donation to our charity of the year.

Our meeting on 27th March will take place at All Saints Community Hall, Melbourn when our speaker will talk about Macular Degeneration. 24th April sees us meeting in The Meeting Room of Holy Trinity Church, Meldreth when the topic is ‘An unexpected Journey’ and we look forward to Kate sharing her discoveries with us! 22nd May is our Summer Supper when the committee members will prepare a ploughman’s supper and puddings for members and their guests. Tickets for the supper need to be purchased in advance to enable us to get the catering correct.

All our meetings begin at 7.45p.m. and do come along if you’d like to, or if you want to know more please contact one of the committee members. Pat Smith (262575) Sue Toule (260955) Anne Harrison (261775) Angela Leach (262793)

Short Story Reading Group

The Melbourn Short Story Reading Group starts again on Tuesday the 6th of March at 10am. We meet every Tuesday in the Library Area of the Melbourn Hub between 10 and 11am. Each session is free with a donation to WaterAid welcomed. Everybody is welcome and materials will be provided. For further information contact GroupCoordinator Britta Heinemeyer: britta.heinemeyer@gmx.de.

Or simply turn up and enjoy the short stories.

Melbourn Women’s Institute

The After Eights

The first meeting of 2018 found us listening intently to Veronica Weatherhead talking about her six missions on the Mercy Ships. If you have not heard about the world’s largest floating hospital ship Africa Mercy it is an amazing concept – manned by volunteer doctors, dentists and nurses AND crew – they spend ten months at a time in a West African port providing state of the art medical treatment to patients in some of the poorest parts of the world. The before and after photographs of some of the remedial surgery they perform were sobering.

Mercy Ships is an international, faith-based organisation with a mission to provide healthcare regardless of race, gender or religion. They are supported entirely by donations from Rotary Clubs, Schools, Churches and companies and the general public. Whatever the current problems we have in the NHS we are so very fortunate compared to millions of people, and these dedicated people seek to redress the balance. A thought-provoking and uplifting evening at the start of a New Year.

Our hard working committee (although it sounds to me as though they have a lot of fun at their meetings!) have produced an exciting programme for the coming months. We have an evening with a flautist, talks on synaesthesia, reflexology and Shepreth Wildlife Park. There will be a

quiz evening, a summer garden party at the home of ‘The Pram Lady’ and a display of historical costumes from a Costume Historian, plus a talk on the History of Melbourn The programme culminates in a Christmas entertainment by the Royston Ukelele Group. And do not forget, every meeting has CAKE.

We meet on the fourth Wednesday of the month at 8 p.m in the Melbourn Community Hall behind the church and membership is £41 per annum. Do come and join us.

Mavis Howard

The Eleventh Safari Supper 2nd June 2018

Our eleventh Safari Supper will take place on Saturday 2nd June this year – we have taken care to avoid the Melbourn and Meldreth Fetes . I do hope that everyone who has taken part before will do so again and that even more people will join in. For the evening to work well we need people willing to provide a starter, main course or dessert for 4 to 8 people – and after each course you all move on to different venues hopefully (if we have organised it properly) not meeting the same people again. We all finish up at the Hall to have coffee and exchange notes on the evening! The cost is £15 per person but we do offer something towards the food for those who are cooking and two bottles of wine to the main course hosts.

We already have a nice solid core of supporters but it would be good see some new faces. If you haven’t taken part before, please consider doing so. It is always important to remember that it is not intended to be an evening of haute cuisine but of fun and friendship.

Not everyone has to be a host, we do take guests as well and have several regulars from outside the village who enjoy taking part. It is good fun and you get to meet a lot of people.

If you would like to know more about our Safari Supper, or indeed to put your name down to take part, do please ring either me on 260686 or Jane Brett on 260306. Or alternatively, email howards.carlings@btinternet.com for an application form.

Mavis Howard

Melbourn & District Gardening Club

The Melbourn & District Gardening Club is no more, with the last meeting in November 2017.

I think the club had been in existence for at least thirty years. We still had a thriving membership, but not a large enough committee.

We have met in All Saint’s Community Hall since it opened and were very fortunate to have had such excellent facilities.

It has been a pleasure to have known so many lovely people and I will miss them all.

Helen Powell, Chair/Treasurer

The Hall for All and Melbourn Cinema Event

Melbourn Community Hall is now officially ‘on the map!’ We have a brand new fingerpost located near the telephone box so that you can find us easily.

Our monthly Cinema Event continues to thrive – our programme for the next three months is Victoria and Abdul on 23rd March, Hidden Figures on 20th April and on 18th May The Greatest Showman. June marks the tenth anniversary of the Hall and we shall be celebrating in style. On Friday 22nd June there will be the normal Cinema Event (film yet to be decided) and on the Saturday we were hoping to have an all day event to welcome families but it seems we clash with the Melbourn Fete. So we are concentrating on an upmarket evening event – a Glyndebourne-type evening with prosecco and a picnic showing a ballet or opera. Then on Sunday 24th there will be an Afternoon Tea with Live Jazz. I think that will be a fitting celebration for our lovely hall!

Coffee Stop is still a popular item on a Saturday morning, very well supported and we were saddened to learn that a similar venture in Meldreth had been forced to fold. We are, of course, indebted to our large band of Baristas who deal with the coffee every week and the strong armed men who put the tables out for us. Where would we all be without volunteers?

We are currently exploring the possibility of getting a Television License. This would be for the Royal Wedding on

19th May. IF the wedding is scheduled for a suitable time in the morning, say 11 or 11.30 we could then show the wedding on our big screen – with more prosecco and cake! Everyone seems to think this is a good idea so we just await the timing of the wedding ( shall know more when Harry sends me my invitation!)

One or two people suggested that we made a day of it and showed the Cup Final as well, but I suspect that is something best watched at home or in the pub!

We continue our scrupulous attention to maintenance – new blinds are ordered for the kitchen, they had become stained – a new microwave has been installed and, of course, after months of negotiating our WIFI is now in place. Alan and Jane Brett run the very popular Book Shelf on the first Saturday of each month and we offer space free of charge to any charity wishing to raise money for their cause. We are already pretty full for the coming year.

If you are thinking of hiring the Hall, Saturday morning Coffee Stop is a good time to come and explore the facilities and get a good cup of coffee.

Mavis Howard.

(Cinema tickets £5 from Brenda 261154, Cyndy 264189 or me 260686)

Relate Cambridge

Take a fresh approach to self-care this spring with Relate Cambridge With spring just around the corner, what better time to think about a fresh approach to self care and to find some new ways to keep all of your relationships in good shape during 2018.

Home-Start, Royston & South Cambridgeshire are looking for family group volunteers for Buntingford and Royston.

Our volunteers are all parents or grandparents who can give a few hours a week to help families who are finding it difficult to cope.

All parents need emotional and practical help to get through the first few years, but not everyone has friends or family nearby.

This is when Home-Start volunteers can help! A training session for new volunteers will be held on Wednesday 14th March 2018

The course will run from 9.30am – 2.30pm at our offices in Meldreth.

For more details contact Jackie or Jo at:Home-Start Royston & South Cambridgeshire, Unit 6, Valley Farm, Station Road, Meldreth, Royston, Herts, SG8 6JP

Tel: 01763 262262 or e-mail admin@hsrsc.org.uk www.hsrsc.org.uk

Registered Charity No 1105385

At Relate Cambridge we really believe it is a good investment to spend some time considering our emotional resources as well as building up our resilience for any challenges that lie ahead. We work with individuals and couples – who have been struggling with their relationships – teaching exercises and coping strategies for building up strengths, almost as you would during a course of physiotherapy after a physical injury.

We know that how we feel about ourselves as individuals, both physically and mentally, can have huge impact on our relationships and those around us.

For more information, call us on 01302347866 or visit www.relatecambridge.org.uk

Relate Cambridge offers information, advice and counselling for all stages of your relationships at our outpost in Melbourn.

The sessions are held in the small meeting room at Melbourn Hub on Wednesday each week.

Appointment times are: 10:30; 11:45; 13:00 For more information or to book an appointment, contact Relate Cambridge on 01302 347866 Mon-Thur 8am-10pm, Fri 8am-6pm, Sat 9am-5pm (confidential answerphone at all other times)

Relate Cambridge – supporting relationships at every stage of your life.

…continued

page 13

Parkinson’s & The Tango Effect

Writing as a response to diagnosis

By Kate Swindlehurst Parkinson’s Disease fight or flight?

I was diagnosed with Parkinson’s in 2004. After the initial shock my response was to fight it – I wasn’t going to let a disease get the better of me. What that meant in practice was keeping it under wraps and carrying on as normal. I ran myself ragged until I was exhausted, making sure I hid the condition from view, desperate to prove that I was coping, that I was as good as I used to be. When that was no longer sustainable, it was a time for giving up – running, teaching, even dancing.

What happened to change things? In a way I took flight, from rural Cumbria to central Cambridge, from the public face of teaching to the private world of the writer, where I discovered a different way to respond to the condition which had altered my life so radically. Rather than denial, I would try exploring and embracing: I would take refuge in what had been a lifelong habit of reflection and invention, translating my own thoughts and experiences into stuff that others might, just might, want to read.

Except the writing life is anything but private, of course. I still remember the terrors when a piece I’d written was first subjected to the combined examination of a group workshop, the delight when I had a story published for the first time. In a way the tango world is similar: what begins as a private passion exposes you. The cracks in your armour spread until you are all soft underbelly, vulnerable to any sword. Somehow I knew intuitively, though, that it was where I was weakest that I might find strength.

So I signed up for a private tango lesson a short train ride away and plucked up sufficient courage to spill the Parkinson’s story as I fastened my dance shoes. This was the start of a seven-year odyssey in the company of two tango teachers who eventually became close friends. It was also where the book Parkinson’s & the Tango Effect was born.

Through these fellow travellers, I learnt that in Argentine tango there is nowhere to hide. That if you try and dance with some part of you kept in reserve, you are wasting your time. That if you have Parkinson’s, or flat feet, or are depressed or anxious or profoundly deaf and are open about it, tango will take whatever you have and translate it into something potentially wonderful.

I make it sound easy. It isn’t! Argentine tango is the hardest dance in the world and a harsh mistress (not unlike Calliope, chief muse and traditionally a writer’s inspiration). But the more I danced, the more I benefitted from the tango ‘treatment’, the more I wanted to share the incredible news: that tango can impact hugely, not just on the physical symptoms of Parkinson’s but on the emotional and social aspects, on mood and outlook and quality of life. It transforms the dancer, from the infelicities of the condition into something approaching grace; as if my clumsy feet have learned to take flight.

Parkinson’s & the Tango Effect: my Year on the Dance Floor was launched with award-winning crowd-funding publisher Unbound in December 2017. For further information, video, extract and synopsis and to pledge your support follow the link www.unbound.com/books/tango

Parkinson’s disease: the facts

• 10 million people worldwide live with Parkinson’s – that’s around 1 million in the US and 130,000, or 1 in 500 in the UK

• Every hour someone in the UK is told they have Parkinson’s: in the same week in January 2018, veteran DJ and broadcaster David ‘Kid’ Jensen and singer Neil Diamond both revealed they had been diagnosed with the disease

• Parkinson’s is a progressive neurological condition which occurs when the brain stops producing dopamine, a neurotransmitter responsible for sending messages to the parts of the body which control movement

• Parkinson’s is a disease of the brain but is now thought it may begin in the gut

• There is no single obvious cause and as yet no known cure

What’s in a name?

In 1817, Dr James Parkinson published an essay on Paralysis Agitans or ‘Shaking Palsy’, describing symptoms he observed in a handful of individuals while he was out walking. After his death, his name was given to the condition which he identified. The son of an apothecary and surgeon, he worked from his home in Shoreditch. He was a champion of the underprivileged and a medical all-rounder, as well as something of a pioneer – he was the first in English medical history to write about peritonitis, for example.

The symptoms

Everyone is different. Some of the most common symptoms are

• tremor

• stooped posture and loss of balance, often resulting in falls

• muscle stiffness

• slow movement

• depression, insomnia, memory loss, slow or quiet speech, difficulty swallowing

The treatments

• Medication: drugs can restore dopamine levels or mimic their effects but can have troublesome side effects such as uncontrolled movements, impulsive or compulsive behaviours and hallucinations

• Physical therapies (physiotherapy, speech therapy)

• Surgery: Deep Brain Stimulation, where electrodes are planted deep within the brain and controlled with a battery beneath the skin

• Possible breakthrough treatments include those involving stem cells or growing new neurons from the patient’s own skin

Living well with parkinson’s

• A healthy balanced diet can help manage the symptoms

• Exercise is good for everyone but especially good for those with Parkinson’s

• Research shows that dance may be a particularly effective

Some studies suggest that

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connect people with Parkinson’s with others living with the condition, helping them to take

treatments, faster. We accelerate the development and testing of promising new Parkinson’s drugs.

• Life-changing care. We listen to people with Parkinson’s and drive forward improvements in Parkinson’s care services.

Parkinson’s can feel overwhelming if you don’t have the right information and support. We’re here to help everyone feel in control of life with Parkinson’s.

For more information telephone 0808 800 0303

www.parkinsons.org.uk

From Melbourn Parish Council

The last few months have been a time of change for the Parish Council. We said goodbye to our Clerk, Sarah Adam, just before Christmas. Sarah has moved on to another job and the Council wishes her well for the future. We hope to be in a position to introduce a new Parish Clerk in the next edition of the Melbourn Magazine.

All councillors will come to the end of their term of office in May and there will be an election. Melbourn Parish Council has 15 Councillors. If 15 or fewer people apply to become councillors in May, those people will be elected unopposed, in the jargon. If more than 15 people put their names forward, there will be a contested election like the one that took place in September 2016.

It is good for local democracy if people living in the parish have a choice of people to elect and it is a hope of the current council that there will be an election. If you are interested in becoming a councillor, please read the article in this magazine about what being a councillor involves and how the role will be changing in the future.

The council has also welcomed Gabby van Poortvliet as its new Responsible Financial Officer. The council has been trying to get to grips with its spending over the past 15 months. Councillors decided that to do this most effectively, it is best to separate out the two aspects of the previous Clerk’s job. The new Clerk will be responsible for the conduct of general parish business and council meetings. Gabby’s role is to ensure that the council’s financial transactions are rigorous and that the council’s budget is spent as effectively as possible.

Gabby joined the council just in time to help us set the budget for the new financial year. If you want to find out more about the council’s budget and how it was agreed by the council, please read the article in this magazine. Julie Norman, Chair; Claire Littlewood, Assistant Clerk Help your community by becoming a Parish Councillor

The Parish Council plays a very important role in Melbourn life. As actor Michael Caine famously once said, ‘not many people know that’. It makes sure that the money which you contribute to the upkeep and development of Melbourn through payment of the Council Tax is spent on what matters to the public and what is needed to keep the Parish running. If you would like to have your say and an influence in the way your council tax is spent you might want to consider becoming a Parish Councillor. The Council has the ability to shape the future of the Parish through its advisory role in the planning system and management of local assets. Councillors decide how to allocate the Community Grant fund (which is paid by the 2 solar farms located in the Parish) of about £38,000 to local good causes and community groups. John Travis, who became a Parish Councillor just over a year ago, says

‘I had no idea how much went on behind the scenes to keep village services operating! It is really rewarding to be part of planning a better future for a community of which I am proud to be a part’.

As a Councillor, you attend 10 Parish Council meetings a year (there are no meetings in August or December). These are held on the 4th Monday of the month and begin at 7.30pm. You also have the opportunity to take a more detailed interest in particular aspects of the Council’s work according to your interests and expertise: finance and governance, planning and parish maintenance. The latter includes the maintenance of open spaces, play parks and cemeteries as well as ensuring that the buildings owned by the Parish Council are maintained.

This is an exciting time to become a Parish Councillor The emphasis in the past has been on ‘places’ as you can see from the work carried out on parish maintenance. This need will not go away but, as County and District Councils cut down on the number of services they provide, Parish Councils will need to consult with their residents and decide which to pick up. For the future, the emphasis is “People not places”. The Council will need to understand the local community profile. It will need people interested in really getting to know what makes Melbourn tick and identifying how our community can be improved.

Parish Councils will need people with a broader range of skills than they have in the past. Councillors need to ask their communities what they want and expect from their Parish Council. If the Council takes over delivery of a service, it will need people with experience in finance, knowledge of how to run projects and communication skills.

In May 2018, people will have the opportunity to put themselves forward to become a Parish Councillor for Melbourn. The application process is simple – find 2 parishioners in the Parish to propose and second you, and complete an application form. If 15 people or fewer apply, then you would be elected unopposed. If more than 15 people apply, then there will be a contested election. Details of what to do will be posted on the Parish website nearer the time.

If you would like to find out more, please contact the Parish Clerk (01763 263303 option 3; parishclerk@melbournpc.co.uk) and they will ask a current Councillor to contact you to talk it through.

The closing date for nominations is 6 April 2018

Do you have practical skills to use for the benefit of Melbourn?

Keith Rudge and Dennis Bartle, the job-share wardens, carry out a wide range of jobs around the village. The Parish Council has also been very lucky in having some local businesses carry out work for free. In October, P L Cooper and Sons donated replacement vinyl flooring in the pavilion kitchen.

Melbourn Mobile Warden Scheme

Can we help you? Can we help a relative? Can we help a neighbour?

Who does the Scheme help?

The scheme is open to the mobility impaired in Melbourn and Meldreth including those who live alone or with their families, but need the extra support offered by our services. Couples too are most welcome.

It is also open to those in sheltered housing, as the scheme offers different, but complementary services.

Note: The scheme also offers its services for short periods to cover the temporary absence of relatives who otherwise provide this support.

We offer help with:

• Friendship and support via twice weekly visits and daily phone calls

• Ordering and collection of prescriptions

• Basic shopping

• Collection of pensions

• Setting up Lifeline service

• Bereavement support

• Advice on benefits

• Going to the Post Office to pay your bills

• Advice on getting repairs done in your home

• Arranging transport to the hospital or other appointments

• Just coming round for a chat

What will it cost?

We do have to make a small weekly charge for the warden’s services. The fee is only £7 per week (a little more for couples).

Jeannie Seers (Mobile Warden)

Jane Cage (Deputy)

However, Melbourn is a big parish and the number of jobs to be done always exceeds the time the wardens have available. If you are looking for a way to give back to the community and can be available on weekdays, would you like to give Keith and Dennis a hand? You may have skills such as plumbing or be a qualified electrician. You may like gardening. Or you might be happy to be the extra pair of hands needed if both wardens are not working at the same time.

The Parish Council is not looking to stop using contractors. We really appreciate the work they carry out on the parish’s behalf and the goodwill that the Council can rely on. The council wants a cost-effective way of dealing with the many small jobs that crop up on a day to day basis.

Interested? Contact the Parish Clerk. Telephone 01763 263303 or e-mail parishclerk@melbournpc.co.uk Parish Maintenance Working Party

Do You Fancy ‘The Good Life’?

Many residents may not realise that Melbourn provides a large number of allotments! Most of these are located at the end of The Moor, beyond the Village College, and are enthusiastically loved and maintained by all who tend them.

The benefits of keeping an allotment are many and various. They become your private source of quality fruit and vegetables, fully organic if that is your preference. They can also save you a great deal of money, as the costs of ‘growing your own’ are small compared to supermarket prices.

The good news is that there are a number of allotments now vacant and looking for new people to bring them to life. The early work is made easy as the Council will strim and rotovate plots as a free service, immediately prior to any new occupier!

An alternative option is to take a ‘half-allotment’ rather than a whole plot. Even smaller ‘taster’ plots are sometimes available. The annual costs for these alternatives are about £20 for a half plot and in proportion for other plot sizes. An annual insurance of £5 is also payable by everybody.

Finally, many are unaware that there is also a Community Allotment. Here the labours and rewards are shared between all who participate. Tools and refreshments are free to those who come along. A small group currently meet every Friday morning between 10.00 am and 12.00. For further details see the contact numbers below.

Barry Deville, the Chair of the St George’s Allotment Association says ‘Taking on an allotment is one of the best decisions I ever made! We welcome all new members, who can also benefit from our discounted supplies of seeds, fertiliser and other items that can be purchased through the Association’.

If you like the idea of combining fresh air, healthy exercise, saving money and socialising with other like-minded people, this is your chance!

For more information on allotments please contact either the Parish Clerk on 01763 263303 or Barry Deville on 01763 260784. For further details concerning the Community Allotment contact Diana Barker on 01763 260141.

How Does The Parish Council Use Your Money?

By the time you read this article you will have received your Council Tax bill from South Cambridgeshire District Council. You will see on the bill that some of the money you pay comes to the Parish Council. What is that money spent on?

Melbourn Warden Scheme

a registered charity

The important point is that all of this money is spent within the parish. The general council tax paid to South Cambridgeshire District Council is likely to be spent on projects in other parts of the district and so not

benefit Melbourn directly. The majority of the money spent in Melbourn each year comes to us via the council tax. For the financial year 2018 to 2019, Melbourn will receive £236,570 from that source and £38,300 as income. The income comes from facilities which the council hires out – the sports fields and Pavilion, the building where Littlehands Nursery school is housed and the allotments.

From 2015 for the next 20 years, the Parish Council also receives about £37,500 income from the 2 solar farms in the parish. This income must be used for community benefit and a Community Fund has been set up to achieve this aim. The council asks people to submit applications for funding twice a year.

Melbourn is one of the largest parishes in South Cambridgeshire and covers a wider range of work than most others. For example, over the previous 4 years, there have been a number of large planning applications submitted which affect Melbourn. Looking at the implications of these for Melbourn, fighting them where the council has judged appropriate and negotiating with developers and South Cambridgeshire District Council to get the best deal for Melbourn when the applications are going ahead takes a great deal of time from both councillors and council staff. The council employs 6 part-time staff who cover a range of functions from keeping Melbourn free of litter to managing the smooth running of the council to keeping the finances in order and doing essential maintenance around the village.

Your money is also spent on maintaining the parish’s assets: cutting grass verges, keeping the cemeteries looking good, repairing the buildings such as the Hub and the Pavilion. The council provides football pitches for local teams to hire – these have to be cut and marked. Stockbridge Meadows is a wonderful local place to walk and picnic. Have you discovered the fruit to pick in the Jubilee Orchard at the rear of the Pavilion?

This is what your money pays for. We hope that you use and enjoy these facilities that the council provides and appreciate the work which goes on to keep the parish beautiful and a lovely place to live.

This year the council asked for a bigger raise in the amount of money you pay than in previous years. The actual amount you pay depends on the Council Tax band your home falls into. For a Band D property the increase this year of £14.73 per home or £1.23 per month. The council agreed to this rise because there is a backlog of maintenance work which must be done and no impact would be made on the length of the jobs list without this necessary increase. If you want to be involved in making decisions about how the money is spent, you can apply to join the Parish Council (see article on pXXX) or you can come along to the Parish Council meetings held on the 4th Monday of each month (except for August and December) at 7.30pm at The Hub, and speak up for the things that are important to you in our village. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter and see what is going on.

From County Councillor Susan van de Ven

Children and young people

Children’s Centre service changes. I’ve continued to ask the County Council for details of changes that local families can expect from April 1st when the £900K spending reduction takes effect. At the time of writing, while Melbourn is meant to experience a change in premises and some other adjustments, details are not known. Supported Lodgings for young people leaving care. Can you provide time and space? The County Council has relaunched the ‘Supported Lodgings’ scheme and is looking for people with a spare room or annex who can support a young person aged 16-21 leaving care. Carers can be from a wide range of backgrounds and walks of life. An allowance of £250 per week is paid to them while they have a young person in placement. Although the Supported Lodgings scheme requires less intensive support than other types of foster care, carers do need to be able to make time for the young people in their care, as well as offer advice on all aspects of independent living such as cooking, washing and budgeting.

For more information please contact Cambs County Council’s Fostering Service on 0800 052 0078 or visit our Supported Lodgings webpage. Just google ‘Cambridgeshire County Council Supported Lodgings.’ This is a paid caring role with a fixed tax-free allowance of £10,000 per year plus an extra £250 for each person supported each week or part thereof.

Trains planes and automobiles (and bikes and people walking)

Network Rail Public Inquiry, level crossing closure near Bury Lane. Together with several local residents, I testified at this inquiry. Collectively a strong case was made against closing the crossing. It’s worth keeping in mind that Network Rail intend to close ALL level crossings in the next decade or so. The issue for us is the closure of a right-of-way on a well-used public footpath network, and a proposal to divert people over Meldreth Station bridge, which is not fit for purpose. No convincing case has been presented by Network Rail as to the need for the closure.

Lasting impressions from the day include the startling unpleasantness of the barrister acting for Network Rail and what must have amounted to massive bill to the taxpayer for the cost of the inquiry. A huge space in the Hallmark Hotel in Bar Hill was rented out for several weeks, and many highly experienced council officers were made to spend a huge amount of valuable time just waiting to be called, and therefore unable to carry out their ordinary work. I intend to submit a Freedom of Information request on the cost of the Inquiry, after the result is known – we now wait for the Secretary of State to make a formal decision.

Melbourn walk/cycle/scooter link to Royston. Now that the path connecting Melbourn to Frog End Shepreth has become an established feature of Melbourn daily life, it’s easier to imagine a path in the other direction, connecting Melbourn to Royston.

The Frog End path has proven to be multi-purpose, much enjoyed by walkers and well suited to wheelchairs and mobility scooters too. The distance between Back Lane and the Royston Leisure Centre is less than two miles. Much work has taken place through the A10 Corridor Cycle Campaign to foster cross-county border co-operation to fund a path/bridge connection. Unfortunately, one of the key potential sponsors, the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Local Enterprise Partnership, seems now not to be in the game. But a new idea conceived by the Greater Cambridge Partnership, Greenways, may provide another means of achieving this project. A Greenways network would comprise a series of radial corridor paths linking from South Cambridgeshire villages into Cambridge, and the ‘Melbourn Greenways’ proposal includes a link to Royston.

Meanwhile, the Greater Cambridge Partnership is currently preparing a business case report on the Melbourn-Royston link, prompted by many people who live, study or work in Melbourn who continue to argue the case – including Melbourn Village College student Sambor Czarnawski-Illiev, and former Melbourn Science Park employee Mike Prior-Jones, pictured below at Shire Hall following a joint presentation to the Board (Sambor being the youngest ever presenter!).

Park and Ride charges to be dropped. The Greater Cambridge Partnership has agreed to subsidize the removal of Park and Ride charges from April. Since the £1 charge was introduced, use of the sites has dropped significantly. Councillors have asked the Board also to review P & R opening times and the Stagecoach bus schedules that serve them – in particular for people working early and late, and for night time leisure activities in Cambridge. Unfortunately, this is not a sustainable way of financing Park and Ride. Greater Cambridge Partnership funding is a oneoff grant intended for infrastructure development, rather than supporting ordinary council services, so hopefully a long-term plan will be worked out.

Can’t manage the Meldreth Station steps? Free taxi provided

We continue to field questions about the inaccessibility of Meldreth Station for people with any mobility needs, including prams and pushchairs. Great Northern will provide a free taxi lift for whichever leg of your journey you can’t manage due to the impediment of the steps over the tracks. You will need to book ahead of time but this should be routine: please Google ‘Govia Thameslink Railway Assisted Travel’ to find out about all the options.

Ever wanted to drive a street sweeping vehicle? In a sign of the times, when the District Council can’t afford to sweep streets and paths as often as it should, Cllr Jose Hales and I were asked if we would like to help set up a Community Street Sweeper volunteer pilot programme. The idea is to loan out one of the South Cambs street cleaning machines to provide extra service. We were wary – after all we are all tax payers and this is something we rightfully expect the council to do. On the other hand, keeping an open mind, we put feelers, out because you never know.

We’re delighted to report that a strong cluster of volunteers have come forward to receive health and safety and operational training, and to give their time driving the sweeper. Together we are agreeing on specific routes – this will include a route in Melbourn village and the A10 walk/ cycle path.

If you would like to participate, please do get in touch, as a second round of training will shortly be taking place. If you ever wanted to drive a street sweeper, now is your chance! New Community Interest Company. With dedicated support from local residents, South Cambs District Council, Cambridgeshire County Council and the Association of Community Rail Partnerships, a new ‘Meldreth, Melbourn, Shepreth and Foxton Community Interest Company’ has now been formed for the purpose of providing a legally and financially accountable structure for the Meldreth, Shepreth and Foxton Community Rail Partnership. There are ample opportunities for the Rail Partnership to foster community projects involving schools and local businesses.

The CIC has three Directors: the Chairs of Foxton Parish Council Finance Committee, Melbourn Primary School Governors and Melbourn Village College Finance Committee. Meanwhile, the paid post, to which Meldreth,

Mavericks Non-conformists

In

of

MADS CHARITY FUNDRAISER 2018 SUPPER AND VARIETY SHOW

In aid of MindEd Trust (Charity No:

Friday 20th & Saturday 21st April 7.30pm

Come and join us on a voyage of fun and entertainment aboard HMS MADS!

MADS invite you to an evening of glitz and glamour. Come and dine with the Captain and his crew and then relax for an evening of laughter and entertainment all aboard our cruise ship.

Meldreth Village Hall

more information call: 07513 457845

Please dress to impress! Licenced bar and raffle. All proceeds from the Saturday performance will go to MindEd Trust.

The MindEd Trust is a Registered Charity which is focused on the prevention of mental illness in young people and early intervention strategies for those experiencing trauma.

Melbourn, Shepreth and Foxton solar funds and parish councils, together with Govia Thameslink Railway, contributed equal amounts (£700 each), drew many outstanding applicants and the new post-holder starts shortly. SCDC has topped up the fund for a two-year part time post (two lots of £5K over two years), and is providing temporary administrative support including payroll. The original parish contributions were aimed at supporting a sixmonth paid post on fewer hours, so this has turned out to be a much more significant post than originally hoped for.

All of this emanates from the multifaceted work of the Meldreth, Shepreth and Foxton Rail User Group, which continues to meet quarterly. More at www.meldrethsheprethfoxtonrail.org.uk.

Where does our waste go?

Landfill and Recycling – visit to Waterbeach Waste Management Park. Over the Christmas period questions came in from residents concerned about the end of the paper caddy in our blue bins, and what we can do about plastic waste –inspired and distressed by David Attenborough’s Blue Planet TV show. With the announcement by China and Hong Kong that UK plastic waste will no longer be received for recycling there, Cambridgeshire and the UK have much to consider.

Our waste is disposed of at the 165-hectare Waste Management Park just north of Waterbeach, on a County Council contract with Amey. To learn more, I liaised with the Park to arrange two open-day visits in February, including half-term, as children and young people are especially welcome. If you missed this visit and would like to visit another time, please ring Jonathan Crisp, Education Officer at the Waterbeach Park, on 01223 861010 or jonathan.crisp@amey.co.uk. Or feel free to contact me directly.

Citizens Advice Bureau (CAB) at the Hub

Our area is served by ‘North Herts and District’ CAB, an independent charity that provides advice on basic rights and services, like housing and benefits. One question I often hear is how to establish entitlement to a carer’s allowance – this is a good example of where the CAB can help.

A free drop-in service is held at the Hub every 1st and 3rd Thursdays (9:30am-12pm), and every Monday and Wednesday mornings (9.30AM-12PM) at the CAB offices at Royston Town Hall, SG8 7DA. The CAB reports an increase in people requiring advice and support, but also an increase in people offering their services as volunteers. Any questions, please ring the CAB Monday–Friday, 10am-4pm, on Tel 03444 111 444.

Questions about Addenbrookes or other health services? Healthwatch, a patient advocacy service, is a hugely helpful resource for questions or concerns relating to the NHS. CEO Sandie Smith has made a point of saying that she welcome questions, so please feel free to contact her on Tel 0330 355 1285 or sandie.smith@healthwatchcambridgeshire.co.uk

Drop-in councillor advice surgery

Please feel free to drop in at the Melbourn Hub on first Mondays of the month, 3-4pm, for any questions or concerns relating to council services. Or get in touch any time by phone or email.

You can’t always see what is happening to your flat roof so, Replace It Once and for All with our unique RubberBond EPDM FleeceBack Roofing System, guaranteed not to leak or crack and tough enough to stand on.

Profile

Melbourn Fish and Chip Shop

How would you like to make the change from sunny Madeira to a fish and chip shop in Melbourn High Street? No? Well that was exactly what the Silva family did some 11 years ago when they took the shop over from the previous owners – also a Portugeuse family.

Jojo and Maria, and their two sons Carlos and Jojo junior have settled down happily in Melbourn with their assistant Rui who also lives with them. They had previously, when Carlos was a little boy, run a similar shop in Oxford for a short time so they knew what they were letting themselves in for; namely a lot of hard work.

Carlos, or Freddie as he is known, is the front man and has a very sunny and outgoing personality which is popular with the customers and whilst he was talking to me, Jojo and Rui were working away on the potatoes in the back room.

They work SO hard! I gazed with awe on the sacks of potatoes waiting to be prepared. The chips are not bought in – each day eight 25 kilo bags of potatoes are put into the peeling machine and if that sounds an easy option, I can assure you that each potato still has to be handled and trimmed. If the potatoes were uniformly round or oval it would be easy, but potatoes are often misshapen and have blemishes and so, as I said, each spud has to be closely examined before being put into big drums to await the chipping machine. Imagine doing that six days a week!

Little Hands is a Private Nursery School specialising in quality education for the under fives and offers

Flexible hourly booking - open 08.30 to 16.30

Term time bookings with optional holiday club

Bumble Bee room for children 12 – 24 months

Ladybird room for 2 year olds

Butterfly room for children 3-5 years With optional “ready for school sessions”

Holiday club for children aged 12 months to 8 years

All sessions have a high staff to child ratio and are available for funded 2 year olds and funded 3/4 year olds with no extra charges

Categorised as “Outstanding” by Ofsted

For further information please contact Anne McCrossen - Nursery Manager : 01763 260964 e-mail lh-melbourn@btconnect.com

Little Hands is also at Bourn, Linton and Newton visit the website at www.littlehands.co.uk

The fish, mainly haddock, cod, plaice and skate comes from a supplier in Stevenage and haddock is the most popular choice. They do not handle shellfish at all as without a dedicated frying vat they could not guarantee that cross contamination would not take place and, as we know, some people are violently allergic to shellfish. Best to leave it alone!

The fish is dipped in rice flour and then batter and always cooked fresh to order. The three frying vats have big temperature gauges and maintaining the correct temperature

is critical, 180 degrees. They also make their own mushy peas from scratch – the dried peas are soaked and then cooked in a pressure cooker, I wonder when and where mushy peas became the usual accompaniment to fish and chips?

They also sell fried chicken and their beef burgers are very popular. Because many older folk cannot manage huge amounts of food they do a slightly reduced portion for OAPs which costs £3.70. A normal sized portion would be in the region of £6.30 and would set you back nearly 1000 calories. They also sell children’s portions so they really do cater for the whole family. To accompany the fish and chips you can add pickled eggs, onions or gherkins and there are soft drinks on sale. I gather that they would quite like to have a small seating area where you could eat in the shop, but there just is not enough space for that.

They decided at the start that they would stick with the hours which the previous owners had worked and they are open from 12–2 p.m and 5–10 p.m on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesdays, from Thursday to Saturday they are open from 4.30 to 10 p.m. After each session the shop must be cleaned down (the shop has a very good record with the food inspectors) and the fryers and extractor fans checked and cleaned, unused food packed away and then they have a few hours rest before starting all over again for the evening session. Naturally Fridays and Saturdays are the busiest days and they are on their feet all day.

Fried fish was introduced into London by Jewish immigrants from Portugal and Spain probably as far back as the 17th Century. On a visit to London in the 1790’s the American President Thomas Jefferson described eating fried fish in ‘the Jewish fashion’ and Charles Dickens referred to a fried fish warehouse in Oliver Twist.

Indeed, Dickens also spoke of ‘Husky chips of potatoes fried with some reluctant drops of oil’ in A Tale of Two Cities. The fried potatoes probably originated from Belgium. The popularity of the dish owes much to the development of the trawler industry in the North Sea which provided huge amounts of white fish and the development of the rail network connecting ports like Grimsby and Whitby to the major cities meant that it could be easily transported to heavily populated areas with masses of hungry workers to feed.

From the 1880’s to the post war years fish and chips sustained and cheered the lives of people and became the recognisable culinary symbol of British food. It was the original, affordable and nutritious takeaway meal. By 1910 there were about 25,000 fish and chip shops around the country rising to 35,000 between the wars. The dish was exempt from rationing during the Second World

War and Churchill referred to fish and chips as ‘Good Companions’ It was said that during the D Day Landings British soldiers identified each other by calling out FISH and the response, or password, had to be CHIPS!

I asked Freddie and Jojo about their hobbies although none of them have much spare time except on a Sunday. Freddie loves football and computer games whilst father Jojo is a keen clay pigeon shooter, attending shoots in Ramsey, Fairfield or Bedford. Jojo junior who is 19 is doing Business Studies – I did not meet him as he was busy practicing for his Driving Test

I was disappointed not to meet Maria, probably the king pin keeping the family in order, as she was in Madiera. I understand that she does the most beautiful and intricate traditional Portugese embroidery and I would really have liked to talk to her about that – a woman after my own heart. The family make regular visits back to Madiera and have family members living in Oxford and Swindon so they do manage to have quality time away from the shop. . They all keep in touch with each other via social media – this is an instance where texting and Face Time brings them all closer together.

Freddie likens the atmosphere in the shop to that in a pub – there is the same camaraderie amongst the customers as they wait for their order to be freshly cooked. Confidences are exchanged and there is much banter and chat going on. They get to know their regulars of course, and Freddie says it is very sad when they suddenly realise they have not seen someone for several weeks and then learn that they have passed away.

We really are very fortunate to have this wonderful facility here in the middle of the village. Madeira’s loss is our gain!

Mavis Howard

Brand new purpose built site

MVC VILLAGE PRIMARY SCHOOL

PLAY SCHOOL LITTLE HANDS

NOTRE ECOLE U3A EDUCATION COLLEGE

Melbourn Village College

Little Hands

Karen 01763 260964

Melbourn Playgroup

Jane Crawford 07842 151512

Notre Ecole

Janet Whitton 261231

Pippins Children’s Centre

Alison Wood 223460

Primary School

Headteacher Stephanie Wilcox 223457

U3A (Univ. of Third Age)

Chairman Tony Garrick 01223 510201

Village College

Principal Simon Holmes 223400

Melbourn Village College governor Katharine Carruthers has spoken of her delight at receiving an OBE in the New Year’s Honours for her services to education.

“I am thrilled with the award,” she said “It is an official recognition of the work to develop Chinese teaching in schools in which I and my team have been involved over a number of years.

“I have had messages of congratulations and support from all over the world.”

Mrs Carruthers is the Director of University College London’s Confucius Institute of Education and a driving force behind the teaching of Chinese in schools in England. This includes Melbourn VC, which became the first school in Cambridgeshire to include Mandarin as part of the curriculum two years ago. The school has since been invited to join the national Mandarin Excellence Programme and she is very pleased with the on-going work.

“As a governor at MVC, I have been delighted to be able to help the school with the introduction of Mandarin. I am proud that the school’s first teacher of Chinese, Frank Fan, was one of my PGCE Mandarin students at the UCL Institute of Education, before taking up his role at MVC.

“Over the past 18 months, I have come in to see Mr Fan teach at MVC every term and have been very impressed by the progress and motivation of the students and the high expectations of the teacher.

“It is encouraging to see the school joining the Mandarin Excellence Programme with the first cohort of Year 7 students receiving four taught hours of Chinese per week and four hours of self-study.

Katharine Carruthers, Frank Fan and Simon Holmes

“The introduction of Chinese in the school would not have been possible without the strong support of the Head, the Languages Department, the Chair of Governors and Professor van de Ven and other governors.”

While the Mandarin Excellence Programme has given

Bumpkins Toddler Tips

Get Creative!

How can you encourage your children to develop creativity?

Encourage their interests and play styles

Children make sense of the world by acting out familiar scenes around them. Encourage such play, whatever your child’s play style or interest, as it’s an important part of learning.

Let them explore the world around them

Children explore with their senses. From 40-60months your child begins to experiment with materials to create different textures and understands that different media can be combined to create new effects.

Try offering interesting materials to explore, such as sand, water, cornflour or crinkly paper.

Adding scented flavouring into paint or playdough will extend their sensory play, or adding glitter or sand to paint will create different textures and affects.

Make sure you give lots of praise and reassurance to encourage them to keep creating!

a

boost to some of the youngest students at the college, the support of Melbourn technology company TTP has helped some of the older ones.

The Melbourn Science Park-based company last term pledged £100,000 over two years to help science teaching at the college.

There are a number of projects in the pipeline but this term the whole of the Year 10 cohort has benefited from being given free GCSE revision guides.

Head of Science Simon Callow said: “I am really pleased to be able to use some of the money gifted to the college to provide revision guides to all students studying Science.

“When I first learned about TTP’s generous donation I want to make sure that we used it to support teaching and learning within the department in a multitude of different ways.

“One area in particular was the idea that it would be nice to do something that directly benefited students and families within our local community and we felt that the purchasing of revision guides for families, rather than by them, could be one such gesture.

“It may be a small saving for each family but it is nice to see a supporting link between local businesses, schools and the surrounding community, especially within the backdrop of tough economic times for many.

“Of course, the second, and perhaps more important benefit, is that all students in Year 10 have a guaranteed revision resource.

“TTP’s donation now means that all students have another resource to support their educational journey and I hope that this is one that ends in success for as many of our students as possible.”

The school has purchased a number of spares to make sure any new students can also benefit as the schools numbers continue to rise rapidly.

This year has continued to see rising numbers at the college, both at the start of September and during the year. More than 20 students made in-year transfers to Melbourn during the Autumn Term and Principal Simon Holmes expects that number to rise during the Spring Term; “We have already created an additional class in Yr7 to accommodate the increasing numbers. It was challenging to change the timetable partway through the year but the interests of our students always come first.”

Melbourn

Suppliers

Getting to know French culture and food

This April, I am delighted to start a course of French cuisine for adults at Sawston Village College. My name is Fanny, I am a passionate, self-taught, French cook.

Long ago, when I was studying for my Baccalaureat, I discovered the relaxing virtue of cooking. My parents still remember today the feasts I prepared for each of my passed exams. I have experimented, tried, shared and my passion has grown ever since. Nine years ago, we moved to England and I discovered novel tastes to enrich my palette of flavours. Yes, cooking has always been part of my life even when I was teaching at the Farmland Museum how people were growing, harvesting and cooking wheat.

While it feels we are always short of time, I like to take some to look after my guests and myself: from choosing my ingredients, thinking of the possible combinations of flavours to the actual preparation, boiling, sizzling, cooking to make mouth-watering perfumed dishes.

I promise there will be no raw snails or frog legs during this course but enthusiasm, classical tastes with possible twists and definitely a French accent. If you have an interest in French culture and food, some basic cookery knowledge and open to new experiences, come along to treat yourself by cooking. You may learn a few new techniques, will take home the dishes you prepared and meet people sharing passion for food!

On the menu: Week 1: Degustation and choux pastry Week 2: Quiche Lorraine and chocolate tart Week 3: Stuffed vegetables and tapenade Week 4: Tatin tart and Chantilly cream Week 5: Galettes from Brittany Week 6: Nicoise salad and pissaladiere Week 7: Beef Burgundy Week 8: Floating Islands

French cuisine runs on a Wednesday evenings here at Sawston Village College 7pm – 9pm for 8 weeks at a total cost £88. Our next course starts 25 April 2018.

Come with your apron, containers and ingredients (the list of which will be given to you after your enrolment). All cooking utensils provided by the College.

Fanny Bara Moreau French Cuisine

Adult Education Tutor

Nature

Melwood Your Local Nature Reserve

The importance of Melwood in the wider countryside

It has been very noticeable in the recent weeks that the numbers of birds making use of the nut and seed feeders in my garden has been consistently higher than over the last 2 or 3 years. I do not know the reason for this but one possibility is that food in the surrounding fields is lower and birds are using gardens as their preferred food stations. As more houses are built around the margins of our villages, this situation is likely to become worse. In Melwood, we therefore seek to increase the variety of flowers on the woodland floor and look for quite areas where berry producing bushes can be encouraged. This will benefit nectar feeding insects when flowers are present and seeds and fruit for birds in the autumn and winter. On farmland, farmers may occasionally scatter bird seed mixtures along paths adjacent to their crops but there are risks in this if the seed mixture contains species which are not native to the area and may be spread by the birds or simply grow in the surrounding countryside. This is a risk too far for Melwood, where we aim to keep introductions limited to species that grow locally or in similar nearby habitats.

Three main factors influence what may be persuaded to grow in Melwood.

1 The tolerance for a slightly alkaline soil

2 Ability to tolerate prolonged dry periods, especially but not exclusively in summer

3 Sufficient light for healthy growth.

Of these 3, the last is the only one over which we have much control, although we seek to influence the second by spreading green mulch in selected areas to try to increase the organic content of the top soil layers.

During the winter of 2017/2018, we will be cutting back a lot of the unproductive Elder scrub to open up the floor of the wood and encourage seed germination. This process started with our November work party. Alongside this, some of the largest hawthorn and hazel bushes will be coppiced to enable them to regenerate fresh young growth. Where sufficient light can be created around the hawthorn bushes, additional plantings will be considered, with the aim of producing compact dense clumps of potential use to small birds.

Woodland seeds have been scattered in bare areas at the back of the wood and as lighter areas are generated within the wood, this same mix will be scattered there. We await spring to assess the success or otherwise of this policy.

The river continues to suffer from a lower than optimum average water level and fewer trout have been obvious this winter, but specialist fishers are presumably finding fish of some sort. A kingfisher has been a fairly regular visitor to some sites on the river through Melwood and little egrets turn up in all sorts of places from the mill to the roadside near Melbourn. Egrets are now regular winter visitors to the River Mel.

Jim Reid, Melwood Conservation Group Website: www.melwood.btck.co.uk

If you are interested in joining the conservation work, please contact: Jim Reid 01763 260231 or Bruce Huett 01763 232855

Winter forager: Muntjac. Photograph: Jim Reid

Goldcrest. Photograph: Jim Reid

Banish niggling aches and pains!

We keep many local people supple and mobile with our range of osteopathy and complementary treatments including sports massage, chiropody and acupuncture.

Please call us on 01462 490141 to book.

The Melbourn clinic times have been extended so more appointments are now available.

A MBER H EALTH

Serving the local community www.amberhealth.co.uk

Appointments available in Ashwell, Melbourn and Baldock Easy parking at all 3 clinics

For the Community by the Community

Spring events at the Hub

Due to the success of a packed events programme in 2017, the Hub is bringing you lots more exciting events in 2018.

Here is a sample of what’s coming up in early Spring. Look out on Facebook, inside the Hub or on the website for more details.

All events and activities at the Hub are listed in the NEW online calendar on the Hub’s website, and also promoted via our Facebook page. You can also register your interest for all bookable events by calling 01763 263303 or emailing centremanager@melbournhub.co.uk

February 3rd – Afternoon teas, 2–4pm

Authentic teas offering sandwiches, savoury & sweet treats, scone, cream, jam, tea/coffee £11.95pp

March 11th – Mother’s day Sunday lunch A delicious roast dinner and special treats.

March 18th – Oh, Whistle... Two Ghost Stories by M R James Performed by Robert Lloyd Parry. 7.30pm start M R James is acknowledged as the master of the English Ghost Story. Now Robert Lloyd Parry brings two of his eeriest and most entertaining spine-chillers back to life in a gripping oneman show. Oh, Whistle, and I’ll Come to You, My Lad is a tale of nocturnal horror on the Suffolk coast. £10.00pp Booking for all three events above essential!!

March 25th – Onesie walk. A charity walk starting and finishing at the Hub. The cafe will also be open selling food and drink to support this event.

Please note we have new Saturday opening hours: 4pm for the cafe 5pm for the Hub.

Village information

IMPORTANT NUMBERS

Orchard Surgery

Appointments & Dispensary 260220 For repeat prescriptions send email: prescriptions.orchardsurgery@nhs.net

Hospitals

Addenbrooke’s 01223 245151 Royston 01763 242134

NHS111 – Urgent Care 111 24hr helpline

Medical help when not a 999 emergency

Police Non Emergency number 101

Help when not a 999 emergency

Fire & Rescue Service 01223 376201

Crimestoppers 0800 555111

Neighbourhood Watch 260959 Maureen Townsend maureentownsend1@aol.com

Telephone Preference Servicewww.tsponline.org.uk 0345 070 0707

EDUCATION

Melbourn Playgroup Jane Crawford 07842 151512 Library LAP Jane Stevens johnjane.stevens@tiscali.co.uk

Little Hands Nursery School 260964 Out of school times 01223 503972 Notre Ecole Janet Whitton 261231

Primary School Headteacher Stephanie Wilcox 223457 U3A (Univ. of Third Age)

Chairman Tony Garrick 01223 510201 Hon Sec Hilary Docwra 222486 Mem Sec Chris Davison 264189 Village College Principal Simon Holmes 223400

HEALTH

Age UK Cambridgeshire 01223 221921

Blood Donors 0300 123 23 23 Chiropodist 263260

Dentist 262034

District Nurses (Primary Care Trust) 01223 846122 Home-Start 262262

S. Cambs PCT 35 Orchard Road

Child & Family Nurses 262861 Car Scheme 245228

Osteopath Kath Harry 261716

LOCAL CLUBS

Air Cadets 2484 (Bassingbourn) Squadron 249156

Tony Kelly Mon & Wed evenings 7 – 9.30 p.m.

Bellringers Barbara Mitchell 261518

Bridge Club Howard Waller 261693

1st Melbourn Rainbows Abigail Roberts 261505

Brownies 1st Melbourn Stephanie Clifford 220272 Brownies 2nd Melbourn 261400 Samantha Pascoe (Brown Owl)

Gardening Helen Powell 245887 Guides 1st Melbourn Hilary Marsh

Melbourn History Group Ann Dekkers 261144

Melbourn Mushroom Club John Holden email: frog.end@virgin.net

Melbourn Pottery Club Maggie 01223 207307

Meldreth Local History Kathryn Betts 268428

Mothers’ Union Pauline Hay 260649

National Trust Marian Bunting 246122

bunting@uwclub.net

New Melbourn Singers Adrian Jacobs 243224

Photographic Club Bruce Huett 232855

Ramblers Dave Allard 242677

Royal British Legion Women Elizabeth Murphy 220841

Royal National Lifeboat Institution Jean Emes 245958

Royston and District Local History Society

David Allard 242677

Royston Family History Society Pam Wright frierley@ntlworld.com

Royston Lions Chris Cawdell 448236

RSPB Fowlmere Doug Radford 208978

SOAS (Supporters of All Saints’) Colin Limming 260072

St George’s Allotments Assoc. Bruce Huett brucehuett@compuserve.com

Thursday Luncheon Club at Vicarage Close

Jeannie Seers 07599 292327

Women’s Group Pat Smith 260103

PLACES OF WORSHIP

All Saints’ Church Revd. Elizabeth Shipp 220626 vicar.melbournmeldreth@gmail.com

Churchwardens Roger Mellor 220463

David Farr 221022

Baptist Church Rev. Stuart Clarke 261650

Secretary Guy Manners 01223 872298

United Reformed Church

Minister Rev. Duncan Goldie 260747

Secretary Rosaline Van de Weyer 01223 870869

Hall booking Beryl and Barry Monk 246458

SPORT

Badminton Steve Jackson 248774

Bowls Arthur Andrews 261990

Croquet Janet Pope 248342

Jazzercise Maxine Rustem 07963 161246

Judo Iain Reid (Chief Instructor) or Lesley Reid 241830 email melbournjudoclub@gmail.com 07974 445710

Melbourn Dynamos FC Gordon Atalker 07770533249 Blake Carrington 07730488743

Melbourn Football Club Simon Gascoyne 261703

Melbourn Sports Centre Graham Johnson-Mack 263313

Meldreth Tennis Club Tracy Aggett 243376

Swimming Club Jenny Brackley 244593

COMMUNITY SERVICES

Community Hall

Contact hallbookings@live.co.uk 07821 656033

Dial-A-Ride 01223 506335

Home Start Tracy Aggett 262262

Mobile Warden Scheme Jeannie Seers 262651

Moorlands Denise Taylor 260564

Vicarage Close Warden Eileen Allan 263389

Lead Sheltered Housing Officer – Monday to Friday 9–1.30

Vicarage Close, John Impey Way & Elin Way Eileen Allan Mobile 07876 791419 / 245402

Every other week. 9–5 Monday to Friday

DIARY

MARCH

Thursday 1

Said Eucharist All Saints 10am

Lent Lunch ASCH 12.30pm £4 All welcome

Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm weekly

Royston & District Local History Society Royston Town Hall 8pm

Friday 2

Coffee at URC 10.30am

Women’s World Day of Prayer Baptist Church 2.30pm

Saturday 3

Coffee Stop ASCH 10.30am The Bookshelf & Brownies

Sunday 4

Said Eucharist All Saints 8am

Morning Service Baptist Church 10.30am Holy Communion URC 11am

Communion Service Baptist Church 6pm Service of Wholeness and Healing All Saints 6.30pm

Monday 5

Drop in Session with Councillors at The Hub 3-4pm Melbourn Bridge Club every Monday URC Hall 7pm contact Howard Waller 261693

Tuesday 6

Toddler Plus Baptist Church 9.30-11.30am (TT) Melbourn Bridge Club every Tuesday URC Hall 2pm contact Howard Waller 261693 Melbourn Short Story Reading Group The Hub 10-11am weekly

Wednesday 7

Craft Club Baptist Church 9.30am (TT)

Coffee Break Baptist Church 10.30am

Thursday 8

Said Eucharist All Saints 10am

Lent Lunch ASCH 12.30pm £4 All welcome

Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm weekly

Friday 9

Coffee at URC 10.30am

Saturday 10

Coffee Stop ASCH 10.30am

Cambs. Family History Soc. Central Library Lion Yard 12.30pm (see article)

Sunday 11

Sung Eucharist All Saints 9.45am

Morning Service Baptist Church 10.30am URC Communion Service 11am

Tuesday 13

Toddler Plus Baptist church 9.30-11.30am (TT)

Mother’s Union contact Diane Blundell 221415

Wednesday 14

Craft Club Baptist Church 9.30am (TT)

Coffee Break Baptist Church 10.30am

Hub Club lunch 12.30pm

Thursday 15

Said Eucharist All Saints 10am

Lent Lunch ASCH 12.30pm £4 All welcome

Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm weekly

Friday 16

Coffee at URC 10.30am

Saturday 17

Coffee Stop ASCH 10.30am Scleroderma & Raynaud’s

UK charity stall

Sunday 18

Said Eucharist All Saints 8am

Sunday @ 11 All Saints 11.00am

URC service 11am

Communion Service Baptist Church 10.30am

Tuesday 20

Toddler Plus Baptist Church 9.30-11.30am (TT)

Wednesday 21

Craft Club Baptist Church 9.30am (TT)

Coffee Break Baptist Church 10.30am

Thursday 22

Said Eucharist All Saints 10am Lent Lunch ASCH 12.30pm £4 All welcome

Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm weekly

Friday 23

Coffee at URC 10.30am

Melbourn Cinema Night showing Victoria & Abdul contact 261154/260686

Saturday 24

Coffee Stop at ASCH 10.30am

Sunday 25

Said Eucharist All Saints 8am

Palm Sunday Service Baptist Church 10.30am URC Service 11am

Palm Sunday Ecumenical Procession with Noah the Donkey leaving Meldreth Village Hall at 9.15am

Tuesday 27

Toddlers Plus Baptist Church 9.30-11.30am (TT)

Women’s Group Melbourn 7.45pm

Temple Tuesday Compline & Address All Saints 7.30pm

Wednesday 28

Coffee Break Baptist Church 10.30am

Royal British Legion Women’s Section Vicarage Close 2pm

Melbourn WI ASCH 7.45pm

Thursday 29

Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm weekly

Maundy Thursday Service Baptist Church 8pm Maundy Thursday Sung Eucharist and Watch All Saints 7.30pm

End of term

Friday 30

Good Friday Service URC 10am followed by 10.45 Hot Cross Buns and coffee Good Friday – Reflections on the Easter Story 1.30-4pm Baptist Church

Good Friday Service of Readings and Guided Meditation

All Saints 12noon followed by the Liturgy 1.30pm

Saturday 31st

Easter Vigil, Blessing of the Easter Fire, Procession of the Paschal Candle, First Eucharist of Easter at 7.30pm

All Saints

Sunday 1

Easter Sunday

APRIL

Holy Communion 8am Sung Eucharist at 11.15am

All Saints

Easter Sunday Family Celebration Baptist Church 10.30am

URC Communion Service URC 11am

Baptist Communion 6pm

Monday 2

Easter Monday

Tuesday 3

Melbourn Bridge Club every Tuesday URC Hall 2pm contact Howard Waller 261693

Melbourn Short Story Reading Group 10-11am weekly

The Hub

Melbourn & District Photographic Club Foxton Village Hall 7.30pm (runs weekly September to April)

Wednesday 4

Coffee Break 10.30am Baptist Church

Thursday 5

Holy Communion All Saints 10am Craft and Chat URC 2pm-4pm weekly

Royston & District Local History Soc. Town Hall Royston 8pm

Friday 6

Coffee at URC 10.30am

Saturday 7

Coffee Stop ASCH 10.30am The Bookshelf

Sunday 8

Sung Eucharist All Saints 9.45am

Morning Service Baptist Church 10.30am Baptist Communion Service 6pm

Holy Communion URC 11am

Monday 9

Melbourn Bridge Club every Monday URC Hall contact Howard Waller 261693

Tuesday 10

Mothers’ Union contact Diane Blundell 22141s

Wednesday 11

Coffee Break 10.30am Baptist Church Hub Club Lunch 12.30pm

Thursday 12

Said Eucharist All Saints 10am

Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm

Friday 13

Coffee at URC 10.30am

Saturday 14

Coffee Stop ASCH 10.30am British Legion Women’s Section stall

Cambs Family History Soc. Central Library Lion Yard 12.30pm (see article)

Musical Evening Concert URC and supper contact 262346 for details

Sunday 15

Said Eucharist All Saints 8am

Communion Service Baptist Church 10.30am URC Service 11am

Family Service All Saints 11am

Tuesday 17

New term begins

Toddler Plus 9.30-11.30am (TT)

Wednesday 18

Craft Club 9.30am Baptist Church (TT) followed by Coffee Break 10.30am

Thursday 19

Holy Communion All Saints 10am

Coffee & Chat URC 2-4pm

Friday 20

Coffee URC 10.30am

Melbourn Cinema Night showing Hidden Figures contact 261154/260686

MADS Charity Fundraiser Meldreth Village Hall contact 07513 457845

Saturday 21

Coffee Stop ASCH 10.30am

MADS Charity Fundraiser Meldreth Village Hall contact 07513 457845

Sunday 22

Sung Eucharist All Saints 9.45am

Family Service Baptist Church 10.30am URC Service 11am

Tuesday 24

Women’s Group 7.45pm Meldreth Pat Smith 262575

Wednesday 25

Baptist Church Craft Club

Coffee Break Baptist Church 10.30am

British Legion Women’s Section Vicarage Close 2pm

Melbourn WI ASCH 8pm

Thursday 26

Said Eucharist All Saints 10am

Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm

Friday 27

Coffee URC 10.30am

Saturday 28

Coffee Stop ASCH 10.30am

Sunday 29

Sung Eucharist All Saints 9.45am

Morning Service Baptist Church 10.30am

URC Service 11am

MAY

Tuesday 1

Toddlers Club Baptist Church 9.30-11.30 Baptist Church Melbourn Bridge Club every Tuesday URC Hall 2pm contact Howard Waller 261693

Melbourn Short Story Reading Group The Hub 10-11am weekly

Wednesday 2

Craft Club Baptist Church 9.30-11.30am

Coffee Break Baptist Church 10.30am Thursday 3

Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm weekly

Home-Start Literary Lunch The Old Bull Inn, Royston 12noon

Friday 4

Coffee URC 10.30am Saturday 5

Coffee Stop ASCH 10.30am The Bookshelf Sunday 6

Said Eucharist All Saints 8am URC Communion Service 11.00am Baptist Morning Service 10.30am Baptist Communion 6pm Monday 7

May Day Bank Holiday Tuesday 8

Toddlers Plus 9.30-11.30am Baptist Church Mothers’ Union contact Pat Smith 262575 Wednesday 9

Craft Club Baptist Church 9.30-11.30am Coffee Break Baptist Church 10.30am Hub Club Lunch 12.30pm Thursday 10

Sung Eucharist for Ascension Day All Saints 7.30pm Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm weekly Royston & District Local History Society Royston Town Hall 8pm AGM

Friday 11

Coffee URC 10.30am

Saturday 12

Coffee Stop ASCH 10.30am Christian Aid stall

Cambs Family History Soc. Central Library Lion Yard 12.30pm (see article)

Sunday 13

Sung Eucharist All Saints 9.45am Messy Church Holy Trinity Meldreth 3.30pm Morning Service Baptist Church 10.30am Holy Communion URC 11am

Tuesday 15

Toddlers Plus 9.30-11.30am Baptist Church Wednesday 16

Craft Club Baptist Church 9.30-11.30am Coffee Break Baptist Church 10.30am

Thursday 17

Said Eucharist All Saints 10as

We shall be pleased to receive contributions in any form, articles, poems, drawings, photographs, letters etc., pertaining to Melbourn. Please send any contributions to the Editor, at 110 High Street, Melbourn, marking them ‘MELBOURN MAGAZINE’ or you can email them to melbournmagazine@gmail.com

Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm weekly

Friday 18

Coffee URC 10.30amg

Melbourn Cinema Night showing The Greatest Showman

Saturday 19

Coffee Stop ASCH 10.30am

Sunday 20

Holy Communion All Saints 8am

Celebration of Baptism All Saints 3.30pm

URC Service 11am

Communion Service Baptist Church 10.30am

Tuesday 22

Toddlers Plus 9.30-11.30am Baptist Church

Women’s Group 7.45pm contact Pat Smith 262575

Wednesday 23

Craft Club Baptist Church 9.30-11.30am

Coffee Break Baptist Church 10.30am

Royal British Legion Women’s Section Vicarage Close 2pm

Thursday 24

Said Eucharist All Saints 10am

Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm week

Friday 25

URC Coffee 10.30am

Saturday 26

Coffee Stop ASCH 10.30am

Sunday 27

Said Eucharist All Saints 8ams

URC Service 11am

Baptist Family Service 10.30am

Monday 28

Bank Holiday Tuesday 29

Half term Wednesday 30

Coffee Break Baptist Church 10.30am

Thursday 31

Said Eucharist for Corpus Christi All Saints 10am Craft & Chat URC 2-4pm

date for the next issue is Friday 13th April which will be published in June, listing events in June, July and August.

Volunteersfor

Magazine is

to everyhousehold in the villageby volunteers. If you would like to help pleasecontact Ann Dekkers on 261144

Village

Orchard Surgery & Dispensary

Monday to Friday 8:30–1pm and 3pm–6pm Phone 01763 260220 www.orchardsurgerymelbourn.co.uk

Repeat prescriptions can be made either, by post, in person or by registering to use the online NHS service. Prescriptions can still be collected from: Surgery Co-op Tesco in Royston

Prescription Home Delivery

The surgery offers home delivery service for prescriptions, on a Tuesday & Thursday.

For more information on any of the above, please see their website or contact the surgery.

BIN COLLECTION

MELBOURN

Bin collection day – TUESDAY

Melbourn Health Visiting Team

Drop in clinics for parents and babies are held as follows: Melbourn clinic every Wednesday between 9.30am and 11.00am at: 35 Orchard Road, Melbourn. Telephone 01763 262861

8a Romsey Terrace, Cambridge. CB1 3NH Of ce Mon-Fri 9.00am-12.30pm. Telephone 01223 416 141 answerphone out of these hours enquiries@cambridgeshirehearinghelp.org.uk

A drop in advisory session is held at Vicarage Close Community Room, the 4th Thursday every month from 2pm to 4pm

See the website for more information www.cambridgeshirehearinghelp.org.uk Battery exchange and retubing. We do not do hearing tests

For an update

www.scambs.gov.uk/binsearch

more

Melbourn and Meldreth Infant Welfare Centre

Taken from the Diary of events of the Melbourn and Meldreth Infant Welfare Centre.

• Infant Welfare Centres were started, in London, when, as a result of recruiting for the Boer War, it was noticed how physically unfit many recruits were. This was mainly due to poor nutrition, and steps were taken to remedy this.

• The Melbourn and Meldreth Infant Welfare Centre was started just after the outbreak of WWII, after permission was gained from the Ministry of Health, and on Tuesday Sep 26th 1939 a meeting was held to form a committee and appoint officers for the IWC

• The Public Health Association promised an initial grant of £10; Mrs Fordham, of Melbourn Bury, had kindly promised a further £3, and two further anonymous donations of 10/each were received through the agency of Nurse Cox. It was suggested that a Samaritan Box and possibly a Farthing Box kept at the Centre might be a way of augmenting funds.

• It was agreed that visits should be made to the existing Centres at Harston and Kneesworth to see how they were run.

• Mrs Fordham was appointed President, the Chairwoman was Mrs Davis, the Secretary Miss Wynne with Mrs Elbourn assisting, Rev. A.R. Wynne (of the Baptist Church) was Treasurer, while Dr Gregor and Nurse Cox were the medical team.

• At the meeting on Oct 3rd Dr French of the M.O.H. attended and explained that an Infant Welfare Centre was a voluntary place to deal with infant health. This did not replace Health visiting, both were needed. An IWC is an advice centre, for keeping children healthy and where infant foodstuffs could be obtained cheaply. Breast feeding should be encouraged and children should attend from birth to school age.

• All new born babies were to be seen by the medical officer, then once a month for 3 months. Those over I year visited every 6 months.

• Proper and accurate records of weight must be kept and a card given to the mother showing records, which she can keep.

• No more than 40 children were to attend each session, and Friday was chosen as a suitable day for the fortnightly session. An initial sum of 6/- was allocated to purchase paper squares, 6 enamel bowls and 6 pots. Enquiries were made as to the cost of purchase of Avery scales. Eventually

these were bought from Todd of Cambridge at a cost of £8.15.0 and a man came to explain how to use them.

• Members of the committee were asked to subscribe 2/6 each, and to try to obtain more from sympathisers. At the next meeting the treasurer was handed £3. 13. 4 1/2. Committee members agreed to loan oil stoves for heating the water and the room, buying and making tea etc, and Mrs McNeice (wife of the Vicar of All Saints’) undertook to order the oil. Due to wartime shortages mothers were asked to bring their own sugar.

• The venue for the first meeting was the ARP hall, and the prams were stored in the open garage of the ‘Rose Inn’, which also provided any water needed.

• The first fortnightly meeting was attended by 29 local children and 12 evacuees on November 3rd 1939. Amongst those at this first meeting was Alan Belgrove. In later years both his son and his two grandchildren also attended

• In 1940 the clinic moved to the Congregational Church vestry and a pew was screened off in the schoolroom for the use of the doctor. During this period the military were also using the church, so the situation was not ideal. Jumble sales were held to raise fund, and £1 was received from a Red Cross whist drive.

• Over the years money raised was given to charities.

• Later the clinic moved to the Baptist Church schoolroom, this was beautifully kept and newly decorated and Mr. Ussher and the deacons were thanked.

The generation game – Alan Belgrove (below right) was taken to the clinic in 1939 when it first opened and his family continued to attend. Here he is with his son Kevin and grandchildren Fiona and Justin.

• Diptheria injections were introduced in 1941 and the shop flourished selling milk powder at competitive prices and giving out free cod liver oil and orange juice.

• At the end of the war numbers were down as the evacuees left, and in 1946 Dr Gregor retired, and was replaced by a woman doctor, Dr Levy and Nurse Harvey took over from Nurse Cox.

• In 1948 Heydon, Chishill and North Hall attendees were brought in by taxi!

• In July 1949, after ten years the Centre was taken over by the NHS, which paid all the expenses. (Before the NHS of course there was no free health care.)

• Dr Erskine joined in 1954, and in 1956 polio vaccination was introduced.

• In 1960 the Welfare Centre moved to the Village College.

• On the 25th Anniversary in November 1964 the committee had a coffee party at the Pink Geranium and Nurse Harvey retired in 1965 after 15 years. By 1966 a doctor attended every session.

• In 1981 the last move was to 35 Orchard Road, a bungalow, where the clinic was held in both morning and afternoon.

• In 2000 volunteers were banned from making tea or coffee as children could be injured by hot spills. In 2003 ‘Volunteer’ badges were introduced and volunteers were told they were not permitted to touch the babies. In 2004 the toys bought with the £300 raised by the volunteers were banned (though toys are still allowed in the doctors surgery!)

An entry in the minute book in 2005

After almost 70 years of volunteer help at the Infant Clinic it was decided ‘that for reasons of Health and Safety it is no longer acceptable for non-professionals to be involved in this work.

At a luncheon party those who had served for 20 years or more were thanked and presented with a bouquet and a final Tea Party, given by the nurses, was held at the Clinic.

Over the years the volunteers had been responsible for weighing and recording the weights of babies, providing tea and coffee for mothers and toys to keep siblings occupied while mothers discussed problems with nurses. Modern day concerns about risk of injury etc etc meant that they could no longer perform these duties. By 2008 they were required to have police vetting!

The final entry in the minute book records ‘Regretfully after 70 years the volunteer helpers attended their last session on March 25th 2009. Having passed our ‘Criminal Records Bureau’ checks we are now required by Health and Safety’ to have Child Protection Training, and ‘it does not seem feasible to ensure that all volunteers go through training and health checks for such a relatively few hours each week’.

… We will miss our time at the clinic and wish it continued success in the future.’

Signed Peggy Wright Chairman & Anne Hardiman Secretary

Ed, AD. Do you have memories of the Infant Welfare Centre, if so please get in touch with the magazine. Thanks to Doreen Johnston for checking information.

September 22nd 1999. 60th Anniversary Celebration Lunch. From the back row. Anne Perry, Georgina Frost, Joan Bowden, Sheila Ford, Ann Hardiman, Marie, Margaret Burbridge, Joan Warden, Sandra, Liz. Beth Dumpleton, Pippa, Pat Crane, Doreen Johnston, Edith French. Beryl Penny, Peggy Wright, Gwen Thurley, Lilian Tam, Joyce Howard.

Churches Together

United Reformed Church

Tastes of Christmas

This fundraising and social event took place on Saturday 2nd December. People were encouraged to come in via the church, there were stalls in the church and the church was beautifully decorated and lit with Christmas lights. There were further stalls and activities in the back room and hall including the food hampers’ raffle. Coffee, food, mince pies and mulled wine were a big attraction.

Christmas Family Service: Joyce Goodall led our Christmas Family Service on Sunday 17th December. The prayers included the “Christmas Stress Prayer”. There was a drama entitled “So much to do!” and it wasn’t until the end of the conversation between two people that we realised it was Mary and Joseph speaking. During the scripted bible readings a candle was lit for every person mentioned in the reading and a candle was extinguished when each person exited the story leaving one remaining candle alight at the end. This candle being Jesus the light of the world which continues forever.

Our morning worship on Sunday 31st December was led by members and friends and included an interesting presentation of slides from Jerusalem and Bethlehem taken in 2017 by Aidan and Rosaline Van de Weyer.

Carol Singing

Churches Together joined customers at the Black Horse on 13th December for the annual Carol singing evening and on Saturday morning 16th December Churches Together sang carols opposite the Cross. Donations for both events amounted to £152 which was given to the local Home Start charity.

Week of Prayer for Christian Unity

There were various prayer meetings, communion and services held in the churches during the week beginning 18th January. A reflective service was held in our church on the Wednesday. The joint service when all churches took part was held in our church on Sunday 21st January at 4pm followed by a bring and share tea giving an opportunity for the churches to socialise with each other. The theme for the week was “That All May Be Free”.

Easter

Our Good Friday Service will be at 10am on 30th March followed by hot cross buns and coffee in the hall. Easter Sunday Service is on 1st April and will include the Sacrament of Holy Communion. All are warmly invited.

Photograph by Nigel Cox

Photograph by Nigel Cox

Concert

We are having a Musical Concert in the church on Saturday evening 14th April. The musicians, Boniface Consort, are booked and the evening will conclude with a supper. Please contact Eirwen Karner for further details, telephone 01763 262346.

Minister

Our minister the Reverend Duncan Goldie is moving on to pastures new. Duncan has accepted a calling to be a minister in the URC/Methodist pastorate on the Dorset/Wiltshire borders comprising Sherborne, Shaftesbury, Wincanton and Mere. Duncan has been with us for over 11 years and his last service with us will be on Good Friday. We wish Duncan well in his new venture.

All Saints’, Melbourn, and Holy Trinity, Meldreth

Now that Spring is in the midst of springing, the earth awakens around us, and Mother Nature is busy once again! There is also a lot of good news to report from All Saints’ and Holy Trinity, and much to look forward to.

Christmas saw record attendances in both Holy Trinity and All Saints’, which was especially encouraging

for all those who worked so hard to make our two churches welcoming and attractive. Once again, we welcomed Noah the Donkey to our annual Crib Service (Noah left us a little Christmas present for our roses!), and it was a delight to see so many faces, both old and new, gathering to worship the birth of Our Lord Jesus. The Carol Service was very well attended (perhaps the mince pies helped!), and so was the Midnight Eucharist. On Epiphany Sunday, we blessed some yellow chalk, which we used to mark a special blessing above the doors of our homes, upon all those who visit us throughout the year.

Candlemas Sunday on 4 February also saw a special day of celebration, with two festival services in the morning. In the afternoon, Dr Tom Murgatroyd gave an organ recital at All Saints’, which followed a programme of J S Bach, and others, along with Olivier Messiaen’s ‘La Nativite du Seigneur’, a musical meditation upon the birth of Jesus. We then had tea and cake, and to end the day, we had a special Choral Evensong with a candlelit procession.

Lent Lunches are being held once again in both parishes, so do please look out for posters to find out more. We are also planning on holding Lent Groups again this year, following two different modules of the ‘Pilgrim Course’, ‘The Beatitudes’ and ‘The Creeds’.

Of course, Holy Week and Easter are just around the corner, and so on Palm Sunday, we will have an ecumenical procession, followed by a Sung Eucharist. Noah the Donkey will help us mark Palm Sunday, and if you want to join in with us, we’ll be leaving the Village Hall in Meldreth at 9.15am. Holy Week is a very special time in the church’s year, and so we have a full programme of varied services throughout the week: on Tuesday at 7.30pm, we have Compline and an Address at All Saints’; Wednesday at 7.30pm we have a Service of Tenebrae at Holy Trinity; on Maundy Thursday, we have a Sung Eucharist and Watch at 7.30pm at All Saints’; on Good Friday we have a Children’s Act of Worship and then Workshop at Holy Trinity at 10am, followed by a Service of Readings and Guided Meditation at All Saints’ at 12noon, followed by the Liturgy of the Day at 1.30pm at All Saints’. On Holy Saturday (sometimes called Easter Eve), we have a very special Easter Vigil, blessing of the Easter Fire, procession of the Paschal Candle, and then First Eucharist of Easter at All Saints’ at 7.30pm; and on Easter Day itself, we have services at 8am and 11.15am at All Saints’, and 9.30am at Holy Trinity.

Yet – that’s not all! On Sunday 20 May, we have a very special Celebration of Baptism Service, to which we will be inviting all those who have been recently baptised (and their families!) to join us at All Saints’. All are welcome, and do look out for more details!

Messy Church continues its success, and our next session is on Sunday May 13 at Holy Trinity at 3.30pm. Last time, we had over 31 children join us, so do come along and see what all the fuss is about!

There’s a lot going on at All Saints’, and Holy Trinity, so come along and join in the fun!

Best wishes indeed to you all, The Revd Lizzie Shipp MA

01763 220 626

Melbourn Baptist Church

Melbourn Baptist Church’s Christmas card scheme raised more than £102 this year for charity. Each year, rather than church members sending cards to one another, it has become a tradition for people to send one card to the whole church, and to give to charity money that would have otherwise been spent.

This year the church chose to support the Challenging Behaviour Foundation, which works with children and adults with severe learning disabilities.

Youngsters at the church followed up their successful Landlubbers summer holiday club with their Snowlubbers holiday club just before Christmas. Those who attended had a great time, with plenty of fun and games.

The church enjoyed a ‘chocaholics’ fundraising event, when people had a chance to try and buy various chocolates, and support the church’s special building fund.

There is plenty for other church members to get involved with this year, including another opportunity to Eat Cake and Pray, when people have a chance to get together for a time of fellowship and prayer.

There is also safeguarding training for everyone who takes part in pastoral, children’s, and youth work.

The church also held deacons elections early this year, and took part in a week of prayer for Christian unity, which included a Melbourn and Meldreth Churches Together service.

The church also learned of the passing away in January of Ron Frost, one of its previous ministers.

Supporters of All Saints SOAS

The November draw was made by Mike Rawlings on 2nd December. The first prize of £28 goes to Joan Statter at 60 Orchard Road and the second of £14 to Ruby Wilson at 40 Orchard Road. The December draw was made by Mike Rawlings on 30th December. The first prize of £28 goes to Sue Toule (5) and the second of £14 to Angela Leach (80).

The January draw was made by Anna Taylor on Saturday 3rd February. The first prize of £20 goes to Maureen Townsend (13) at 32 New Road and the second to Janet Batchellor (54) at 13 Elm Way.

The winners of the Winter Quiz were Avril & Roger Mellor who won £10 the second prize of £5 goes to Graham Porter in Hook, Hants.

The Word of God from David Burbridge God, who made heaven and earth, by the mouth of His servant David, has said: Why did the heathen rage and the people imagine vain things? The rulers were gathered together against The Lord and against His Christ, against Thy Holy Child Jesus, to do what Thy Lord determined before to be done (they killed The Lord Jesus) but with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection of The Lord Jesus From Acts 4 verses 24–28 & 33

Persephone, Queen of The Underworld, and Goddess of Spring

Sweet Persephone rises from the Underworld

As do the daffodils, escaping the dark: The earthen tomb, with petals unfurled Smiling and swinging, and sap rises in bark.

Sweet Persephone, beloved daughter of Demeter: The ‘beautiful maiden’, the meaning of her other name ‘Kore’, Brings the season of Spring, with a new metre In the poem of life, from mythological lore.

Sweet Persephone: Zeus was her father: A lovely young girl never lacking a suitor. But she was loved with obsession by Demeter Who kept all men far from her.

Persistent in love was middle aged Hades, God of the Underworld, living in darkness Among the shadows of the dead, loving no ladies, Only sweet Persephone; he was in distress.

Of Demeter he asked permission

To marry her daughter, for he was lovelorn. Furious Demeter just gave him rejection, Leaving Hades heart broken and forlorn.

Determined Hades planned an abduction.

As Persephone stooped to admire an enchanting narcissus, Hades’s chariot rose: took her down to oblivion

As the earth opened beneath her, into the dark abyss.

Distraught Demeter withdrew her fertility: Earth suffered Winter, barren and cold. To save the world from starvation and frigidity Zeus settled the argument, his decree to everyone told.

For six months Demeter’s world is fruitless and dark: For six months Persephone can come up to light, And Spring graces field, meadow and park, And seasons revolve, as do day and night. Yvonne Chamberlain

Review

Literature & Film: A Love Affair

As an annual visitor to Melbourn, I browsed and bought books at David’s Bookshop in Letchworth twice a year –Christmas and summer – for close on forty years. Today, still recognisable with values and ambitions unchanged, it has evolved as Hertfordshire’s largest independent bookshop and a major centre for and contributor to literature, drama, music and all creative arts. Tucked away alongside ‘Creative Writing Workshops’ and nestling among ‘tens of thousands of books, CD’s dvds, and vinyl records’ stands a notable Visiting Authors Programme

The Programme presents an occasion for ordinary people of all ages and abilities to see, hear and put questions in public discussion to nationally and internationally renowned authors. This opportunity, to meet, exchange a handshake, and enjoy a few words of conversation with a hugely talented author, was available to be taken up by anyone during the Autumn 2017 Programme just concluded. In a laudable gesture of outreach, created through hard work and progressive decision-making, this enlightened strand of activity has been pushed out into the wider community. The choice of author and venue selected – whether the bookshop itself with attached café, a local school, the Spirella Ballroom or the fabulous space that is Letchworth’s Broadway Cinema – gave great range and reach to the Programme.

On the evening of 6 September, in the convivial setting of the Broadway Cinema, the mantle of Visiting Author was worn by Irishman John Connolly. His first published novel Every Dead Thing established his reputation. All his novels have been best sellers; he was the first non-American to win the US Shamus Award; and the first Irish writer to be

awarded the Edgar by the Mystery Writers of America. A writer of great talent widely recognised, his latest work represents a considerable departure. he: A Novel is a research based true-to-life reimagining of the life of Stan Laurel, one half of the legendary Laurel and Hardy film partnership.

The evening began with a showing of The Music Box, a painstakingly restored Laurel and Hardy classic short film. This was followed by the Visiting Author’s explanation of his love for film, an account of the artistry of the gifted emigrant from England to the USA that was Stan Laurel, and the creative process whereby his own work he: A Novel came into being. His blending of these two world art forms the creation of works of literature and of film – was insightful, thought-provoking, warm, affectionate and very funny. The restored film, a marvellous masterpiece, and the author’s contribution and enthusiasm combined at many levels in an evening of great delight.

Believing John Connolly belongs in the literary tradition of Graham Greene, George Simenon or Raymond Chandler, I stated this and asked was he influenced by the USA’s still living and working James Lee Burke. He said delightedly: “Ah! My inspiration. Thank you. Thank you. I’m delighted and privileged that anyone would think so.” He also told me that his life in Ireland and the great themes central to Irish culture also inspired and influenced his work.

David’s Bookshop has over decades made – and continues to make – a major contribution to the promotion and strengthening of cultural life in this region. It is a treasure-house on the door step of Melbourn. By bringing together famous authors with ordinary interested readers, by combining enduring art forms like literature and film, and by reaching out to the entire community they do a great service to residents and to the rich culture we share.

Visit David’s Bookshop; browse among the books; examine its many other treasures; enjoy the attached café and then return refreshed to buy the books that stayed in your mind. Be tempted – and look out for its Visiting Authors Programme. You will not be disappointed.

Hugh Pollock

Paul Wallace, owner of David’s Book Shop

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Stick Out Your Tongue

by Ma Jian

Vintage Books, London, 2014

This is a slim volume: five short stories focused on Tibet and spread across 81 pages with an additional eight page Afterword by the persecuted Chinese author Ma Jian.

Read the Afterword and weep for the injustice and deprivation heaped upon Ma Jian and for the manner in which we in the West care so little about such impositions at the individual or societal level in countries across the world. Weep also for ourselves in the West, and for the manner in which we in Britain today value so little the great achievements we have secured for ourselves over centuries. Achievements which include human rights, human liberties, accountable elected government along with an independent judiciary to enforce, defend and protect those same achievements. Ma Jian’s Afterword yearns for these rights and liberties which do not exist in China.

The volume Stick Out Your Tongue was first published in China thirty years ago in an extended 1987 issue of the journal People’s Literature edited by Lin Xinwu. The journal was immediately suppressed by government decision, the Editor sacked and Ma Jian forced to remain in exile in Hong Kong. A complete ban, which still exists, was placed on all future publication of his work in China. This translation into English was published in Britain in 2006 and the present edition in 2014.

The five stories are set in Tibet and consider, within its high altitude landscape and natural environment, the cultural values, Buddhist beliefs and grinding poverty of its rural nomadic people. Presented in an air of unreality and with a strangeness that is unsettling, the all pervasive poverty of Tibetan life is captured and conveyed in all five stories by an imagery and a quality to the writing which is thought provoking. It is impossible to identify one story as superior in any way to any other in the collection. Rather do they stand together as an episodic journey undertaken by the writer across the Tibetan landscape – writer and countryside each lost in desolation – some twenty years after Tibet and its inhabitants were “liberated” by the Chinese government. The stories as a collection are allenveloping. They manage almost to overpower the reader so that one endures a sense of suffocation creating almost a need to struggle for breath – which represents and is in fact a struggle for independent life itself.

Ma Jian is truly an artist who has suffered for his art. Each of us is deeply involved and implicated in such imposed suffering, even more so if we do not yet accept that we are involved. Ma Jian’s creative literary work is both ground-breaking and award winning. Today, with his work

translated into many languages, he lives in London with his translator Flora Drew and their four children. Read this volume of short stories and you will be moved – then act on what you believe.

Royston’s Heritage Buildings’

by Peter Robson

Peter Robson’s book ‘Royston’s Historic Buildings’ is an important and essential one for anyone interested in historic buildings and in the history of Royston because there is nothing like it! Despite the help and assistance of Royston and District Local History Society, the Museum and Art Gallery, the Library and Historic England website, nothing was available which gave a consolidated list of structures complete with text and photographs. So, he set himself the task of producing such a book. This was a more daunting prospect than anticipated given the failure of listed building owners, North Hertfordshire District Council and ‘Royston First’ to engage with the project, the lack of original deeds to properties, by the destruction of many deeds by solicitors without the property owners consent and the difficulty in donating items to museums and county record offices.

The book is divided into 3 parts: Part 1 which gives the details of Grade 1 listed buildings – King James’ Palace, the Church of St John the Baptist, Thurnalls and the extraordinary Royston Cave – together with the extensive list of Grade II listed buildings, second only to St Albans in Hertfordshire, which range throughout the historic centre and comprises whole streets, such as the High Street, Baldock Street, Barkway Road, Market Hill and Melbourn Street to name but a few. Each entry is accompanied by text and photographs making it easy to navigate and appreciate.

Part II is taken from the North Hertfordshire District Council’s Register of Buildings of Local Interest which lists ungraded properties that are relevant to the locality and its history such as The Corn Mill, local almshouses, Royston Museum and the National School.

Part III is intriguing and consists of Peter Robson’s ‘Why Not?’ list of buildings not listed anywhere, the most important of which is the historic ‘Roysa Stone’, central to the very name of ‘Royston’.

With good photographs and enlightening texts, this is not only a good coffee-table book but also a scholarly and important contribution to local history. Take it with you when you venture into Royston and see for yourself.

Peter Horley

Hugh Pollock

Nature

The Fight for Beauty Our Path to the Future

Fiona Reynolds

“Is there no nook of English ground secure from rash assault” Wordsworth.

Perhaps the last book on a winter reading pile might be Fiona Reynolds ‘The Fight for Beauty’ A daring title for an inspiring and thoroughly argued book. Once director of the National Trust, she is now Master of Emmanuel College in Cambridge and has had the time to write this comprehensive history of the conservation movement in Great Britain. There is an urgency of tone, it is an argument from someone who is aware of what is happening to us and to Nature in the Anthropocene. Her knowledge of literature history and society informs every page

Included are some shocking statistics; one in four children in the UK do not play outside more than once a week, one in ten children have never visited the countryside. Children spend 6 to 7 hours a day on electronic media. The area over which parents allow their children to roam unsupervised has shrunk by ninety percent in a single generation (less physical freedom than free-range chickens), we are depriving children of play in mud and trees and the access to the inspiration of nature. 90 percent of children can name a dalek only 30 percent can recognise a jackdaw. Heart and lung fitness are declining, obesity and mental health problems are rising. And that is not all. In the RSPBs report the State of Nature 2013 they calculated that in the previous 50 years 60 percent of woodland species had declined including woodland butterflies and birds, invertebrate species and woodland flowering plants. 11 percent of which are now on the endangered list. The reasons for this are many: the dropping of management techniques like coppicing, lack of light, no nesting sites and the removal of dead wood and leaf litter causing disturbance, forestation on naturally occurring bog land and peat mosses which affects our carbon store, and intensive farming on a large scale. When farmed intensively and dries out and carbon losses from soil have accounted for 10% of UK carbon emissions since 1850. (It takes around five hundred years to build up a top soil and we are losing it at a rate of 2.2million tons a year).

Uncontrolled sprawl in the early twentieth century, intensive farming and agriculture that drains land and destroys habitat, pressure on the environment because of pesticides, urbanisation, mid twentieth century pollution of rivers: Nature is in a worse state than when the conservation movement set out to protect it in 1949.

She believes that this is because of a lack of joined up policy between agencies and a more insidious story in the decline of beauty as an idea, is the current economism, the belief that only the economy really matters. We have become consumers rather than citizens, seeking instant gratification, so perhaps even the word beauty is elitist and so indefinable.

She also celebrates achievements. Reynolds shows how delight in a landscape became the need to defend it in the nineteenth century when ‘a new breed of business opportunists spotted the commercial potential of the age old industries of the Lake District: slate quarrying and mining for copper’. Enter Wordsworth and Ruskin scorning the invasion of people and industry which would lay waste to their beloved natural landscapes. Ruskin also linked these feelings to ideas of social justice, human effort and the intrinsic beauty of art and founded the Guild of St George. It aimed to acquire land where people could live dependent on the forces of nature, water, human and horsepower not machines in communities committed to education fairness. Ruskin’s and Wordsworth’s writings created the cultural atmosphere which surrounded the founding of the National Trust by Canon Rawnsley and Octavia Hill. Hill felt that even the poorest people needed beauty and dignity in their lives. As a teenager she took ragged children out of London to Romford and Epping forest to let them experience clean air trees growing flowers and grass. She wrote: ‘The need of quiet, the need of air, the sight of sky and of things growing seem human needs common to us all’. From this vision the National Parks movement was formed.

The need to defend land continued in the early twentieth century. The white tailed sea eagle and the osprey became extinct in 1916 and the golden eagle driven out of England by 1915. At the end of the 19th century there were no wolves or polecats in England. It was Charles Rothschild, a leading amateur entomologist who set up the society for the promotion of Nature Reserves in 1912. He and a group of naturalists began collecting information on sites worthy of protection. He bought and saved Wicken Fen, one of the last surviving undrained remnants of the Fens, and the movement he founded led eventually after the Second World War to the 1949 Act for Nature for which 73 National nature reserves were proposed: ‘to preserve wild species of flora and fauna’. This was the Nature Conservancy Council. They were only a small part of the land of little economic value, but it was better than nothing. There were no tools to protect nature outside these when new building was taking place after the Second World War and agriculture and forestry were intensifying. These activities brought pesticides and pollution. In the first half of the 1950’s oil pollution killed 50,000-250,000 sea birds annually, salmon

disappeared from the whole length of the Thames and it was declared devoid of oxygen. Pesticides killed many otters in rivers (Only banned in the 1980’s by which time many butterflies, flora and common wildlife was destroyed). Once again it was the voluntary bodies RSPB and The Wild Life Trusts which fought back and the National Trust became a conservation body too.

These movements broadened to include the charity Common Ground which was influenced by Richard Mabey’s early book, Second Nature. They wrote the first action guides to local conservation which were designed to show people how they could protect and identify what they cared about locally. Wildlife milestones and apple trees were the first things to be celebrated as ‘the commonplace, the local, the vernacular and the distinctive’. Despite subsidies encouraging the intensification of agriculture and the introduction of commercial forests in Scotland, the battles fought led to in 2011 to a white Paper The Natural Choice ‘aiming to secure the value of the environment with the idea of a new biodiversity strategy with a 25 year plan because of the continuing declines in habitat’. Since then we have seen the creation of 12 large nature improvement areas. The red kite has been reintroduced in the Chilterns, the buzzard is once again a common bird, the otter is back on many rivers, the blue butterfly is reintroduced and we can hear a bittern at Slimbridge. We have urban wetlands and have saved the corncrake and the stone curlew from extinction. But Fiona Reynolds argues we still need a policy for large swathes of countryside not just pockets, so ‘The fight for Beauty is as important and necessary as ever’. Citing research at the university of Essex where people from all social classes were consulted and remembering the factory worker in 1902 who sent two shillings and sixpence from his wages to the National Trust, writing: ‘All my life I have longed to see the Lakes I shall never see them now but I should like to help keep them for others’.

‘The human spirit needs beauty and can’t live without it; and we will all strive for beauty in our lives given the chance. The economy on its own meanwhile will not save the planet from irreversible damage and will not make us happy. Beauty really is essential to us all’ Reynolds concludes. What stays with me from my reading of this book is that in the First World War the poetry book most taken to the Front and read in the trenches was AE Housman’s The Shropshire Lad because of its evocation of the land and ‘blue remembered hills’ that were lost to them and were an ideal of home.

Clare Crossman

Melwood Conservation group manages Melwood Nature Reserve in Meldreth. As a group it meets regularly. To get involved or just find out more contact: Jim Reid 01763 260231 or Bruce Huett: 01763 232855 Website: Melwood.btck.co.uk

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Sports & Clubs

Bowls

Arthur Andrews 261990

Bridge Club

Howard Waller 261693

1st Melbourn Rainbows

Abigail Roberts 261505

Brownies – 1st Melbourn Stephanie Clifford 220272

Brownies – 2nd Melbourn Samantha Pascoe 261400

Croquet

Janet Pope 248342

Football Club Andrew Edwards 223109

Dynamos Football Club Les Morley 07739 593771

Gardening Club

Helen Powell 245887

Guides – Ist Melbourn

Hilary Marsh 261443

Melbourn Judo Club

Iain Reid 241830

Melbourn Karate Club Peter Khera 07866 374674

Melbourn Sports Centre

Graham Johnson-Mack 263313

Melbourn and Meldreth

Women’s Group

Pat Smith 262575

Sue Toule 260955

Anne Harrison 261775

Photographic Club

Bruce Huett 232855

Ramblers

Dave Allard 242677

Royston and District Round Table Michael Seymour 221398

Swimming Club

Jenny Brackley 244593

Tennis (Melbourn)

Dave Liddiard 07508 995 781

Tennis (Meldreth)

Tracy Aggett 243376

1st Melbourn Guides

‘To serve the Queen and my community’ is a promise that all Guides make, and we at 1st Melbourn Guides did so on three occasions this autumn term. On Remembrance Sunday our girls led the parade with the Union flag and also carried our Unit flag, and many more participated in the march. The following weekend we supported the All Saints Christmas bazaar by running a children’s tombola, and in December we provided a decorated tree for the Meldreth church Christmas Tree festival.

At our evening meetings the older girls have continued to help run the activities; in November Chloe and Nina each ran a cooking competition for two patrols. The Unicorns and Polar Bears competed to make the best risotto and fruit salad, and the following week the Pandas and Penguins created tasty meals from pasta, sausages and various vegetables. Later in the month Niina and Vicki ran an international evening, including baking Scandinavian pastries and learning a few words in Japanese.

At our final meeting in December we presented six of our older girls with their Baden Powell awards, after first having embarrassed them with a slide show of photos taken over the past four years. As we said goodbye to the girls, we are very proud that most of them are going on to become Young Leaders at Guides, Brownies and Rainbows in the village.

If you would like to know more about joining our waiting list or becoming a leader, or if you have any skills or hobbies which you would like to share with us, please contact me on: 01763 261443 or email: melbournguides@gmail.com

Hilary Marsh

Melbourn Cubs

The three months between November and January is always the quietest period for cubs, with less opportunity to go outside and most sessions being held in the hours of darkness. We haven’t let this stop us, however. We played games with torches, manhunt and capture the lantern being the cubs’ favourites. Between Halloween and Bonfire night we came together with beavers and scouts for our annual group campfire. Songs both traditional and modern were sung, and many sausages were eaten.

We started work on our DIY badges, sawing, drilling and screwing to construct three new rope making machines for the group.

Thinking of others, part of the scout promise, we collected gifts for less fortunate families and attended the remembrance service in Melbourn.

The winter term finished on a high, with an entertaining pantomime for the whole group, a visit to the Institute of Astronomy in Cambridge, where we viewed Uranus and a yellow and blue binary star system, as well as learning about the solar system and handling a meteorite.

As I write this the new term has just kicked off, 2 new leaders have been invested, and we are looking ahead to the spring and our biggest year yet, with four weekend camps planned.

The cubs meet at Melbourn Primary School every Friday 6:45–8:00pm. Any adults interested in volunteering to join our fun and adventure please contact me at cubs@1storwellscouts.org.uk. We are unfortunately full

currently, until we get enough adult volunteers to open another pack. Young people can join our waiting list by contacting admissions@1storwellscouts.org.uk.

Royston & District Local History Society

www.roystonlocalhistory.org.uk

Our website shows all the books we have for sale. Many of these result from the considerable work undertaken by our Publications sub-committee. The books may be ordered by post from David Allard 01763 242677. They may also be purchased at the Royston Museum & Arts Gallery in Kneesworth Street (open Wednesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays 10 a.m. to 4.45 p.m.) and some are available at the Cave Bookshop in Melbourn Street or at Royston Library.

The society is responsible for the opening of Royston Cave, Melbourn Street, Royston which will re-open on 31st March 2018 and will then open on Saturdays, Sundays and Bank Holidays until the end of September 2p.m. to 4.30 p.m.(last admission 4p.m.) www.roystoncave.co.uk

Our evening meetings, which are held in the Heritage Hall (the main hall downstairs) Royston Town Hall will continue on the first Thursday of each month (second Thursday in May) starting at 8pm. Annual membership £5 (Sept–Aug) (Under 18s half price)

» 1st March – Station to Station Cambridge-London Terry Ward

» 5th April – Clarksons of Wisbech+Abolition of Slavery

Dr Maureen James

» 10th May – AGM + Who do you think you are?

Richard Till

We are a war m, friendly, f amily r un home conveniently situated close to the station and town centre of Royston.

If you would like to f ind out more about St George’s, please call us for a brochure or drop in for a chat.

42 Kneesworth Street, Royston, Herts. SG8 5AQ Telephone: 01763 242243 web site: www.stgeorgescare.com

Cambridgeshire Family History Society

Our monthly meetings are held in the Central Library, Lion Yard, Cambridge, between 10.30am and 3.30pm. Everyone is welcome and entry is free. The meetings follow a pattern of research being available all day plus talks at 12.30 and 2pm.

» 10 March 12.30pm – Genealogical Proof Standards with Caroline Norton. What is GPS – a set of principles which help to ensure “good practice” in family history research, and which should under pin all we do. 2.00pm Breaking Down Brick Walls with Ian Waller

» 14 April 12.30pm – Censuses with Caroline Norton 2.00pm What Other Stories Would Your Ancestors Tell? with Robert Parker. An informative talk for researchers who want to continue discovering their ancestors, giving guidance on using proven research techniques.

» 12 May 12.30pm – Parish Registers – Part 1 with Caroline Norton 2.00pm An Introduction to Using the CALM Catalogue with Kevin Roberts

For more information check out our website www.cfhs.org.uk either on the Home page or in the monthly Newsletter.

Ramblers’ Association Royston and District Group

Our walks programme continues right through the year. For details visit our website: www.ramblers.org.uk or contact David Allard (01763 242677). Email: david.allard@ntlworld. com or Lesley Abbiss (01763 273463).

There is also a poster displaying walks for the current month in Royston library, Royston Museum & Art Gallery and Melbourn Hub.

We have walks on Sundays, which are normally 5–7 miles in the morning and a similar or shorter walk in the afternoon. Occasionally Sunday walks are Figures of Eight making it possible to do only the morning or only the afternoon. Half-day walks (5–7 miles) are held on Tuesday and Thursday mornings. Our evening walks (3–5 miles) will resume on the 30thApril 2018 and will continue weekly moving on one day each week. Prospective new members are welcome and may come on three walks before deciding whether to join. www.ramblers.org.uk to join.

Ramblers’ Association Royston and District Group

Our walks programme continues right through the year. For details visit our website: www.ramblers.org.uk or contact David Allard (01763 242677). Email: david.allard@ntlworld. com or Lesley Abbiss (01763 273463).

There is also a poster displaying walks for the current month in Royston library, Royston Museum & Art Gallery and Melbourn Hub.

We have walks on Sundays, which are normally 5–7 miles in the morning and a similar or shorter walk in the afternoon. Occasionally Sunday walks are Figures of Eight making it possible to do only the morning or only the afternoon. Half-day walks (5–7 miles) are held on Tuesday and Thursday mornings. Our evening walks (3–5 miles) will resume on the 30thApril 2018 and will continue weekly moving on one day each week. Prospective new members are welcome and may come on three walks before deciding whether to join. www.ramblers.org.uk to join.

Try a new sport – Lawn Bowls

Three free sessions for 11–17 year olds. Equipment provided (please wear trainers). Parents & Grandparents are welcome to have a go.

Barton Bowls Club, High St, Barton, CB23 7BG

» Starts 6.15pm Thurs: April 12th then April 19th, April 26th

To register your place: email m.seymour@orwellsbureau. co.uk website & Facebook link www.bartonbowls.co.uk

Melbourn Bridge Club

The Bridge Club continues throughout the year in the United Reform Church Hall on Orchard Road. On Monday evenings we meet at 6.45pm. to start promptly at 7.00pm with a session of Duplicate Bridge. On Tuesday afternoons we meet at 1.30pm for a 1.45pm start to, similarly, play Duplicate Bridge but this session is targeted at beginners and improvers who feel that they may benefit from occasional assistance with bidding or playing the hands. Each year Mike Thrower additionally has been running absolute beginner classes as part of Royston U3A, where possible, on the Tuesday session.

Monday’s is always a competition with players receiving the results by email the next morning or tracking them on Bridgewebs. This we are able to do because all our dealing is now done by a computer driven dealing machine which then displays the hands on the Website (after they have been played by the members!).

Rapidly

On a Tuesday the same occurs with players being emailed the results or also able to view them on the Website. We try to get a result even though we rarely finish the session.

On Tuesdays we sometimes start with a presentation or short tutorial to address any issues which may benefit from being explained.

This is beginning to sound significantly more serious than actuality, where the main objective is to enjoy ourselves!

At Christmas we held two parties which were, as ever, very successful and both benefitted from an opening “magic” session by Derek Ailes and Mike Gilchrist. There was plenty of food and drink to either celebrate or drown ones sorrows!

The support on both days is exceptionally good and though almost full to capacity we have never had to turn anyone away!

We are lucky to have practical support from our players. Mention must be made of Mike Thrower and Jane Tulloch who dabble with our computers and Malcolm Dean who stands in as a most capable Director. Enquiries to Howard Waller on 01763 261693.

Meridian Triathlon Club

MTC has had another successful year with some great results. We have had new members taking part in their first ever triathlons, age group winners, Great Britain qualifiers and several athletes completing half and full ironman distances. In addition, various members have competed in

cycling, running and swimming events, all with the help, encouragement and support of the club and its members.

Triathlons start again in the spring but our training continues throughout the year. Melbourn Sports Centre is the club’s base. We have weekly swim training sessions here and it is where we start our group cycle rides. Other training sessions are held in local villages, plus advice, help and encouragement is always available via our club Facebook page and by email. Club sessions are tailored for all abilities with experienced coaches helping everyone to improve and to reach new goals. Already this year our members have signed up for over 18 different events with 16 enrolled for the Haverhill Triathlon, 13 for the Cambridge Half Marathon and three hoping to complete an Ironman!

If you are already a triathlete, or just want to give it a ‘tri’ we would love to welcome you into our club. Our members have a wide range of abilities and all are catered for. No one is left out. You can contact us at www.meridiantriclub.co.uk where there is also more information about the club.

Melbourn Dynamos Football Club

All welcome! www.melbourndynamos.co.uk

Melbourn Dynamos FC is a friendly community youth football club that gives boys and girls the opportunity to play regular football regardless of their experience or ability at all ages from 3 through to 18.

MTC athletes relaxing after last year’s Haverhill Tri. Lots of support, lots of fun and lots of coffee and cake afterwards.

We are a successful club defined by the strength of support from members and families, the praise and recognition of fellow clubs and FA Leagues, the work with our community partners including Melbourn Village College and Melbourn Parish Council, and of course our players’ achievements on the pitch and their support for the community. With the support of our benefactors and community partners, we are extending our work to make the club more inclusive by assisting players whose families are unable to afford the necessary fees

We have had a successful start to the season for the club with new teams and players welcoming the opportunity to play for Melbourn Dynamos. We now have more than 40 players in our Girls’ Teams at U10, U11, U13 & U17 and including our Dynamites and 13 other teams, we now have more than 230 players at the club. Disappointingly, like many youth football clubs, we have not had sufficient players this season to run an U16s or U18s team. This trend has been recognised by the FA and we are working hard with our younger teams to ensure that we maintain strong squad sizes as they progress to 11-a-side football and the senior teams.

Nationally, there has been much concern about historical failures to protect children in youth football. MDFC takes these concerns very seriously and reassures our community that as a Charter Standard Club we have the required child protection measures in place, that we are annually audited by the FA and that we remain vigilant. All coaches and assistants are both qualified and DBS/CRB checked before they work with our players.

We are very pleased with the success of our youngest players, the Dynamites, who increasingly provide the core of our league teams from under 7 upwards. The Dynamites’ coaching team is led by Dipak Patel. Dee was Cambridge FA’s Community Coach of the year for 2013, gained his Level 2 coaching qualification in June 2015 and is our Football Development Officer. This year in recognition of his tremendous work for the club and community, Dee has been nominated as Coach of the Year as part of the FA’s Community Awards. These players, aged 3–6, have fun and develop their skills before deciding whether to play league football as the club’s under 7s team. This fun, preparation and skill development through the Dynamites has undoubtedly brought more success to our current League Teams. These players train with level 2 and level 1 FA qualified coaches in a Saturday morning fun session for 3-6 year old boys and girls between 09.15 –10.15 a.m. at Melbourn Sports Centre. Sessions feature lots of short activities aimed at improving individual skills, concentration and the ability to be part of a team. The first one hour session is free thereafter we charge £2. All are welcome to the Melbourn Dynamites so why not bring your kids along so they can check it out.

All of our coaches are DBS/CRB checked and qualified to a minimum of FA Level1 standard. In addition, as a Partnership Club of Cambridge United and through the support of the FA, our coaches are now receiving high

level mentoring and support to develop our players and above all else provide them with enjoyment and exercise. We are also an FA Charter Standard Club which means that we have all the correct people and practices in place to operate in line with FA & government requirements. All are welcome and we are delighted to offer opportunities from age 4 upwards. Why not find out more about MDFC and the opportunities to play football with us by contacting David Atkins on 01763 263462 or email: secretary.mdfc@gmail.com.

The club’s success depends entirely on enthusiastic members and volunteers. Our continuing success and growth means that we need even more volunteers. If you feel that you would like to contribute to the club as an administrator, communications leader, fixtures secretary, coach, match day official or in some other volunteer capacity then we would be pleased to hear from you through secretary.mdfc@gmail.com or chairman.mdfc@gmail.com. More information about the club and individual teams is available from the club’s Website: www.melbourndynamos.co.uk.

Melbourn Sports Centre

For those of you who don’t already know, we have:

• A state of the art fitness suite offering a variety of membership schemes

• A 20 metre swimming pool (kept ever so slightly warmer than most!)

• A comprehensive swimming lesson programme, catering for all ages and abilities

• Upgraded multisports courts for hire including tennis, football and squash courts

• Water sports courses and activities

• Traditional and modern exercise classes

• Access to Melbourn Village College sports hall and gymnasium for activities such as trampolining, badminton and basketball

• Supervised sports and pool parties

March/April – It’s a universally accepted fact – Mums are great! So this Mother’s Day how about treating her to her own gym membership or purchasing a gift voucher for our other activities here at Melbourn Sports? Make this Mother’s Day one she’ll never forget!

We’ve got a bumper bag of Easter activities this year, including our OFSTED registered Play Scheme, where children will be treated to trampolining, swimming and creative crafts. Other holiday activities include Swimming Crash Course and Trampolining Crash Course.

April 2018 also sees the return of our charitable Swimathon, with all participants raising money for the Marie Curie Cancer Care Trust. We’d love to have as many entrants as possible; teams of up to five are welcome as well as individual swimmers. The Swimathon takes place on Friday 27th and Saturday 28th April. For further

information, please see reception or visit our website at www.mc-sport.co.uk.

May – We welcome back the outdoor sports and tennis season. For all you budding Wimbledon stars, courts can be hired mid-week and at weekends. For those that want to improve their ability or to take their tennis to the next level, then why not have some lessons? We’ve teamed up with MF Tennis to offer coaching session on a Saturday morning/afternoon, as well as midweek slots on a Wednesday evening For further information please contact Matt Fellingham 07779 273655 or e-mail: matt@mftennis.com

After last years success, we are also looking to run another Scootatlon/Bikeathlon event, enabling youngsters a chance at completing a mini fun triathlon, where they scoot or bike and run around a basic course. Full details will be released in April.

Later this month, we will be running our children’s holiday activities once again, with Play Scheme and a mixture of indoor and outdoor activities available.

June – For something a bit different this Fathers Day, how about treating your Dad to his own gym membership or purchasing a gift voucher for our other activities here at Melbourn Sports? It’s a great way to help a loved one get fit!

Plus why not start planning your summer sports early, with our holiday courses like the Children’s

Pentathlon and Swimming Crash Course? Bookings taken from June onwards.

Other activities on offer this spring and summer include:

• Our usual popular swimming lessons, both group and private

• A range of exercise classes including Aqua-fit, Body workouts, Boot Camp, Pilates, Swim-Clinic (pool training session)

• Indoor and Outdoor Court Hire

For further details on these or any other activities, please drop in, call 01763 263313 or go online at www.mc-sport.co.uk. We look forward to seeing you this season!

Graham Johnson-Mack/Melbourn Sports Centre Manager. 01763 263313 www.mc-sport.co.uk info@mc-sport.co.uk

Grinnel Hill BMX Club

After the site was put to bed and multiple aggregate deliveries, this winter has seen the creation at the top of the site of a new entry line into The Advanced Line due for completion around the time of publishing.

The club is open annually April to September

Strictly for BMX use only, for ages 12 and older, members have the option of either becoming a seasonal member for £50 (April to September), or a day member (per session) for £10.

Our aim for the club is to promote an activity for the young community of Melbourn and surrounding areas to participate in, with the guidance of our committee and experts, in a safe and friendly environment. Members will have access to BMX coaching and expertise on site during club open days.

For more details and to download your membership form today please visit; www.grinnelhillbmx.co.uk

Acknowledgements: Melbourn Parish Council for their ongoing support at all levels to keep the club sustainable and open. Wrights Mower Centre Melbourn for their help and generosity in supporting us to keep the site to a well maintained and safe standard for the foreseeable future. Frog End Pet Supplies for their help and generosity in supporting us with the ongoing wildlife conservation work carried out on the site remaining sympathetic to its heritage. Norburys Builder Merchants for their support with our open days, and supply of heavy plant landscaping machinery

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What’s On Royston Choral Society

Requiem – Gabriel Fauré Motets – Bruckner & Duruflé

Sunday 25th March

7.30pm Standon Parish Church

Tickets £12 (concessions £9, school students £1) available from choir members, online at www.bit.ly/RCSMar2018 on the door or from Caroline Franks – tel 01920 822723 email caroline.franks@rf152.co.uk. website www.roystonchoralsoc.org.uk

Ashwell Music Festival 2018

11th – 20th May at St Mary’s Church, Ashwell Friday 11th May 6.00pm – Widdershins Puppet Theatre

(01763)

Dunsbridge Turnpike, Shepreth, Royston, Herts

(Old A10 to Melbourn) www.wrightsmowercentre.co.uk email: jwrightsmowers@btconnect.com

Saturday 12th May 8.00pm – Motown Tribute Act,Mission Blue Thursday 17th May 7.00pm – Young Musicians’ Concert

Friday 18th May 8.00pm – Darius Brubeck Quartet

Saturday 19th May 8.00pm – An Evening with Ben Goldscheider. Horn & Piano recital

Sunday 20th May 6.00pm – Festal Evensong

For more information, and to book tickets, visit www.ashwellmusicfestival.org or telephone 01462 743289

Home-Start Literary Lunch

Thursday 3rd May, 2018 at The Old Bull Inn, Royston 12.00pm – 2.15pm Guest speaker: Dame Fiona Reynolds, Master of Emmanuel College Cambridge and previously Director-General of The National Trust. Dame Fiona published: ‘The Fight for Beauty’ in May 2016. In a discussion with Home-Start’s Poet-in-Residence, Jude Simpson

Tickets £15 to include buffet lunch with tea/coffee from 01763 262262 or admin@hsrsc.org.uk or online at: www.ticketsource.co.uk/hsrsc

Cracked Voices

Cracked Voices is a new sixty minute song cycle centred on South Cambridgeshire and North Hertfordshire and focuses on the extraordinary lives of ordinary people.

From Servandus waiting on his lost Celtic goddess at Ashwell, to the POW’s celebrating Hitler’s birthday on Therfield heath, the songs feature a tangle of quirky time signatures and memorable lines, focusing heavily on nature and the world around us.

Cracked Voices will premiere at Anglia Ruskin University on March 10th 2018, with performers Ian Beadle (baritone), Donna Lennard (soprano), and Ralph Woodward (piano)

For more information go to www.cracked-voices.co.uk

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Melbourn magazine is non-profit and all work on the magazine including layout is produced by volunteers. The Magazine is published four times a year in the first week of March, June, September and December. We print 2200 copies which are delivered free to every house in the village. Advertising revenue is used for printing costs only. Adverts should be supplied as finished artwork and must be at the sizes shown below. Please send artwork to melbournmagazine@gmail.com

The current rates for advertising in the Magazine are as follows:

Size per… Width x Height B/W Colour

1/4 inside page (79 × 128 mm) £105 £155

1/2 inside page (163 × 128 mm) £180 £250

Full inside page (163 × 262 mm) N/A £480

Advertising rates are per year (four issues)

For further information on advertising please telephone 220363. Remittance or cheques should be made to Melbourn Magazine.

We are grateful to The TTP Group for their continued sponsorship

Melbourn Magazine Committee

Editorial Ann Dekkers 261144

Editorial\Production Peter Simmonett 220363

Advertising Vernon Gamon 221965

Distribution Eric Johnston 220197

Parish Profile

Proof reading

Mavis Howard 260686

Brenda Meliniotis 261154

Village Diary Brenda Meliniotis 261154

The Melbourn magazine team would like to thank all our advertisers for their support and sponsorship

Village & Community news

Abobe Town & Country / Estate Agent - 01763 259888 48

All Eyes / Spectacle Makers - 01954 231545 48

Amber Health - 01462 490141 30

angliEAR / Hearing services - 01223 661399 52

Ashton Renovations - 01763 290335 4

Bannold landscaping materials - 01954 231666 28

B.C.R / Plumbing & Heating - 01763 260007 42

Bed Store - 01763 247490 64

Bumpkins Day Nursery - 01223 208777 22

Bury Lane Farm Shop - 01763 260418 54

Bury Lane Fun Barn - 01763 260418 60

Carters Shoes / Quality Leather Footwear - 01223 264930 44

Chris Thomas /Carpet & Upholstery Cleaning - 01223 836002 46

CHS / Local Community Services - 01763 260564 42

Clark Philips / Estate Agent - 01763 248682 52

CSL Cheap Storage Ltd - 01763 262344 54

ESSE - 01763 261000 56

Fieldgate Nurseries / Fruit & Vegetables - 01763 260737 22

Frog End pet Supplies - 01763 263342 60

Garden Design Solutions - 01763 263231 14

Greenlow Kennels - 01763 260624 2

GYC Photography family photographer - 07786 707869 18

Home Store - 01763 245888 64

Jazzercise / Body Workout - 07963 161246 54

Jeremy Ashworth / Property Maintenance - 01763 230831 58

Jeremy Rule / Funeral Service - 01763 242560 62

J Oliver Radley / Opticians - 01763 273300 10

Kathleen Harry Osteopath - 01763 261716 24

Langford Windows - 01462 701828 14

Langham Press - 01223 870266 28

Laura’s Hairdressing - 077927 49760 59

Lawn Partners / Bespoke lawncare - 01763 244955 14

Law Storage Ltd - 01223 874629 22

Leech & Sons / Master Butchers - 01763 260255 26

Little Hands Nursery School - 01763 260964 20

Melbourn Buildings & Fencing Suppliers - 01763 263336 26

Melbourn Dental Practice - 01763 262034 50

Melbourn Flooring & Interiors - 01763 262413 61

Melbourn Garage - 01763 263344 62

Melbourn Ironing Service - 01763 220996 2

M&M Furniture - 01763 256722 42

Moncraft / PC Repairs & Installation - 01223 208529 46

Nancy Foster Footcare - 01763 261250 44

Newlings of Royston / Funeral Services - 01763 242375 38

Norburys / Building & Landscape Supplies - 01763 261740 58

Oven Clean / Cleaning Specialist - 07513 439604 60

Paul Hutley / Carpenter - 07702905915 58

Phillimore Garden Centre - 01763 260537 2

PL Cooper / Flooring Specialists - 01763 260918 57

Prince Property / Property Improvements - 01763 269565 14

Projects4Roofing / Flat Roof - 01223 258049 20

Projects4Roofing / Roofing Specialist - 01223 258049 50

Redmayne Arnold Harris Letting Agency - 01223 800860 44

Rothwell’s Carpet Cleaning - 01223 832928 42

Royston Complementry Health - 01763 247440 8

Sage / Blinds & Interiors - 01763 263399 12

Simon Robinson / Bespoke Picture Framers - 01223 873123 62

South Cambs Motors / Servicing & Repairs - 01763 260246 27

St Georges Nursing Home - 01763 242243 50

Summit / Landscape Gardeners - 01223 929394 30

Taylor & Co /Chartered Accountants - 01763 248545 39

The Letting Centre / Property Management - 01763 263039 38

The Sheene Mill - 01763 261393 56

The Spice Hut / Indian Takeaway - 01763 262425 27

Three Counties K9 Hydrotherapy - 01763 838536 24

TTP Group - 01763 262626 18

Urban Plastics / Plumbing Suppliers - 01763 262337 58

Wrights Mower Centre / Garden Machinery - 01763 263393 59

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• Extensive kitchen, bathroom & flooring showrooms displaying a variety of de signs to suit all budgets from contemporar y to traditional.

• Wide range of products including the new exclusive addition “EVERHOT” electric (Aga) ovens.

• Free on-site visit quotation offering a 3D design making your room come alive.

• The in-store and fitting team work closely with you from your first visit through to the design, installation and completion.