Saturday 1^st November 2003

Bonfire Night will be celebrated in a small Devonshire village on Wednesday with the rolling of lighted tar barrels through the streets, a tradition that goes back to the middle years of the 19th century.

Twenty thousand people usually flock to Ottery St Mary, north east of Exeter, to see this fiery event that was first held in 1859 but as with so many of Britain’s old world customs, its origins could well be ancient and rooted in pagan celebrations to remember the dead, to give thanks for the harvest or appease spirits walking abroad. Barrels are soaked in tar for weeks prior to the event and then lit in order that they spew flames as they are rolled through the winding streets from one team to another and many suffer burns and bruises.

It is a curious tradition but one that is not unknown in Bourne because a similar observance was practiced here in years past to mark occasions of public celebration and of course, Guy Fawkes’ Night, because everyone then thought that the gunpowder plot was hatched at the Red Hall, a belief that has since been disproved by recent research.

The event at Ottery St Mary is strictly controlled to reduce the risk of endangering life and property but such safeguards were unknown in Bourne 150 years ago when the rolling of lighted tar barrels may have been fun but it was also foolhardy and there were demands each year that the practice should be stopped. One of the worst incidents occurred on Monday 5th November 1877 when there was riotous behaviour and vandalism as fireworks were thrown about the streets and market place, lighted tar barrels rolled around the town and a fire lit in South Street from where the sparks blew into a nearby paddock and set light to a straw stack which was burned out. There was also some stone throwing from the assembled crowd and a window in the police station in North Street was broken but no injuries were reported.

The police had an idea that trouble was brewing and took the precaution of swearing in 56 young men as special constables before the town's magistrates the previous week when the chairman of the bench, Lord Aveland, expressed the hope that all respectable inhabitants would co-operate with the police in preserving order and warned that offenders would be severely dealt with. The disturbances were not as bad as expected and were soon brought under control. Nevertheless, the following week, Wednesday 14th November, 40 men and youths appeared before a special sitting of the magistrates in the Town Hall, 20 of them on charges related to the disturbances in Bourne and the other 20 in connection with similar mayhem in the surrounding villages, notably Corby Glen, Thurlby, Morton, Baston and Market Deeping. All of the accused pleaded guilty, the main charges relating to the rolling of lighted tar barrels down the street and of starting bonfires on the highway. Other offences included assaulting the police, firing guns, discharging fireworks in a public place and causing a general commotion to the annoyance of the public.

The accused expressed regret for their conduct and promised not to offend again but all were punished, mainly fines of five and ten shillings with costs, although the penalties for the Bourne defendants were much heavier, with fines of up to £5 plus costs [£1 then would be worth almost £50 by today's values] and one man, a soldier on leave from his regiment and thought to be one of the ringleaders, was committed to prison for 21 days while another who had assaulted a constable was sentenced to one month's hard labour. Some of the accused could not pay their fines and were subsequently sent to the House of Correction at Folkingham for either 14 or 21 days.

There were similar incidents most years until Superintendent Willerton Brown was appointed head of the police force in Bourne in 1876, an important position in those days when police strength in the town was one superintendent, an inspector, two sergeants and 15 constables. He at once directed his endeavours to stopping such practices and eventually succeeded, bringing the tar barrel tradition to an end, much to the relief of the magistrates and shopkeepers.

The workhouse was no place to be in past times and even today, the word has connotations of poverty and deprivation. But in those days before old age pensions and the welfare state, when benefits are now available for those in need, a man had to provide for himself and his family or suffer the consequences. Some could not face the stigma of living off the parish, as it was known, and took drastic action, as in this news report from the Stamford Mercury on Friday 12th May 1871:

On Monday morning last, a report was circulated at Baston that John Newcomb, 77 years old, had attempted suicide by cutting his throat with a large pocket knife. He has been ill for several months and the fear of having to go to the parish for relief after his sick pay from the club is discontinued has preyed upon his mind, it is thought, and caused him to commit the rash act. He is under medical attendance and may probably recover.

Newcomb’s plight could have been eased by an extra few pence a week. The workhouse and parish charity no longer exist and have since been replaced by state welfare benefits which are currently costing the country around £120 billion pounds a year.

A sign of the continuing devaluation of our currency can be found in the foyer of the Sainsburys supermarket in Exeter Street that has just been revamped at a cost of £5 million. A new machine called a Coinstar Centre has been installed and is designed to lighten your load of inconvenient coins. The logo on the machine assumes that people no longer like to carry them but dump all of their change in a jam jar when they get home rather than weigh themselves down with so much metal when paper money is much more convenient.

The purpose of the machine is to exchange the lot, whether it is a few spare coppers, 50p pieces or even £1 and £2 coins, and users are instructed to empty their containers into the dispenser and receive a voucher from the slot instead. “Coinstar sorts and counts your loose change right in front of your eyes”, goes the publicity blurb. “It is very quick and easy to use and will process at the rate of 600 coins a minute. You can pour in your change and watch the value grow on the customer display. The machine then prints a voucher which can be exchanged for cash or shopping at the checkout.”

But you get nothing for nothing in this life and I see that the machine requires what the company calls “a very small service charge” for changing your money of 7.5 p in the £. This does not sound a lot until translated into fiscal terms and that means a 7½ per cent rate of exchange which is three times the rate of inflation. To put it in simple terms, Sainsburys are asking customers to bring the currency they have in coins to the store where they will take them off your hands and charge you for doing so. You may then spend what is left on their groceries that carry a generous profit margin. Nice money if you can get it but if you go to your bank, they should do it for nothing. Better still, anyone who can afford to chuck all of their coins into a jam jar at the end of the day would not miss them if they were paid into a savings account, a far more prudent way of managing your money than shelling out high rates merely for swapping them for a promissory note. Better still, carry the lot to the checkout and pay your bill with them, thus saving yourself 75p in every £10.

A year or so back, (Diary, 23rd December 2000), I saw a boy leaving one of our supermarkets and throwing a penny down the drain because he appeared to believe that it was worthless. There is an old English proverb “Take care of the pence and the pounds will take care of themselves” but that appears to refer to another age. Not content with their very considerable success in selling us groceries, Sainsburys now seek to profit from the small change they give us when paying the bill.

What the local newspapers are saying: I wrote last month (October 11th) about the secrecy surrounding the deliberations of Bourne United Charities and the exclusion of reporters from their meetings, with the result that the public knows little or nothing of their activities even though the trustees are administering money which was left to the people of this town. The Local (October 31st) highlights a similar gap in the democratic process because meetings of the Town Centre Management Partnership are also closed to the Press and the public. The issue has been raised by the Mayor of Bourne, Councillor Trevor Holmes, who points out that although several local councillors are members of this organisation, they treat the information they receive as confidential and refuse to disclose it even to the councils on which they serve, namely Bourne Town Council and South Kesteven District Council. This is a nonsensical situation because the TCMP is at the very heart of the decision making on major improvements to our town centre and to treat these matters as though they were state secrets is anathema to the democratic process.

The problem in both cases, with the BUC and the TCMP, is that once elected, members tend to retreat behind the closed doors of the committee room, a situation which breeds suspicion and resentment among those they represent and by holding meetings in camera, they forget that they are there in the first place at the behest of the people. It is satisfying to learn that The Local is to have a copy of the minutes of the partnership’s meetings once they have been approved by members but the people of Bourne would be even better served if local newspaper editors banded together and demanded the right to attend their meetings and the same with BUC. Exposure to public scrutiny is the only way to ensure that members of these organisations are fulfilling their duties as they should because complete transparency is the ultimate acid test.

The big green bins have become a familiar sight in the streets as they stand at the kerbside waiting to be collected every fortnight, a sign that green issues are being addressed by our local authorities. These containers were issued to every household in Bourne last January as the £250,000 scheme was launched by South Kesteven District Council and although there were fears that it might founder through a lack of co-operation by home owners, the reverse is proving to be true. The Stamford Mercury reports (October 31st) that the amount of paper, glass, plastic and old clothing being put out for recycling is so great that a new collection lorry is needed to cope. About 60 tonnes of waste is being picked up around the district each week, far beyond what was originally predicted.

One of the oldest properties in Bourne is Monkstone House in West Street, a Grade II listed building currently used as an Indian restaurant. Few houses in which the townsfolk lived in earlier times have survived but this one has remained virtually intact externally for the past 250 years and is similar in style and period to the house nearby that is now used by Lloyds TSB. The rear part of Monkstone House dates back to 1620 while the impressive red brick frontage with stone quoins was erected in the mid-18th century and the original doorway incorporating a broken pediment and fanlight still graces the main entrance. This handsome building rising to two storeys above the ground was the home of the town's more affluent citizens in past times although it has been used as an Indian restaurant since 1993. But the Stamford Mercury tells us (October 31st) that the owners are in trouble with South Kesteven District Council for ruining the original appearance by giving the stone quoins a lick of paint that is not in keeping with the character of the frontage. As the management of the Angel Hotel recently found out to their cost when they were ordered to change their new green and cream livery on the frontage back to the original black and white, listed building consent is needed for such changes and council planners have told the restaurant owners to restore the stone to its original colour.

The cleaning of St Peter’s Pool by schoolchildren continues and a photograph of the four youngsters involved is carried by The Local newspaper with a report of their work (October 31st). Heartened by the support they have been given, particularly from park visitors and the Civic Society, the four pupils from Bourne Grammar School now plan to extend their activities. Ben Francis, aged 17, told the newspaper that the appearance of the pool has been improved sufficiently for them to move on to other areas of the Wellhead Gardens. “We want to start cleaning up the hedges, pathways and the park in general”, he said. “We intend to carry on through the winter and you will see us out here until it snows and maybe even then.” Such enthusiasm should be noted by the trustees of Bourne United Charities who are responsible for this place, an organisation with assets worth more than £7 million but who claim that they cannot afford to take on more staff to do this work and so they rely on the goodwill of children instead.

Weather conditions during the late summer have resulted in a kaleidoscope of colour for our trees this autumn, in the woods, parks and even in the streets, providing one of the most beautiful sights I can remember at this time of the year. Everywhere you look, the leaves have turned a variety of russet shades, from golden yellow to red and brown, as they prepare to fall for another year. Little rain and no wind has meant that they have stayed in place for far longer and so the glorious sight has been with us for some weeks, no more so than in Bourne Wood and the Stamford Mercury carries a full page colour feature on this phenomenon (October 31st). Forestry Commission ranger Cheryl Joyce explained: “The forests in autumn are continually changing and every day brings a different feel to the woods. It is particularly exciting here because of the amazing variety of trees including beech, birch and maple, all of which are looking absolutely stunning right now. There’s plenty to do and see and an autumn walk in the wood is just the tonic to shake away the stresses of modern life.” The commission rates the changing colour of leaves in its forests on a scale of one to five, where one is green and five is gold, and Bourne Wood has a gold rating this week. Go and see for yourself.

Thought for the Week: I have taken to locking my garden gate whenever I go out. I am terrified of finding someone building a house on my lawn when I get back. – message contributed to the Bourne Forum by Stan Watson, Monday 27th October 2003.

Saturday 8^th November 2003

The October Fair has been here for another year, bringing with it the usual traffic chaos caused by the loss of 80 spaces in the Exeter Street car park behind the Post Office for five days. Last Saturday was particularly traumatic for drivers seeking somewhere to leave their vehicles and as a result, the car parks outside the Sainsburys and Budgens supermarkets were full for most of the day and tempers frayed as new arrivals competed for each space as it was vacated. The kerbside in the town centre was under similar pressure and visitors with no knowledge of the town arriving for lunch or a spot of shopping would no doubt just keep going after unsuccessful attempts to find somewhere to park.

In short, a fair in the town centre has become bad news for Bourne and it is time that our councillors addressed this issue. The fair operators will no doubt say that this is a traditional event and one that should continue and no one will argue with that even though the premise is incorrect. There is no evidence of such a precedent for a fair at Bourne but a Royal Charter was granted to Baldwin Wake, then Lord of the Manor, by King Edward I in 1279, enabling him hold a weekly market every Saturday and extract tolls from those who came to sell their wares. These rights passed to the Cecil family in 1564 and in recent times were acquired from the Marquess of Exeter by South Kesteven District Council who continue to hold markets on Thursdays and Saturdays. There is also evidence that until 1803, the town had a stone butter cross on the west side of the market place, ten feet high with an octagonal shaft and three steps at its base, around which the goods from farms and villages were brought in for sale such as butter, cheese and poultry, and visitors travelled in from miles around to buy their produce. From this sprang the weekly markets and annual fairs.

But the swings and roundabouts of the pleasure fairs that we know today are totally different to the fairs of yesteryear that were devoted to the sale of produce and livestock, or the hiring of servants and labourers, and any amusements that did take place were merely fringe activities. Today, the pleasure fair continues on its own although operators claim the rights of past centuries and this is misplaced. By all means, let them come as they have done in previous years but to allow a fair to disrupt the town in this way for two or three days over a busy weekend is no longer acceptable and they should be given an out of town site, a field or meadow, where our daily life will not be so disrupted.

As with most of the difficulties that beset our town, the solution is purely a matter of common sense and yet the problem is not a new one. Our senior councillor, Mrs Marjorie Clark, still serving after 40 years, told a meeting of Bourne Town Council on Tuesday 23rd September 1980, that the amusement fair which visited annually was taking up badly needed parking spaces and added:

I am disturbed that the fair can be held on one of the car parks we have left in Bourne. Surely there are other parts of the town where it could be held without causing such inconvenience. In the past, fairs have been held in Mill Drove and Spalding Road but instead we have them in the town centre on a Friday and Saturday every year when these car parking spaces would normally be heavily used.

That was almost 25 years ago and as the situation remains unchanged, we are entitled to ask why is it that if both the people and their representatives are still dissatisfied, nothing has been done to change it?

It is at this time of the year that we remember our valiant dead, those who gave their lives in the battles of recent years, particularly the two world wars of the 20th century. The cenotaph here in Bourne was erected as the centrepiece of the War Memorial Gardens in September 1956 and bears two plaques containing the names of those from Bourne who never returned, one on the south side listing those who lost their lives in the First World War of 1914-18 while that on the north side contains the names of those who died in the Second World War of 1939-45 and subsequent conflicts such as Malaya, Borneo and Northern Ireland. But it is the poppies that bloomed in the fields of Flanders in that first great conflict that have come to symbolise those we have lost and so they appear every year to commemorate Remembrance Day, in wreaths here at the cenotaph and pinned to the lapels of those who have reason to remember.

We live in a changing world and perhaps this annual remembrance to honour our dead may soon disappear but in the meantime, towns and villages around the country still find time to gather together for this purposes. Before the War Memorial was erected in 1956, these services were held in the market place, or the town centre as we know it today. The tradition lapsed for a few years until revived with a morning parade by the Royal Naval Association and then the British Legion decided that they too would like to hold a similar event but were unable to agree whether it should be held in the morning with the RNA or be a separate occasion in the afternoon. Tradition decreed that it should be a morning service at 11 am to coincide with the rest of the country but various factors influenced the decision and from the first parade in 1976, when the British Legion president Lord Ancaster took the salute, it was held in the afternoon as it still is today.

And so we have two Remembrance Day parades, although both organisations are now negotiating to join forces and it is likely that they will be merged into a single morning parade from next year followed by the usual service at the Abbey Church. This makes sense because numbers have declined in recent years with the RNA down to just a handful of supporters and the main British Legion parade attracting about 300 people. A single parade would provide a show of unity and harmony for a traditional occasion when we remember our war dead.

The saga over the closure of the public lavatories in South Street rumbles on and has now become the subject of internecine warfare in the letters’ column of the Stamford Mercury. The exchange started on Friday 17th October when Councillor John Kirkman (Bourne East) made an impassioned plea for the toilets to be re-opened immediately until the future of this amenity is decided. This was a perfectly reasonable request to make because, after all, Councillor Kirkman is an experienced member of Bourne Town Council, South Kesteven District Council and Lincolnshire County Council, and if he does not know the wishes of the people then who does?

The toilets were closed in October 2002 on the pretext that they were being vandalised and attracting paedophiles and the decision to shut them appears to have been taken by one man, Councillor Peter Martin-Mayhew, deputy leader of SKDC and the cabinet member responsible for lavatories. He was obviously piqued by Councillor Kirkman’s remarks because he replied in a letter to the Stamford Mercury on Friday 31st October outlining the current situation and claiming that the closure would continue while costings for refurbishment are obtained and a new system of running the toilets in conjunction with Bourne Town Council is considered. For the first time, he also publicly accepted complete responsibility for the inconvenience to which Bourne people, particularly the elderly, have been subjected, because he said: “Yes, it was my decision to close them and it has remained my decision not to re-open thus far.”

But he added: “I would invite Councillor Kirkman to get in a positive debate and not negative criticism. Thus far, he has not been in touch with me to offer the benefit of his considerable experience and local knowledge. Parochialism and political point scoring is of no value over issues such as this.”

This acerbic exchange between fellow councillors does little to improve their image. Do they forget that it is we who elected them? It is also the first time that Councillor Martin-Mayhew (Caythorpe and Fulbeck) has addressed the people of Bourne even though the issue of the closed lavatories has been a major talking point in this town for the past 12 months and Councillor Kirkman, who has been involved in local authority work for almost a quarter of a century and has twice been Mayor of Bourne, has been particularly vociferous in the debate.

To present this as a political argument is also misguided. I suggested to Councillor Martin-Mayhew that perhaps he might put his views to the town on this web site which has 500 visitors a week, but as I received no answer, I take it that he prefers to keep us in ignorance of his intentions unless a fellow councillor raises his ire. The people of Bourne, particularly those who have been forced to use the loos in shops and pubs when visiting the town centre, or even relieve themselves elsewhere, would prefer him to admit that he has made a terrible mistake and to put it right by taking Councillor Kirkman’s advice to re-open the toilets now. Sniping at each other through the columns of the local press when they have the comfort of the council chamber to discuss their differences is not only unproductive but an indication that perhaps the wrong people are running our affairs.

What the local newspapers are also saying: Relationships between councillors on Bourne Town Council are similarly strained according to The Local (November 7th). The newspaper reports that the Standards Board for England, which investigates allegations of impropriety or misconduct by local councillors, has rejected a complaint by the mayor, Councillor Trevor Holmes, that fellow councillor Guy Cudmore had failed to comply with the council’s code of conduct. It was alleged that in a newspaper article, Councillor Cudmore advocated and promoted unlawful behaviour by teenage children, an incident related to the use of police sniffer dogs in Bourne schools to help detect illegal possession of drugs (see Diary entries for 28th June and 19th July 2003), by advising pupils to walk out and not take part in such searches. Fortunately, common sense has prevailed in the adjudication which said: “The board considered this allegation and decided not to refer it to an Ethical Standards Officer as it was not sufficiently serious to warrant an investigation.”

It is to be hoped that these two examples are not typical of the relationships between all members of our local authorities. If our councillors cannot agree, what hope is there for harmony among politicians at a higher level, or agreement between nations and peace in the world?

The debate over paying to park in Bourne is back on the agenda and the days of finding a space to leave the car free of charge may soon be over. The Stamford Mercury (November 7th) says that a major review of car parking is being carried out by South Kesteven District Council for the second time in two years although a bid to introduce charges in January 2002 was thrown out. Bourne is the last large urban area under the council’s jurisdiction that still has free parking and with costs rising annually, this additional source of income may prove too attractive to resist.

The youth hostel at Thurlby which was due to be closed and sold by the Youth Hostels Association has been saved by the intervention of Lincolnshire County Council who have agreed a joint £300,000 funding deal with South Kesteven District Council, according to The Local (November 7th). This will mean that a much-loved amenity used by visitors from around the world will remain open in accordance with the wishes of the man who gave it to the community. The Thurlby hostel is based at a substantial private property known as Capstones, built in the village High Street during the 19th century and was bequeathed to the association in the will of Mr Harry Garwood Sneath, a prominent farmer and businessman, who died in February 1979 and whose family had lived there since 1862. He also left £4,000 that helped towards the cost of converting the house for its new role, work that was carried out by local building contractors although the decorating, equipping and fitting out was appropriately completed by youngsters employed under the government's Youth Opportunities Programme.

Capstones opened as a hostel in 1981 and can accommodate 26 overnight visitors in three dormitories and there is a kitchen for them to cook their meals, a comfortable common room, a small shop, a drying room, shower and other facilities and spacious grounds. The YHA runs a network of 230 hostels across England and Wales which cater for all ages, not just young people, and the Thurlby hostel is used every year by 2,500 people for overnight stays, many of them from overseas, yet the association claimed last year that this did not constitute a high popularity rating with travellers and was therefore one of ten hostels that has been chosen for closure.

There has been a passionate campaign by villagers to keep it open and councillors have hearkened to their wishes and now the takeover is scheduled for next April in time for the summer season although it will continue to be run by the YHA. But before then, the building will be refurbished with self-catering accommodation increased to take 32 people with additional cooking, washing and toilet facilities and more amenity areas.

From the archives: Work on improvements to the public toilets in South Street began on June 28th, members of South Kesteven District Council’s environmental health committee were told on Thursday. Commenting on the improvements which will cost around £11,000, Councillor Don Fisher said: “It seems that many vandal-proof precautions have been taken and the facilities for the handicapped are to be applauded.” – news report from the Stamford Mercury, Friday 23rd July 1982.

Thought for the week: Politics is perhaps the only profession for which no preparation is thought necessary. – Scottish writer and novelist Robert Louis Stevenson (1850-94).

Saturday 15^th November 2003

Autumn is a golden month and nowhere are its colours more pronounced than in Bourne Wood which has become a riot of russet shades, of reds, golds and browns. The footpaths here are among our favourites and we walk them often, still finding hidden tracks and secret glades even after two decades of visiting. Fallen leaves underfoot make the going soft and mushy and the dank smell of the season is one of mushroom and fungus and fresh hoof marks in muddy places indicate that deer have passed this way a short time before.

Wet days prolong the autumn tints but the westerly gales for which November is renowned will soon sweep through these acres and strip the trees of the last vestiges of their colourful foliage and the woods will settle down for winter. Bird movement is already on the decline and most of our summer visitors have departed for warmer southern climes but as autumn advances, those birds that are left become more gregarious, moving together in great flocks that sweep up and down the fields and hedges that fringe the woods like shoals of fish, as though guided by one mind.

It seems that a great silence is about to descend on our woods and certainly some of its inhabitants are already preparing to hibernate although there will still be life to be seen even in the depths of winter because few animals disappear completely. But in the little that is left of autumn, we can still enjoy these ripe and mellow days when grey squirrels can be seen scavenging for late acorns to add to their winter store and performing their dizzy acrobatics among the high branches of the larches or hear the robin from the bushes, chirping a little as it makes short flights from twig to twig, watching as you pass by in case you are tempted to invade its territory.

It is now getting dark when we finish our walks in the late afternoon, the street lights are on as we return home and we see families gathering for the evening through uncurtained windows. Our autumn will soon give way to winter and these golden woodland days will be gone for another year and so enjoy them while you can.

Meanwhile, Santa’s siren call sounds forever nearer and the inevitable "Jingle Bells" can be heard in the stores where shelves have been cleared of the usual stock to make way for the seasonal tat of glitter and gew-gaws. Wherever you go, housewives have already started shopping for the big event although you rarely see cash changing hands. Even the smallest bill is paid for with plastic and it is therefore not surprising to read the latest government statistics that credit card debt is running at an all time high and that if interest rates suddenly went up by two or three per cent, many would not be able to settle their monthly bills. The drawback about borrowing, which was drummed into me by my mother when I was young, is that you are spending money that has not yet been earned but the various financial institutions make it so simple and seductive that their offers are hard to resist. We are also into a blame culture and so anyone who suddenly finds themselves with debts that they cannot pay can justify their imprudence by accusing the banks that gave them a loan of impropriety instead of holding themselves responsible. We will live to regret this profligacy, but not until after Christmas.

South Kesteven District Council is trying to drag its members into the technological age and to this end, all 58 members have been issued with laptop computers worth £1,000 each. It is part of the current strategy advocated by central government in pursuit of a paperless administration, thus cutting costs and streamlining efficiency.

The new equipment is intended to keep them in contact with the council offices in Grantham by email and eventually to receive the minutes of meetings and other communications connected with their duties which are currently sent through the post in huge envelopes at enormous cost and present a formidable body of work when they thump on to the doormat.

To familiarise councillors with their machines, IT specialists from council headquarters have been visiting them in their homes to make sure that they understand the setup and that their modems and telephone lines are correctly connected and so there can be no excuse if anyone defaults. But it has not quite worked out like that. At a recent meeting to discuss the innovation, a large number said that by next morning they had completely forgotten what they had been taught and the lids of their laptops have remained firmly closed ever since because they just did not understand them.

This is a particularly unfortunate admission because most councillors are also governors at one of their local schools, sometimes two, where pupils of five and six years old are happily using computers every day without difficulty and they are extremely efficient into the bargain. By not using their laptops, councillors are contributing to a reckless waste of public money and perhaps this resistance to innovation is an indication that retirement beckons because how can a councillor possibly be fit to administer our affairs if they cannot handle the technologies of our modern world that are accepted by practically everyone else, including our kids.

A discussion is underway in the Bourne Forum about the merits of fish and chips wrapped in newspaper and one politically correct correspondent deplores the habit and suggests that serving Britain’s favourite meal in this fashion is unhygienic and a sure way to catch something nasty. He insists that newsprint, whether it be the Daily Mirror or The Times, can easily be impregnated by germs that will be passed on down the chain to those who love their cod and chips in the old fashioned way and they could end up in hospital or even worse.

As someone who was brought up in a working class neighbourhood in the 1930s and 1940s, when fish and chips were a regular part of our diet, I can assure our correspondent that his fears are totally unfounded. I imagine that the entire nation during those depressed days enjoyed this meal at some time or other and as every fish and chip shop in the land served them in old newspapers, we would have ended up with infections of plague proportions if his theory were correct.

He should also understand that we lived in a state of perpetual hunger and that hygiene was the last thing on our minds as we queued up for our pennyworth of chips or, on Friday nights when father got paid, one-and-one which was the trade description for a small slice of battered cod and a helping of chips that cost tuppence in old money which is even less than one penny in today’s decimal currency. Not only did we devour every morsel, but we also licked the last vestiges of our meal from the pages of the Daily Sketch [now defunct] or Daily Express, whichever happened to be at the top of the pile when our turn came and I cannot remember even one stomach upset but then perhaps we were made of sterner stuff in those austere days.

The use of old newspapers is part of the history of fish and chips, introduced into Britain in the 19th century as a working class meal and to take advantage of the ample fish stocks in the seas around this island at a time when meat was becoming expensive. No one actually knows when the tradition began although Charles Dickens refers to “a fried fish warehouse” is his novel Oliver Twist (1839) and the great fish and chip trade we know today grew out of these small businesses which sold fish and chips separately in the streets and alleys of London and some of the northern industrial towns. Both Lancashire and London, therefore, stake a claim to the origin of our most famous meal and over the next 100 years, the public realised that fish fried in batter with chipped potatoes was rather a tasty combination and so it not only became a national institution, but a vital cheap source of nutrition for families and helped fuel the workforce of the industrial revolution.

The fish and chip shop we know today is about 150 years old, the first being opened by Joseph Malin in Cleveland Street, London, within the sound of Bow Bells, around 1860. His enterprise was unknown up north where Mr Lees was selling fish and chips from a wooden hut in the market place at Mossley, near Oldham, Lancashire, in 1863, but business was very successful and when he transferred it to a permanent shop across the road, he posted the following inscription in the window: “This is the first fish and chip shop in the world.” This was the beginning of the country’s fast or convenience food industry and there are now an estimated 8,500 fish and chip shops across the United Kingdom, which is eight for every one McDonald’s outlet.

The idea was to serve fish and chips to the people as cheaply as possible and the use of fancy wrapping paper, which would have increased the cost of each portion, was never even considered when there was so much discarded newsprint lying around. It was an obvious solution to the problem. Shop owners queued up outside newspaper plants and wholesale distributors to buy up their old issues for a few pence [my uncle owned a fish and chip shop], a pile which their wives or daughters expertly divided into neat stacks of appropriate size on the counter and I can assure you that the servings in which they were eventually wrapped, with a scoopful of scraps from the pan piled on top and sprinkled with generous helpings of salt and vinegar, were absolutely delicious and remain so to this day.

Few meals have such nostalgic appeal as fish and chips and to divorce them from the newspaper wrappings of yesteryear, the very embodiment of a meal for the working classes, is to emasculate our national dish. The food police and hygiene fanatics should keep their hands off our fish and chips and if old fashioned shop owners still use newspapers for wrapping, then good for them because you can keep up with local and national affairs by having a good, grease-stained read while you eat, as we did sixty and seventy years ago.

What the local newspapers are saying: Those who feared for the loss of our countryside with the building of the Elsea Park housing development to the south of Bourne will be heartened by the establishment of a community trust for residents on the estate which will monitor environmental issues such as caring for the indigenous wildlife and preservation of the natural beauty surrounding their homes. The building of 2,000 properties on this site to the south of Bourne will mean the loss of 300 acres of green belt land and The Local reports (November 14th) that information packs are being distributed to home owners by the developers with advice on a variety of conservation topics such as gardening to attract birds and butterflies and improving their habitat. The trust will also be responsible for controlling and maintaining all open spaces, landscaping, ponds and grass verges as well as helping develop the 40 acres of amenity land and two football pitches.

One of the town’s controversial head teachers is off to pastures new, according to the front page of the Stamford Mercury (November 14th) which reports that Mark Gray is leaving the Abbey Primary School in the next few weeks to begin a new career in New Zealand. Fulsome tributes have been paid to his work at the school, particularly by the chairman of the governors, Councillor John Kirkman, who said: “Mark has been successful in the establishment of strong, reliable teaching and learning systems, along with the building and reinforcement of leadership in depth across the school. He has worked tirelessly for the children and the school and his commitment to both and his achievements, should not be underestimated.” The newspaper also reminds us, in justifying its headline word “controversial”, that Mr Gray was in charge last summer when many parents were greatly upset after a much loved and long serving member of the staff, Liz Robinson, the deputy head teacher, was sacked as redundant after 18 years as part of a cost-cutting measure to meet a £65,000 shortfall in the school budget.

Someone asked me the other day if Bourne was still twinned with Doudeville in France and I assured them that it was and if anyone has any doubts whether this link is still active, then they must read a report in The Local (November 14th) by Betty James, tireless worker for the cause and a lively writer into the bargain. Her account of a visit by a party from the town’s twinning association to the little Normandy town last month is a delight to read and is evidence that they all thoroughly enjoyed themselves and their taste of Gallic hospitality is evident: “Bourne twinners were high in spirits but low in energy as they waved goodbye to their hosts for the train journey back [by coach and Eurostar] and it was not long before the majority were fast asleep. All this eating and drinking, dancing and singing, had taken its toll.” Undeterred and ready for more of the same, the association is now preparing to entertain a party from Doudeville which is expected in Bourne for a similar celebration at the end of May next year.

Thought for the week: Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under. – H L Mencken, American journalist and editor (1880-1956).

Saturday 22^nd November 2003

The memorial commemorating Bourne’s contribution to international motor racing and to Raymond Mays has been unveiled on a plot of land on the banks of the river in South Street. It is not as intrusive as was expected by some conservationists who objected to this site and no doubt they will learn to live with it.

Nevertheless, the intention is admirable in that it honours the work which was done in Bourne to put Britain ahead on the international racing circuits of the world and to remember one of our most famous sons who made it all possible, as the lengthy inscription indicates:

To commemorate the motor racing heritage of Bourne, celebrating the centenary of the birth of Raymond Mays CBE (1899-1980). A veritable giant of motor sport, he put the town on the world map of motor racing.

65 years of ERA (1934-1999)
These voiturette racers became renowned worldwide for success in the classes for which they were designed and built, successes which continued into the 21st century with historic events.

50 years of BRM (1949-1999)
The natural successor to the ERA, the BRM, was aimed at the Formula One World Championships in a determined effort to put British cars in the front line of racing. In 1962, Graham Hill OBE won the Formula One Drivers' World Championship in the P57/8 model. This brought the Formula One Constructors' World Championship to the town. Testament to the dedication and professionalism of a workforce comprised mainly of local people. The company was acquired by the Rubery Owen Group on November 1, 1952. Sir Alfred and Ernest Owen, along with their sister Jean Stanley, took much personal interest in its running. Mrs Stanley and husband Louis later assumed full management of the company.
On August 29, 1999, Bourne saw the return of the cars associated with the town. The occasion was marked with a celebration dinner and roads were closed off to allow demonstrations of the racing cars. This memorial was financed with the proceeds of this event.

The £10,000 raised therefore has covered the cost of the edifice and Bourne United Charities who own the land readily agreed to the project. As was envisaged, it can now be seen by visitors approaching the town from the south on the A15 and they will have ample opportunity of doing so because the traffic queues on this route lengthen daily as they reach the main traffic lights.

The memorial was officially unveiled on Sunday 16th November by David Owen and Louis Stanley, who both have a long standing connection with BRM through the Rubery Owen Group, and provides at long last a memorial to Raymond Mays who was cremated when he died in 1980 and his ashes were not preserved. There is therefore no tombstone in the town cemetery alongside those of his father and other members of his family although there is a metal plaque outside Eastgate House where he was born and which became his lifelong home and in the summer of 2002, a new perimeter road around the Elsea Park estate was named Raymond Mays Way. There is also a Raymond Mays Memorial Room in the nearby Heritage Centre, devoted to a display of photographs illustrating his career and a number of artefacts from his days on the race track.

It is to be hoped that this memorial will withstand wind and weather much better than the Ostler fountain, now badly in need of restoration after being exposed to the elements for almost 150 years. It was erected in 1860 to a then equally famous personality, John Lely Ostler, philanthropist and benefactor, but after standing in the market place, now the town centre, for 100 years, it was exiled to the cemetery where it now languishes uncared for and practically forgotten. The trustees of Bourne United Charities, who have a remit from the Charity Commission for England to provide money for conservation, our heritage and the environment, want nothing whatever to do with it and have turned down a scheme to give it a new lease of life on their property. Let us hope that when the time comes to clean and maintain the motor racing memorial, they do not adopt the same cavalier attitude and will be a little more charitable.

What the local papers are saying: The welcome news of the month is given front page treatment by The Local in an exclusive report (November 21st) that sanity has reigned and the town’s Post Office has been saved. Foolhardy plans to move it from the purpose-built premises in West Street fifty yards down the road to the back of a liquor store have been dropped following the appointment of a new postmistress who took over the business on Wednesday. The story is a particularly satisfying one for the newspaper which led the “Hands off our Post Office” campaign after the scheme was announced in January, raising 2,000 signatures from townspeople on a protest petition to the Post Office management. The decision also augurs well for the town because the new postmistress, Ms Elain Wells, said in an interview: “I know of the importance of such a facility, particularly with the planned growth of Bourne. Services will be increased in the New Year with new lighting and flooring and a general modernisation to make it much brighter. I also plan to introduce a help desk for anyone who has questions about the way pensions, benefits and some tax credits are paid. My ultimate aim is to continue this valuable service in our community.”

The future however, is not so rosy for the Butterfield Centre that provides day care, social activities and services for more than 200 elderly people. The amenity has been operating from the old hospital building in North Road for the past 15 years but has been dogged by financial problems and the Stamford Mercury reports (November 21st) that it will close in six months unless more funds are forthcoming. There have been similar alarms in the past but the centre has always survived. This time, the situation appears to be far more serious because the committee chairman, the Rev Derek Baines, says: “Over the past three years, we have been running at a deficit of almost £10,000. We did have reserves to keep us going but by the end of the year, they will be gone and the centre could close in 2004.”

I would have thought that the Bourne United Charities might help out. They are sitting on sufficient capital reserves to provide financial help that would solve the centre’s current problems which would appear to be well within their remit because the classification of their registration with the Charity Commission for England includes help for old people and grants to organisations such as this.

The Local also reports (November 21st) that a familiar sight has returned to the town centre with the erection of a huge Christmas tree outside the town hall to celebrate the coming festive season after being banished five years ago to the car park next to the Budgens supermarket, a location out of sight and out of mind. The move was ordered by the town council in 1998 because the tree was being vandalised but now it is back in its original position. The brightly lit tree always formed the centrepiece of the ceremony for switching on the Christmas lights, due to take place this year on Saturday 29th November at 3.45 pm. Many people criticised the move and demanded that it be brought back to its original position, including doughty campaigning councillor Marjorie Clark who said: “It is the central point for our Christmas celebrations. It catches the eye of anyone coming into the town from whichever direction. Not only I am pleased to have it back but a lot of other people have missed it too.”

Bourne has a long history of entertaining itself. Newspaper records from the 19th century reveal that readings and concerts took place most weeks and the participants were invariably local people, many of them prominent in public life and therefore unlikely seekers of the limelight. The variety show being organised by the Mayor of Bourne, Councillor Trevor Holmes, is therefore part of this tradition and augers well for an evening of family entertainment and fun in the old style when it is staged at the Corn Exchange on Saturday 21st February 2004.

The formula is a simple one, that of allowing those with talent, or those who think they have it, their chance on the stage, but let us first consider a similar theatrical event from past years, this presentation for instance, which was given on Monday 7th November 1892, as reported by the Stamford Mercury:

An entertainment was given in the new Baptist schoolroom [in West Street] on Monday evening to a very large audience. The following programme was well given: Overture “Zampa” (Herold), Mr A E K Wherry; song “Stranger’s Yet”, Miss Hardy; song “Down by the Sea”, Mr J H Berry; recitation, Mr F Saril; song “The Land of Dreams”, Mr G H Swift; song, Miss Mays; pianoforte duet “Les Huguenots” (Sydney Smith), Miss Mansfield and Mrs T N Wolstencroft; song “Heart of a Sailor”, Mr Leary; song “Santa Marie”, Miss Ellis; quartette “Crossing the Bar” (Tennyson), the Misses Mays and Messrs Leary and Stubley; recitation “Beautiful snow”, the Rev G H Bennett. All of the items were given a warm reception and a most enjoyable evening was had by all.

Our perception of entertainment has changed considerably since those dignified years of the Victorian period and no doubt the acts that will be presented next February will reflect the age in which we now live, pop and rock interlaced with some risqué humour. It will not appeal to everyone but even they are sure to be swept along by the enthusiasm of the occasion. Both solo and group performers have been invited to participate and if selected at rehearsals, they will be in the final line up for what might be called a Civic Command Performance in aid of the mayor’s fund for youth activities, the chosen charity project to mark his year in office.

The variety show looks like being a night to remember and is open to all age groups and abilities and so if you feel that you might be sufficiently talented to take part, then you will find further details on the web site Notice Board.

The sale of medicines is strictly regulated by law and it is illegal to buy controlled drugs without a doctor’s prescription. Legislation, largely drawn up during the 20th century, was introduced to safeguard the public when buying and being prescribed medicines although 100 years ago, the rules were more relaxed and so mistakes often happened.

In 1907, William Palmer, aged 62, was found dead in bed at his home in Stanley Street, Bourne, on Thursday 7th February. He was later identified by Mrs Mary Ann Daff, of West Road, as her brother. She told an inquest which was held at the Town Hall the following Saturday: “When I left him on Wednesday night, he seemed alright but when I went down next day, the door was locked and I could not get in. My nephew was with me and he got in through the window but we found him quite dead.”

Susannah Gribble, a neighbour, told the hearing that Palmer had been suffering from a bad cold and when she left him on Wednesday night, he said that he intended to see the doctor the following morning. Dr James Watson-Burdwood said in evidence that he had frequently attended Palmer and he would think that he had died from acute bronchitis and heart disease.

Edgar Harvey Judge, MPS [Member of the Pharmaceutical Society], a chemist, of North Street, said that Palmer had come to him and asked for medicine and he gave him an 8 oz. bottle of mixture. The coroner, Dr Augustus Greenwood, asked Judge if he was allowed by law to prescribe to customers and he replied that he was not and the coroner warned him: “I advise you then not to prescribe for anyone else in future.”

Summing up, the coroner said: “With regard to the medicine, I have seen the prescription and I find that it did Palmer no harm and no good. But I think the public ought to know that when they go to a chemist and ask him to prescribe a medicine, the chemist is running a serious risk if he does so.”

The jury returned a verdict in accordance with the medical testimony but Judge was incensed by the coroner’s remarks and consulted his professional organisation, the Pharmaceutical Society [membership was purely voluntary until the passing of the Pharmacy and Poisons Act, 1933], with the result that a statement appeared in the Chemist and Druggist magazine the following week:

It is much to be regretted that the coroner’s remarks have been published [by the Stamford Mercury] without qualification, thereby reflecting unnecessarily upon a chemist who, in prescribing, did not exceed the rights accorded to every citizen of this realm. There is no liability under the Apothecaries Act for prescribing; the offence under the statute is diagnosing disease and prescribing a remedy. Such professional service on the part of chemists we do not attempt to justify or defend but we do most strongly protest against unnecessary remarks in regard to lawful prescribing, especially when evidence shows (as in the present case) that it has not contributed in the slightest to deaths under inquiry.

Thought for the Week: Average household debt in the United Kingdom is £6,800, excluding mortgages, but almost a quarter of people do not realise how much they owe. In addition, 23% of Britons are relying on credit to meet day-to-day expenses. – report from the Office of Fair Trading (OFT), Wednesday 19th November 2003.

Saturday 29^th November 2003

Many people with a private pension provision have felt the effects of the crisis in the financial industry this year and those who have been prudent in planning for their retirement have had a rude awakening. Policy holders with Equitable Life have already lost one third of their pensions and bigger cuts are likely in the New Year. Many of the other big insurance and endowment institutions have slashed payments while one in four of the companies in the United Kingdom have closed their final salary pension schemes to new staff.

A variety of reasons have been given for this worrying trend such as stock market falls and additional tax burdens imposed by central government but the overall effect has been the same: to reduce the expectations of those who were planning for their retirement or who are now trying to reap the benefits of their savings from past years.

It is therefore surprising that South Kesteven District Council is planning to increase its pensions liability by introducing a scheme for councillors based on the allowances they receive. The 58 elected members can currently claim a basic payment of £3,312 but there is extra cash for those with special responsibilities, cabinet members for instance, and this can push their take home pay up to more than £10,000 a year, although the leader gets £15,000 and the deputy leader £12,000. The new proposals, which are made under the Local Government Pension Scheme, are recommended for approval by John Blair, the council’s head of finance, who wants to start paying for it in the budget for 2004-05 when it will cost councillors 6% of their payments while the authority, as their employer, contributes 16.2%. But this scheme has many worrying implications and all of them against it.

A pension needs many years of contributions to mature with any substantial gain and therefore the scheme assumes that councillors will be holding office for a long period, a reflection of the current system in which the same old faces line the council chamber year after year which is not good for democracy. The other is that most are old and retired and are already drawing a private pension from another source or were self-employed and made adequate provision for their old age.

The scheme would therefore appear to be totally inappropriate for elected councillors who have the power to raise their allowances when they wish. In fact, the first thing the councillors on SKDC did after the local elections last May was to give themselves a pay rise, pushing their allowances up by 3.5%, an increase well above the rate of inflation and which is now costing £250,000 a year. A pension scheme for them will increase spending at a time when council tax is rising dramatically year after year and home owners are likely to face yet another massive increase in April. There is also the question of those councillors who are members of another local authority, the county council for instance, who will no doubt be involved in this scheme, and it is hardly right that they should suddenly become eligible for two pensions, both subsided by public money.

The council should be looking to reduce its expenditure and not introduce schemes such as this which feather-bed those very people who are either in well paid jobs or enjoying secure retirement while one of the most financially insecure sections of our society, the old age pensioners, are having to reduce living standards because of a perpetual erosion of their pensionable income while at the same time they struggle to pay bills that are rising at two and three times the rate of inflation. The 58 elected members of SKDC are to vote on this issue and it is to be hoped that they do the right thing and reject it on practical, ethical and moral grounds. The electors will be watching and waiting in the expectation that they do the right thing.

What the local papers are saying: Public disaffection with the police grows daily and a front page story in the Lincolnshire Free Press will concern those who fear that they no longer enjoy their protection from wrongdoers (November 25th). Officers took 35 minutes to arrive at a shop where a man wielding a carving knife was threatening customers and staff after the shopkeeper had dialled 999 and then locked the doors to keep him at bay. But the explanation from Lincolnshire police for their late arrival is quite astonishing. The newspaper quotes a spokesperson as saying: “A risk assessment which can take time is carried out before officers are sent in to deal with armed incidents. We have to establish exactly what is happening so that we can assess the action to take. We cannot just allow the officers to turn up individually and attempt to tackle a dangerous situation. For a start, we have to get all the mobiles to the scene and the amount of time that takes depends on where they are. Secondly, we have to arrange a rendezvous point so that they can decide what action to take because if they all go in separately, the situation is made worse. Obviously people who live in the village were concerned and rightly so but we do have guidelines to follow to ensure incidents are dealt with safely and no one is hurt.” In other words, the public can remain at risk and even in danger of their lives until the police have had a meeting to ensure that they will be quite safe. I would have thought that this illustration of police procedures required a statement from the chief constable in an attempt to restore some vestige of public confidence.

The Local leads its latest edition with a second exclusive in two weeks (November 28th). Last Friday, editor Angela Lowe was first with the news that the Post Office in West Street has been saved and now she gives front page treatment to the announcement that the public toilets in South Street are to be re-opened in a month’s time. Thus ends a long-running dispute with South Kesteven District Council which began in October 2002 when the loos were closed without warning on the pretext that they were being vandalised and becoming a haunt of paedophiles. The agreed solution is the same as that which I suggested in this column earlier this year (Diary February 22nd), that we follow the example of Market Deeping that faced a similar situation but solved it by taking over control of the lavatories from South Kesteven District Council. Bourne Town Council has agreed to do the same with the district council providing the £15,530 needed to open both the public toilets in South Street and those at the bus station, together with maintenance and supervision. The new arrangement was aptly summed up by the Mayor, Councillor Trevor Holmes, who told the newspaper: “We have the opportunity to give the people what they want: a return to sanity.” Indeed so, and we wonder why it took them so long.

The Stamford Mercury follows up its story last week about the financial plight of the Butterfield Centre with front page backing for a £10,000 appeal to ensure that it remains open (November 28th). The centre provides day care, social activities and services for more than 200 elderly people, operating from the old hospital building in North Road for the past 15 years, but has been dogged by financial problems and the latest crisis means that it may have to close in six months unless more funds are forthcoming. The newspaper’s campaign “Backing the Butterfield” is supported with a two page inside photo-feature detailing the work of the centre in which reporter Christian March says: “Dedicated volunteers and staff work tirelessly to make sure the people at the Butterfield get the services they need. Whether it’s cooking meals, picking people up or taking them home, doing shopping for the housebound or calling out the bingo, staff make sure the people there are as happy and comfortable as possible.”

After reading this feature, even the most heartless among us would agree that this amenity must be kept open and it is to be hoped that the necessary money can be found to ensure that it continues to provide a lifeline for a vulnerable section of our society. I suggested last week that Bourne United Charities might help out because a grant which they could well afford is within their remit but there has been no response from the trustees whose policy towards the general public appears to be one of total silence. Their image would suffer even further if it were thought that they did not consider the Butterfield Centre a worthy cause.

The big green box in the side passage has now been joined by a big blue one. These plastic containers have been supplied free of charge by South Kesteven District Council as part of their £250,000 waste recycling scheme which began in January and I hope that householders are not becoming confused.

Just in case it is all getting too much for you, the big green box is for cans and tins, plastic bottles, newspapers and magazines, junk mail, holiday brochures, cardboard, textiles and shoes, but do not use it for discarded knives and hypodermic needles, while margarine tubs, yoghurt pots, waxed milk cartons, polystyrene food trays, egg boxes, cling film, aluminium foil, are also banned. Glass is out, too. Please use the public bottle banks, we were told. That is until the arrival of the big blue box. You may now breathe a sigh of relief because the council list for acceptable waste includes glass bottles and jars of all shapes, colour and sizes but please don’t use it for Pyrex dishes, kitchenware, windows, windscreens and light bulbs.

Why not keep a list of the stuff you can and cannot put in the green and blue bins on the back of the kitchen door to prompt you each time you pop outside to make a deposit? You may need such a reminder because more big boxes may well be on the way. Dawn Temple, the council’s recycling officer, tells us: “This is another step in extending full recycling services across the district as time goes on.” A recent innovation in house building is the introduction of the double garage because homeowners are fast becoming two-car families. With all of these recycling containers we are being asked to maintain, perhaps the developers might consider adding an extra side passage.

The fish and chip debate: The use of newspapers to wrap our national dish of fish and chips has provoked a lively discussion in the Bourne Forum and I devoted some of this column to the subject earlier this month (November 15th), coming out firmly in favour of the habit which did us no harm during the 1930s and 1940s, despite the concerns of the present day food police and hygiene fanatics. Those with similar views are in good company and although the American President George W Bush and Tony Blair had theirs on a plate with mushy peas when they visited a pub in the Prime Minister’s constituency at Sedgefield, County Durham, last week, we are reliably informed by The Spectator (November 22nd) that in private, Mr Blair loves “an honest British newspaperful of fish and chips”. So there we have it. What is good for our leader should be good for us.

For the record: This is my 250th diary. It has appeared almost continually every week for the past five years with an average length of 2,000 words, a total of half a million words which is a sizeable archive, containing a commentary on life and events in and around Bourne since I began writing it on 28th November 1998. Not every entry has been well received because some of my opinions have been controversial and have not met with universal approval. But in the absence of any other personal and published record of this period, this will become part of the history of this town when I have gone because the eight volumes the hardback copies now occupy will be lodged in a safe place for those who come after to read and discover what life in Bourne was like in years past.

This form of social history is far more attractive than a dull list of dates and events because it was recorded as it happened and therefore carries more credence for those investigating the life and times of past centuries from dusty records. The entire Diary is still available on the web site and if you are seeking a particular subject, then please use the Search engine. It is quite surprising how things have changed over the years and, in many respects, how they have not and that many of the old problems persist. But despite this, I hope that my observations have interested or infuriated you sufficiently to keep logging on in the future.

Thought for the week: South Kesteven District Council is about to embark on a consultation process to determine the key priorities of the community so they can drive the services of the council over the next ten years. This will provide an ideal opportunity for residents of the district who have concerns over any matters to make their voices heard. - Duncan Kerr, the council’s new chief executive, quoted by the Stamford Mercury on Friday 21st November 2003.

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