Withington Group Parish Council
Meeting Held on Wednesday 9th September 2026
At 7.30pm in Withington Village Hall
DRAFT M I N U T E S
Present: In the Chair: Paul Andrews (PA); Jonathan Beech (JB); Barclay Rogers (BR); Hillary Holden (HH); Ingrid Heatly (IH); Judith Howe (JH); Ralph Barber (RB); Steve Scotcher (SS);
Also: Sophie Glover (Clerk), Ivan Powell (Ward Cllr); attended from 7.30 to 8.0pm
5 members of the public, one of whom left after item 1 and a further 2 left at 9pm
The Meeting opened at 7.30pm
1. Public open session: 10 minutes was allowed from 7.30pm for members of the public to raise any issues that they would like the Parish Council to consider.
5 members of the public
A member of the public said that the large goal posts had been taken down but had not been put securely. Young people were playing with them and acting dangerously with them. As the posts have been removed the football now all happens very close to the fence to the houses. Because the football is played on the childrens pitch, the adults also use that area when they play at weekends. He asked for a little consideration in moving the playing further away as he is now getting footballs in his garden and he feels that his conservatory and green house is at real risk. He has also addressed the need for the club to paint the containers, which are now looking a real mess.
Action: The Chair is in the process of arranging a meeting with the chair of the FC to talk about their intentions. He will bring up these issues at the same time.
Another parishioner is once again having nuisance issues with voices being raised in the coppice. He said that things had been better in the last 6 weeks but recently they have deteriorated again. He has also expressed frustration towards the residents association lead who doesn’t respond to emails or phone calls. The WGPC have sent a letter to him (by recorded delivery) but have not heard anything since.
Action: Clerk to send another recorded letter to push for a response, ask for a meeting with the PC.
A Crosskeys parishioner asked if there were any plans to extend the traffic control all the way to the main road. The Chair explained that we would have to raise a TRO and there is a cost to doing this. The Chair suggested that the gentleman writes to the clerk if he wants to be cc’d in on future development in the village.
2. To accept Apologies for absence – Howard Mansell (HM); Vikki Brown (VB)
Absent with out apologies : Bob Rudd (BR); Sue Rudd (SR)
3. Declarations of interest – None
4. i Acceptance of minutes of Parish Council meeting –July 2026
Proposed: BR Seconded: RB
The minutes were approved as an accurate depiction of the meeting.
ii. Actions from previous meetings: addressed or on this agenda apart from:-
– Co-option of new Councillor The Chair told the meeting that Kevin Powders had resigned. He thanked him for the excellent work that he had done, particularly with the SID and on the WF working group.
5. Open discussion/public forum including
5.1 Report from Ward Councillor – Cllr Ivan Powell including responses to his action points. IP had provided a detailed report which is attached to the end of these minutes.
– Townsend Farm Barns, Westhide. – update on the visit from enforcement. IP has been talking with enforcement and he is waiting for further information.
– Update on the data collected from speed strips on Withies Rd and by Radway Bridge. Ian Connolly has suggested that the data from these speed strips is now dated and more up to date data should be collected.
– Lack of action by police regarding SID information.
Action: IP will try and identify who would now be the best point of contact in the SNT team now that Stefan has left.
PA requested that IP visited the house on the corner of Springfield as his pots prevent him parking on his drive and he parks right on the corner of the road, which is causing a problem to residents.
Action: IP to talk to home owner.
Gregg Speller is back at Herefordshire Council for now. He is liaising with HM about the remaining works on the traffic speeding works. The assessment for the school ramp has been completed and Gregg is now in talks with the school bursar to progress this job.
Emergency response planning – the school needs early notification if there is going to be a water outage or their solution so that the school knows that they can in fact open. IP has linked them with the department at Welsh Water who should be able to facilitate this early notification.
5.2 Report from local police – update regularly through Neighbourhood Matters emails – although these are generic and not specific to our parishes.
6. Planning: To consider comments on applications to be determined by Herefordshire Council as listed below or on the Herefordshire Council Planning website prior to the meeting:-
6.1 Applications:
P261306: Marshfield Farm Nursery, Cross Keys: Two storey side extension. It was decided that the Parish Council did not need to comment.
6.2 Planning decisions made:
261431 – All Pay, change of conditions for the railway carriages:Approved.
262204 – Prior Approval for Thinghill Court, Withington. 2 new steel portal framed agricultural buildings – prior approval not required.
7. Finance:
a) Balances: Parish @ 01.09.26: £16,083.29; WF acct @ 01.09.26: £4,000.79
CCLA savings account @ 01.09.26: £16,390.90
Balances verified by HH at the meeting.
b) To approve payments :
Payments were put forward for payment: Also including a payment from the Parish Account to Herefordshire Council for bins September to December for a total of £205.14
Proposed: RB Seconded:BR
Action: Clerk to make payments as agreed.
PC approved of getting the clerk a mobile phone for WGPC business. Clerk to proceed with this- given spending approval of £150 to £180.
The clerk left the meeting: there was a discussion about HALCs recommendation that the PC should implement a 3.3% pay increase for the clerk, to be backdated to 1st April 2026.
All were in approval of this.
The clerk was invited back to the meeting where she was asked to action this resolution.
Action: Clerk to contact the payroll agency to implement this.
c) Acceptance of Receipts :
d) Applications for financial aid: None at this time.
8. Withington Fields. Including – update on the toilets, football pitch and the copse.
In order to address the vandalism and troublemaking in the copse, the placement of Trail Cameras had been suggested. The Chair added that he thought that the police might have an alternative and he will follow this up.
Action: Chair to talk with the SNT team
9. Working Parties –
a) on A4103/A465.
The Chair suggested that local residents should be approached in Crosskeys to see what road improvements they would like to see on their roads.
b) School access working group. IH had nothing more to add to IP’s update.
c) Traffic calming in Withington – including update on additional SID & placements. Traffic speeding on Duke St (2 x parishoners letters), Crosskeys. New highway safety plan being considered.
d) Withington Field working group – to include asking residents what they would like on the field. The meeting decided to tie this in to when we do the housing plan consultation.
e) NDP: update on the current status of the WGPC NDP. We still need to know the housing numbers, and is Preston Wynne/ Westhide still going to be classed as open countryside ? Action: Clerk to address question to planning dept
10. Welsh Water update: their report was circulated at the end of August.
Action: Clerk to invite them to the annual meeting in 2027 to revisit the situation in the three parishes.
11. New Councillors – we are now short of 3 Councillors, soon to be 4 in Withington with a councillor moving away. Discussion and resolution of Amending Cllr numbers in our Articles.
HALC had informed the clerk that the process to amend Councillor numbers, but the meeting resolved that the idea should be deferred until after decisions had been made as to whether Preston Wynne and Westhide were remaining in our group parish.
12. Lengthsman Scheme – Notification of jobs completed and those to be done.
The meeting were unhappy with the billing process of the current lengthsman, feeling that we were not necessarily getting value for money. The lengthsman knows and the PC are aware that we are retendering for a lengthsman in the next financial year. Value for money as well as ability to undertake the work that we require will be considerations.
13. Footpath officers reports and identification of work to be done. The meeting asked the clerk to push the lengthsman to actually do the footpath jobs from Withington that have been identified for over 2 years now – by end of September or we will approach other people to do this work.
Action: Clerk to contact the lengthsman
IH asked if landowners were allowed to plough up footpaths? The farmers on the PC explained that the land could be ploughed and reseeded and then should be mowed to reinstate the footpath.
14. Discussion and resolution whether to accept the Herefordshire Council Local Resolution Order: circulated to cllrs in June and last week.
It was agreed that we would continue to work with the Herefordshire process of dealing with conflicts. A general comment was made that the Parish Charter the parish signed up to this in March this year, but, often we don’t get any response from the council when we do raise questions – see the NDP question above.
15. Items raised from last meeting:
Community Speedwatch: still no expressions of interest from parishoners.
16. WGPC emergency plan: Discussion as to the PC’s need or otherwise to do this.
The Chair reminded the meeting that the PC has provided the sand shed and sand bags, and in the recent floods we were able to assist with emergencies. It was felt that until we have a HC contact we don’t need to progress this further.
17. Town and Parish Council survey: Discussion and decision on the WGPC response.
The meeting went through the questions and the clerk will submit their form as advised.
18. SID: update and feed back from the last couple of months data.
The WGPC are collecting the data, but feel that no action is then being taken with the information. With the resignation of KP, RB has taken over responsibility for gathering this date for meetings going forward.
Action: Clerk to stand the lengthsman down from turning the SID until January and then only every 6 months. RB to supply SID information to the November meeting.
19. Items received in correspondence, including:
-Creation of Pickleball court lineage – WGPC have no objection to the MUGA being used in this way. The proposed Pickleball Club would need to manage it all themselves.
-HALC 10 things we need to know. All agreed to clerks pay increase and for this to be back dated.
-Parishoners complaint about footballs being kicked against his fence. This was addressed at the start of the meeting.
-The parishoners comments regarding the EIA at Thinghill Solar Farm were noted.
-Venue in the village for items to be swapped. This item was not discussed further as the cllr who had raised it had left the meeting.
20. Feedback on training or meetings attended. To include feedback from Solar Farm open event. Most who had attended felt that the event was a complete waste of time and that the organisation was poorly prepared and those present were unaware of local issues. It was felt that this had been organised soley as a ‘tick box’ exercise.
21. Items for Face book site and/or social media for WGPC. Advertise for new councillors. Parish magazine has finished: would any one like to be involved going forward, Action: clerk to contact all pay to see if they will still do or will continue to fund the printing?
22. Receive items for the next agenda – (no discussion) Precept setting meeting.
23. Agree time, date and venue of next meeting. The next Parish Council Meeting will be on 11th November 2026 at Withington Village Hall starting at 7.30pm Finance working group to meet to discuss precept on Tuesday 3rd November at 6pm.
Meeting closed at 9.25
Appendix 1.
Ward Councillors Report:
Hagley Ward (WGPC) report September 2026
Withington Group Parish Council matters
I include in this report my updates on outstanding actions identified in this evening’s agenda.
At the July 2026 meeting Cllr Howe asked me to provide a precis of the process for redirection. This I completed and sent to the Clerk for circulation on 9th July 2026.
Cllr Howe also enquired about the correspondence between the planning agent in respect of the land at Townsend Farm and I (representing the parish concerns) was, as the response did not appear to be on the planning portal.
The planning officer responded directly to the clerk explaining it could be accessed under the supporting documents section.
Cllr Howe also asked the Clerk to report a certain apparent breach of planning conditions matter at Westhide to the enforcement team which happened. It remains a live case and I have asked the investigating officer for an update.
Data collection Withies Road and Radway Bridge
The advice from the police road safety officer given time span was to ask Herefordshire Council to do the traffic monitoring again so pre and post road surfacing works could be compared. This appears not to have been actioned so I have done so this week (commencing 7th September 2026).
Lack of action by police regarding SID information
Road safety officer states he did brief the safer neighbourhoods team, but he is not accountable for supervising the delivery of any enforcement actions. The SNT has seen a change of staff so I will rebuild our relationship with that team including action on what the SID intelligence is showing.
I think we should have a brief discussion about who holds (in this case) police accountable for delivery. The parish and my requests to them are on behalf of our residents based on information we receive and have available but they are not democratically accountable to us, that route is via the police and crime commissioner.
Matters such as the SID data of course should not need escalating via that route, so it is a matter I will pick up with police commanders on behalf of the parish. I am sure you will reflect that the parish and I were assured of the police response to the recent incidents of concern in the coppice.
Parking at Springfields and Greenfields is no longer an issue as far as I am aware I visited one resident and discussed his concerns. We did discuss options but he did not wish me/the parish to take any further action. The locality steward has also visited and does not believe there are any parking issues.
Section 106
I have met with Gregg Speller who in turn has been in contact with Cllr Mansell to discuss plans for some of the outstanding works in Vine Tree Close.
The feasibility works for the rear school entrance have completed, concluding there was a good likelihood the project was achievable in the available space. Since that time Gregg Speller is in contact with the school bursar and the school’s identified contractor to move to design and accurate costings.
Section 106/SID consideration
I have confirmed today 8th September 2026, the flashing lights are ‘in stock’ and ordered and being processed through for completion I do not have an exact completion date.
Height and weight restrictions Nunnington.
My most recent update is that I was advised by the officer that the Statutory Consultation was due to be issued week ending 24th April 2026.
I have again chased for the current position.
Welsh Water – emergency response planning
I continue to work on a local response plan with Welsh Water and with particular regard to the primary school, I have connected Welsh Water and the school bursar directly to enable appropriate discussion on meeting the schools needs to occur.
Ivan Powell
Ward Councillor