2024 Minutes Parish Council

Wainfleet St Mary Parish Council,

Annual Parish Meeting Monday 13th May 2024

Minutes of the Annual Parish Meeting of Wainfleet St Mary held in

The Community Hall at 5pm on Monday 13th May 2024.

The meeting was attended by one member of the Public and the full 9 members of the Council together with the Clerk and the ELDC/LCC Councillor W Bowkett.

Cllr M Rust, Chair of the Parish Council, presided.

Welcome and Apologies – The Chairman welcomed Councillors and the public to the meeting.

Chairman’s Introduction and report - Cllr M Rust read out his detailed Annual Report to the meeting and thanked all Councillors, Officers and Volunteers for their work and contribution over the last year.

Chairman’s report – Annual Parish Meeting Monday 13th May 5pm

We keep building on what we achieve each year and hopefully make the parish of Wainfleet St Mary a nicer place to live.

The Lunch Club goes from strength to strength and as last year we are having to restrict numbers as it is so popular. It promotes the use of the Hall and brings in funds to update and maintain the building. This club has helped in purchasing a new cooker with other fund raising events in the hall and field which have been well attended and supported.

Partnership between the Hall Committee and the Council have been able to apply for funding in the form of grants to help with events such as the Village Show which was a great success and the second is planned for Sunday September 1st. Thank you to the volunteers who put a lot of their time into organising these events and to those who put together the fundings bids. Without these people these events would not be able to go ahead so a big thank you to you all.

The Low Road Jubilee Orchard has developed and grown into a lovely area to sit and reflect along with a new bench on the corner of Low Road and St Michael’s Lane.

This year we have been able to purchase through further grant aid and donations a sound system, a cinematic screen and projector which will be used for the benefit of the Community. We have also purchased through grant funding a large marquee available for use by the community and any groups who wish to avail themselves of it.

Last November, as a Council, we organised the first Remembrance Service at St Mary’s Parish Church for the Wainfleet and District RBL which was well attended with good feedback – a service will be held there again this year.

Grants and Donations for WSM were:

UKSPF Funding for the Jubilee Orchard - £2952.00

National Grid donated £700 towards the Orchard

National Lottery Awards for All granted £7750 towards the Village Show.

The Lunch Club benefited from a £2000 social isolation grant

ELDC/LCC Councillor W Bowkett donated a £500 community grant to the Woodthorpe Christmas Lunch and coach hire.

Platform Kindness funded £400 for Tea with Santa for the community.

Wainfleet Community Hall (formerly the OAP Hall) donated the Jubilee bench sited on the Orchard at a cost of £1300.

Not all grant applications are successful and the bid for the D Day celebrations was turned down which makes us all the more appreciative of those that are approved. The commemoration will be funded by the Hall Committee with support from the Parish Council.

Thank you, Clive, for your ongoing support and development of the Jubilee Orchard – and Barry for your continued clean up of the Parish on your walks and the massive hep in the creation of extra storage space in the Hall – Pat for your continued support in everything you do quietly and efficiently – to Cyd for your event arranging and the knowledge of how to get them off the ground – to Christine for your administrative knowledge and finding and applying for funding grants – Iain for your ideas and organising them to fruition – to Mike we welcome you aboard and look forward to having your ideas and style as you find your feet within the Council and are pleased to have you as part of the team. Can we also give a big thank you to Sue Simpson and Jan for their commitment in enabling the purchase of this wonderful Hall. And a special thank you to Maureen from everyone around the table for everything you do over and above. We very much appreciate it.

And thank you to everyone who has supported me during the period of my role as Chair. I have done this to the best of my abilities and wish the next Chair my very best wishes..

District and County Councillor Reports – Chair M Rust had received the report from Cllr WB and read out.

 Lincolnshire County Councillor and East Lindsey District Councillor - Wendy Bowkett Annual Report.

It has been a pleasure as always to work with you and the parish over the past year How quickly the months go by.

You may have seen the recent announcement for the new NHS Community Diagnostic Centre, which is being built in Skegness. This is an exciting development for our health service along the coast and will mean tests such as MRI, Ct and non – obstetric ultrasound can be done locally rather than having to travel to hospitals further away. It is one of 2 that are being built the other is in Lincoln, it will see investment of 38 million and I am really grateful that Skegness was chosen.

Highways fixed 110,532 potholes in 2023, repaired 224 miles of roads, rebuilt 77 miles of footpath, and cleaned 192,235 drains. County council have added a further £19 million of extra money to the highways budget and Government have promised £253 million from the HS2 fund.

Highways have started their first grass cut of the highways verges this will take place from the 22nd April to 28th May. Further cuts will take place from the 10thJune and the 12th July and 2nd September to the 4th October. Two weed treatments will also take place the first has commenced it started on the 15th April to the 28th June and the second will be from the 8th July to the 20th September.

The heavy rain continues and in October we sadly saw many more properties and land flooded across the county Unfortunately 5 properties were flooded in and around Wainfleet. These were caused by a mix of river over topping and surface water flooding. In the past 18 months we have seen 5 ½ feet of rainfall which is an incredible amount, and still many fields are still sodden and will struggle to grow crops this year.

The section 19 reports are being processed for the last two storms in October and January and should be concluded by August This will determine the cause of every property flooded in the county. The results will come to the flood scrutiny committee at the county council.

The County Council have committed a further £4 million to help in flood prevention around the county, this will ensure all drains are jetted regularly and kept clear, which will help in reducing surface flooding.

I continue to sit on the River Steeping group, and we continue to meet to look at what further can be done to improve both channels in the future, along with the work maintenance for the year for the river.

Lincolnshire county council and the EA are working hard to fix the Pinfold and the footpath and railings. LCC and EA officers are working together and as soon as the plan is available I will share it with you.

The Call Connect App is now available, you can now book your journey online and all for £2 for each journey. The £2 journey also applies to the service buses.

Lincolnshire County Council are looking at ways to further support and encourage bus travel in Lincolnshire. We are gathering resident's views to help plan further improvements as part of the latest County Views survey. We want to know how often residents travel by bus, what would encourage you to use it more often, what they like and dislike. The county views survey can be completed on www.letstalk.lincolnshire.gov.uk/buses. Paper copies can be found in the County news which is delivered to your homes and can be returned via free post.

Please get in touch with me any time either by email CllrW.Bowkett@lincolnshire.gov.uk or call me on 07917494478.

Finance report – The Clerk read out the detailed annual finance reports giving a full account of monies received and submissions ready for the Annual Governance statement.

Public Suggestions and Concerns

A suggestion was received to purchase a St George’s Flag for flying April 23rd on St George’s Day.

The idea was taken on board and Cllr MR undertook to consider a planned calendar of dates and flags to be flown at the Hall.

Illegal burning of waste within the village was also raised with reports going to Environmental Health who are monitoring the situation with a view to enforcement action as required. Any evidence of burning – such as photographs with a date and time can be forwarded to the Clerk who will pass to ELDC Environmental as evidence for action.

Public discussion.

Close of Meeting – Chair M Rust thanked everyone for contributing and closed the meeting at 17.45.