Request for help
Please look out for our cat who has been missing from Monks Close since Monday. We are very concerned for her and would really appreciate if members of the community could look out for her
With thanks,
Sharon Rasmussen (07846470051)
Author Archive: dorchadmin
Dorchester Surgery Car service
If you need help to visit Berinsfield Surgery, make an appointment for a forthcoming Wednesday morning. Mention that you will be using the Dorchester Surgery Car service. Then call Dorchester Fireplaces on 01865 341452 before 2pm on the Tuesday before the appointment. Give them your address and phone number. Dorchester Fireplaces will notify the volunteer who will collect you at 10.00am from your home and take you to the surgery.
Dorchester Fireplaces Showroom is open 10am to 4pm Tuesday to Saturday.
Intriguing and Surprising Themes in Medieval Illuminated Manuscripts
Intriguing and Surprising Themes in Medieval Illuminated Manuscripts (Dorchester Historical Society)
Professor Gregory Stores
Wednesday 22nd February 2017
7.30 p.m. Village Hall (back room)
Members Free
Visitors Welcome (£3.00)
Neighbourhood watch – Making our community safer
It has been brought to our attention that we didn’t have any information on the neighbourhood watch scheme running in the village. Therefore we have created a new neighbourhood watch page where you can go to and post relevant concerns you might have, and may also list recent articles.
Below is also an introduction to the neighbourhood watch
Neighbourhood Watch is a national association run in cooperation with the Police. It was formed in the early 1980’s and has existed in the village for much of that time. It has a simple aim – To Make Communities Safer.
The village scheme currently comprises in excess of 20 individual schemes, each headed by a coordinator responsible for circulating relevant information to those households within each scheme. They cover the length and breadth of the village, although there are inevitable gaps – in some cases entire streets; in others, just parts of the longer ones. Approximately 60% of the village is currently covered.
Neighbourhood Watch operates at a number of levels:
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In conjunction with the Thames Valley Police unit at Abingdon, from where messages are sent by email or telephone to our coordinators, are reviewed for relevance to our village, and then forwarded to households.
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Within individual village schemes, where local information is exchanged between households, i.e. simple neighbourliness.
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Across the village, where something arising in one part of the village may also be relevant to other parts of the village.
It is possible to access “Thames Valley Alerts” direct from source (i.e. without necessarily having to be a member of one of the village schemes) by logging onto the Thames Valley Alert website www.thamesvalleyalert.co.uk , taking the “Join” option and then working through the simple registration process.
Open Spaces Society news release from meeting
Update: We have just uploaded the 2 evidence questionnaires onto the site if you would like to download and share your experience and memories of the 2 areas. Please complete, and email in to rightsofwaydot@gmail.com
Below is a news release from the Open Spaces Society since the meeting in our village hall last week.
PACKED VILLAGE HALL FOR LAUNCH OF CAMPAIGN FOR DORCHESTER’S PATHS AND OPEN SPACES
The village hall at Dorchester on Thames in Oxfordshire was packed on Tuesday evening (10 January) for the launch of the village’s campaign to preserve the footpaths and open access to the historic Dyke Hills and Day’s Lock Meadow close to the River Thames.
Kate Ashbrook, general secretary of the Henley-based Open Spaces Society,(1) which backs the campaign, and Dorchester resident Becky Waller spoke at the 180-strong public meeting. They called on residents of Dorchester, Little Wittenham and other nearby villages to join the crusade.
A new landowner, UKIP’s former treasurer Mr Andrew Reid of Bishop’s Court Farm, has erected fencing across paths which people have used for decades; he has enclosed footpaths and restricted access to popular open spaces.
Local people are gathering evidence of use of green spaces at the eastern end of the ancient Dyke Hills and by the Thames at Day’s Lock Meadow, to apply for them to be registered as village greens. This would protect the land for ever and give local people legal rights of recreation there.(2)
They will also apply for paths to be added to Oxfordshire County Council’s official map of public paths and thus recognised as public highways.
Said Kate Ashbrook: ‘We deplore the mass of ugly fencing which has been festooned across the paths and green spaces in this beautiful landscape, and we welcome the campaign to record people’s long-held rights to enjoy these historic paths and spaces alongside the River Thames.
‘We look forward to helping the local people to record their rights so that they are protected for ever more.’
1 The Open Spaces Society was founded in 1865 and is Britain’s oldest national conservation body. It campaigns to protect common land, village greens, open spaces and public paths, and people’s right to enjoy them.
2 Town and village greens can be any land which has been enjoyed by local people for 20 years, without being stopped or asking permission. Once registered with the county council the land is protected by section 12 of the Inclosure Act 1857 and section 29 of the Commons Act 1876, and local people have rights of recreation there.