MOST PEOPLE don’t like speed cameras. Getting caught doing 37mph in an empty village street at midnight seems so unjust. Some cameras like the one on Rushmere Road are on hills, so to keep to 30mph on that road you have to brake continually all the way from the top of the hill. On motorways […]

AMONG THE LIST of subsidised buses under threat shown in the Chronicle and Echo recently was the No. 12A. It will end on 8 May. This is a night bus from the town centre to Camp Hill. The last No. 12 bus leaves the bus station at 18.45. The 12A then provides four additional buses for […]

THERE ARE some rumours going round West Hunsbury about the No. 28 bus: A bus driver was reported as saying that the service was going to end in May Someone else was going to announce that the bus had been saved for certain, at least until 5th September. But neither statement is true! The simple […]

TALK ABOUT  adding insult to injury. The Conservative County Council have cut lollipop ladies and gentlemen; they have cut grants to many voluntary groups, they have cut 900 jobs, but the unkindest cut of all is probably one of the smallest. Companion travellers who accompany people who are entitled to a free bus pass have […]

THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT LibDem Group has just produced a leaflet “Delivering Localism – how Liberal Democrats in Government are helping to set councils free”. You can read it here. Rt Hon Nick Clegg MP, Leader of the Liberal Democrats and Deputy Prime Minister says in his introduction: “Our Party, more than any other, is built […]

PEOPLE in Northampton are  always moaning about local buses. They frequently blame “The Council”. I’m only going to say this once…..the council no longer runs the bus service. When it’s bad it’s not the council’s fault. Mrs Thatcher privatised the council’s buses. They were sold off for much less than they were worth, creating several […]

READERS may be aware of the unpopular decision by the Conservative-led County Council to site a waste re-cycling facility on the derelict old Blisworth sewage farm. This is between the railway embankment of the West Coast Main Line and Young’s nursery between Milton Malsor and Blisworth. Both Milton Malsor and Blisworth Parish Councils objected to […]

THE CONSERVATIVE County Council has now passed its budget, removing most of the money it used to provide to subsidise bus routes. Although the new budget starts on 1 April, the arrangements with the bus companies are on 3 months’ notice, so nothing will happen immediately. Council officers will be asking bus companies whether they […]

THE CHRONICLE’S report was an accurate report – as far as it went. It mentioned the visit of a group of skateboarders to the meeting to demonstrate their enthusiastic support for the £250,000 which the Lib Dem Council has allocated to develop an international standard skate park in Northampton. The report also pictured protestors against […]

NORTHAMPTONSHIRE County Council cuts up to 900 jobs, turns off half the street lights, drops bus subsidies, scraps lollipop men and women…..but it has managed to find £2m for council leader Jim Harker’s vanity project – the Northamptonshire Enterprise Partnership (NEP). The county council’s bid for a Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) was rejected by the […]