THE trees at Daventry Country Park were woken from their winter slumber on Saturday.
The annual wassailing event saw a parade of people set out from the park’s visitors’ centre.
There was music, bells and banging pots and pans together to make plenty of noise to help wake the trees.
Led by the park’s countryside rangers, the group headed to the community orchard where they hung toast on the trees’ branches to and
For photos of the event, see the Daventry Express this Thursday (January 12).
THE controversial High Speed 2 (HS2) rail link between London and Birmingham, passing through the Daventry area, has been given the go ahead by the Government.
The announcement came on Tuesday morning. The Government says the line will help with overcrowding on the rail network, and boost the economy of the West Midlands.
However, opponents say the line lacks a sound business case, and that the money would be better spent on other transport projects.
Transport Secretary Justine Greening has announced extra tunnelling for sections of the 100-mile (160km) link in response to environmental concerns.
One of the areas announced for extra tunnelling was near Aston le Walls and Chipping Warden near Daventry.
See the Daventry Express on Thursday, January 12, for local reaction to the announcement.
A REGIONAL enterprise partnership is kicking off a series of meetings with businesses in Daventry.
The South East Midlands Local Enterprise Partnership (SEMLEP) is starting its series of meetings with businesses on the SE Midlands plan for growth in Daventry, Northamptonshire.
At the Daventry event businesses will be brought up to speed with SEMLEP’s Business Plan and will be invited to make contributions to it. They will also learn about SEMLEP’s other initiatives to support businesses in the area.
Dr Ann Limb, the chairman of SEMLEP, said: “The SE Midlands LEP (SEMLEP) is a part of a nationwide network of private sector led bodies designed to promote sustainable economic growth on a significant local scale.
“Our business plan shows how we can do this by working closely with the local authorities across our region to maximise the use of resources and to leverage funding.
“The board of SEMLEP is keen to listen to businesses and by taking account of their needs, we hope to increase our ability to make a difference for the area.
“We are delighted to begin our series of local meetings in Daventry. Over the years, Daventry has shown itself to be a place which understand the benefits of growth in providing better jobs and services for local people, including the exciting iCon building in which this event will take place.”
Cllr Chris Millar, leader of Daventry District Council, said: “We are pleased to welcome this important meeting to Daventry.
“Daventry still has a strong manufacturing base which exports across the world and a diverse range of other businesses. I would encourage as many local businesses as possible to come along to the meeting.”
The Daventry meeting will be held at the iCon Environmental Sustainability Centre, Eastern Way, Daventry NN11 0QB – www.icon-innovation.co.uk from 2pm to 4pm on Thursday, January 19.
PEOPLE will be able to talk to the police about crime issues in their area with local officers at a village pub.
The Daventry Rural Safer Community Team will be hosting a Community Panel meeting at The Cross Tree Inn in Byfield. It will take place on Wednesday January 18 and runs from 6pm.
The meeting will determine the policing priorities for villages including Badby, Byfield and Woodford Halse with people able to say what the problems are in the respective areas.
For more information, visit www.northants.police.uk.
I’VE come up with an interesting game which could offer a welcome diversion for the long cold months ahead.
I call it Town Centre Dead Pool, and I can’t claim any great Monopoly or Trivial pursuit moment of inspiration that created something new and, more importantly, something that might become a huge success and provide me with stacks of cash steadily rolling in thanks to worldwide royalties and licensing deals.
It’s really only based on the existing Dead Pool game, which you may already know about, even if you frown at its tastelessness.
In a Dead Pool tontine – yes, tontine, look it up – the participants all stick a few quid in the pot and pick a name from a hat.
All the names are celebrities, some of whom are a bit long in the tooth, some still young but careless in their habits, and some picked at random.
If you’re playing the long game, you can decide that the winner of the pot will be the holder of the name of the last celebrity of the selected field still breathing, however long it takes.
Or you can be a little more callous about it, restrict the runners and riders to those in the spotlight who either look a bit peaky or have had one too many trips to the Priory, and run the game over a calendar year.
My variation of the game would see a cold commercial eye passed over your town centre, or your town as a whole, and a list drawn up those shopfront concerns which you reckon are hanging on by a thread.
Even when times aren’t tight every town has shops and High Street businesses which must struggle for custom.
It’s not just fashion salons for ladies of a certain age with window displays that don’t seem to have changed for 30 years or shoe shops stuck in a time warp where you haven’t ever seen a customer cross the threshold.
There are businesses which have been coshed by the internet, like travel agents, and ‘nine day wonder’ efforts like fish spas and milk shake parlours as well.
So draw up a list, get everyone to ante up, and see what happens.
You can pick outlets of local chains, but not national concerns – they may go belly up through no fault of their own, despite their popularity with local punters.
And if can be any sort of business that has a street-level presence, whether it’s an arty pottery workshop, a gift shop full of candles, cards and codswallop or a parlour peddling tenuous therapies to the credulous.
No restaurants and cafes, because they’re too vulnerable to the vagaries of fashion, but anything else should be fair game.
Then you’ve got more of a reason to spend time in your town centre, checking out who is still soldiering on and ticking off those who have handed back the keys.
At the end of the year, the pot is shared out among all those representing the firms which have survived to fight another day.
Oh, but there is one thing – you can only spend the winnings in those surviving businesses, rather than in out of town outlet malls, giant superstores or snapping up online bargains.
Anyone want to join me in the game to run for the rest of 2012?
A free afternoon of family activities is planned on Saturday January 14 and is open to everyone.
Grace Space, co-ordinated by Churches Together in Daventry runs the event, which will be held at the Daventry United Reformed Church, in Foundry Place, and will have crafts, games and refreshments.
The fun starts at 2.30pm and runs until 4pm and will provide space for families to spend free quality time together.
Grace Space runs these activities every two months.
Ali Middleton, one of the Grace Space team, said: “ On Saturday we will be investigating the meaning of our names, writing our names in chocolate and making named door hangers.”
For more information contact Ali Middleton on 0789 160 8612, Liz Adams on 07727055586 or search Facebook.
VOLUNTEERS are being sought for a charity’s recycling project in Daventry.
Oxfam runs a unique warehouse in Daventry, sorting unsellable items to try and make extra money for the charity.
Based on the Marches industrial estate, the warehouse takes in items from charity shops, companies and other sources, sorts through and grades them.
Items are then sold over internet sites, or sorted and sent off for recycling.
Jay Flemming, logistics project manager said: “We’re looking for volunteers to come in and help, if they can offer anything from a couple of hours a week upwards.
“We need people to sort and grade items, but also to test electrical goods.”
Site manager Charlie Littlemore added: “It’s a good atmosphere here.
“Volunteers who come to us directly can receive travel expenses and a lunch allowance, depending on their hours of work.
“It also looks good on a CV and we can give references.”
Anyone interested can contact the warehouse on 07784933834 or at clittlemore@oxfam.org.uk.
PEOPLE can have their say on plans to transfer part of a public playing field to a school.
Daventry District Council (DDC) is asking the public what it thinks of proposals to lease to the Grange School in Daventry part of the neighbouring playing field.
Cllr Alan Hills, portfolio holder for community, culture and leisure, said: “The Grange School is a primary school in Daventry with around 500 pupils, but it has very limited exterior playing space.
“For more formal sporting activities, the school uses Northampton College’s sports grounds, which means that the children have to be taken off-site. As a result the school approached the council to request that it be allowed to fence off and use an area of green open space that is behind the school.
“We agreed that a consultation supported by the Drayton ward district councillors should take place to see what members of the community think about the idea before any lease is granted, so I would encourage as many people as possible to have a look at the proposals and give us their feedback.”
The plans can be viewed at the Grange School in Staverton Road from tomorrow (Friday) to March 10, between 8am and 5pm on weekdays. There will be a drop-in session at the school on Tuesday, January 24, from 5pm to 6pm, when representatives from council and the school will be available to answer any questions.
Alternatively, from tomorrow people can get more information at www.daventrydc.gov.uk/consultation.
A FIRE broke out in a block of flats in Riverside Drive, Weedon.
Firefighters were called to the blaze on Tuesday, January 10, at around 8.15am.
Crews rescued a man and a woman from first floor flats and they were taken to hospital suffering from smoke inhalation. The blaze caused significant damage to the ground floor of the block and smoke damage to other floors.
For more on this see the Daventry Express on Thursday, January 12.
All your local news, including...
– CCTV saved for Daventry town centre
– Priceless photos taken in burglary
– Councillor quits Tories over wind farms
– Full steam ahead for High Speed 2
– Disabled girl refused bathroom funding by council
– Manchester United vets line up for Daventry football event
– SPORT: Eight-year-old boy becomes karate black belt
– WIN: A year’s free gym membership
Plus all the rest of the local news, sport, leisure, property and jobs.
War Horse
It’s rare you will see me criticise Steven Spielberg, but for me this is a massive misfire from a wonderful director.
A theatrical triumph through imagination, this is a deeply uncinematic film and, more worryingly, is so un-Spielbergian.
The story is a moving one, the tale of a bond between boy and horse that even the Great War cannot break. It should be a resounding spectacle, but it isn’t.
It misleads because its central character is an amazing animal so the film taps into something deeply empathetic inside us, blinding us to a terrible, terrible script that is full of awful dialogue and two-dimensional characters.
We follow the story of Joey the horse and the boy who loves him, Albert, from their life on a struggling Devonshire farm to separation by war, to the possibility of reunion.
The well-cast, but badly cultivated, performances are annoying and it takes an hour to be reminded who directed it as the horses are led into battle for the first time and the drama is elevated by a supreme cinematic eye.
But it doesn’t last and save some nice running horse shots and a superb sequence in No Man’s Land, it’s a tired, trad piece of schlock that will doubtless win hearts and awards but is far from being a rounded piece of work.
Shame
The remarkable Hunger stands as one of, if not the finest, British films of the first decade of this century and one of the most remarkable ever.
Directed by artist Steve McQueen, it was coruscating and phenomenally cinematic.
His follow-up, reuniting him with the peerless Michael Fassbender, is the story of a sex addict in Manhattan and it’s as stylised, as impactful and important as his debut.
Fassbender is a lonely, alienated man, a troubled soul, addicted to sexual release to the point of being barren of intimate feeling.
When his younger sister (Carey Mulligan) arrives to visit he is forced to confront his feelings and addiction.
But as we have already come to expect, McQueen doesn’t do Hollywood happy ending and we are left breathless by a portrait of modern life that is hard, harsh and sad.
Gripping, brilliant film-making.
Margin Call
The current poisonous banking culture we are oppressed by gets its first cinematic examination in this star-studded corporate drama.
Set over 24 hours in the early days of the financial crisis, it is a classic ensemble piece, full of heightened drama and tightrope decisions, at all stages of the corporate ladder.
As with most films of this ilk it doesn’t always work and feels rushed out to make a zeitgeist impact, but it can’t because the script and some of the performances aren’t up to scratch.
Still, it’s good to see the likes of Kevin Spacey, Stanley Tucci, Zachary Quinto and Paul Bettany chewing scenery and playing at financial villainy.
A DISTRICT councillor has quit the Conservative party in protest over its position on wind farms.
Tony Scott, who represents villages including Badby, Catesby, Hellidon, Newnham and Staverton on Daventry District Council, will now sit as an independent councillor.
Cllr Scott said: “I have been a DDC Conservative councillor for the ward of Badby for the last 12 years.
“While I continue to support the current administration I want it to be known that I do not support a number of central Government policies.
“Following the recent undemocratic decision of the planning inspector to overturn the council planning committee’s resolution and approve the application to build two wind farms at Watford and Kelmarsh, in line with Government policy, was a step too far.
“As a result I have resigned from the Conservative party and will continue to represent my constituents as an independent councillor.
“To show the Government our complete disdain at its blind determination to blight our countryside with expensive and useless machines I would urge my colleagues to do the same.”
Chris Millar, leader of the council’s Conservative group, said: “Tony has done a good job as a councillor and I’m very sorry that he’s left the party due to national policies, but he will still support our local policies.”
Chris Heaton-Harris, Daventry’s Conservative MP, said: “I think this move is a mistake. If you join party politics, you agree with some policies and not with others which you can then work to change.
“History has proved again and again that independent politicians get washed out by the bigger parties.”
CCTV in Daventry town centre has been saved after nine months of uncertainty – but the decision rested on a single casting vote.
On Monday night, Daventry Town Council voted to take over responsibility for the town’s cameras, and to then out-source the service.
The meeting was told that unless the town council voted to adopt the service Daventry District Council – which currently owns and pays for the cameras – would start to dismantle it from April.
For more on the discussion, and the cost to taxpayers, see the Daventry Express.
TWO people had to be rescued after fire broke out at a block of flats on Tuesday morning.
Firefighters were called to the blaze in Riverside Drive, Weedon at 8.15am.
A woman who’s flat had caught fire had to be rescued by the crew and taken to hospital.
She is recovering from smoke inhalation but has no serious injuries.
And a disabled man who was trapped on the second floor had to be lifted out through a window by firefighters.
Neighbour Sameer Mirza lives in the opposite the flat.
He said: “It was about 8am and I was making a cup of tea when my neighbour knocked on the door to say the flat opposite was on fire.
“We could see smoke coming out of the letter box and we then struggled to get to the woman’s front door because there was a mobility scooter blocking it.
“We eventually got in and she was thankfully upstairs sleeping. If she was downstairs when the fire had started I think it could have been a lot worse.
“The fire brigade arrived soon after and we were all evacuated from the building for an hour or so.
“The smoke was thick and black.
“There is a disabled man living upstairs who can’t walk very far, so he had to be carried out of the window by firefighters on a ladder.
“It’s lucky the building is concrete because otherwise the fire could have spread very quickly and we all could have died.”
A spokesman for Northamptonshire Fire and Rescue said: “The fire caused significant damage to the ground floor of the block and smoke damage to other floors.”
The fire was caused by an electrical fault at the property..
THERE’S a varied field of runners and riders under starter’s orders for this week’s Box Office Stakes, but there’s one nag which is undoubtedly installed as odds-on favourite.
It has the pedigree, it has the form, and can only be handicapped by hype and expectation.
We’re talking about War Horse, of course, Steven Spielberg’s latest venture into the area and humanity.
From popular children’s book to surprise West End stage hit, former children’s laureate Michael Morpurgo’s story of a love between a boy and his horse comes across a bit like Black Beauty On The Western Front.
But even though Spielberg’s trademark soppiness and eagerness to please the audience are in evidence, this is a handsome and star-studded drama which offers a satisfying wallow.
It’s not a gallop by any means – a running rime of nearly 21/2 hours could leave anyone a bit saddle sore – as we follow a Devon farmhand and his maned mate from the bucolic countryside to the hell of the trenches and back again.
The horse, as it happens, gets called up first but the boy takes the King’s shilling in a bid to rescue the stirling steed from the fate that can befall any nag unwise enough to enter French territory, or worse.
> Here’s a clever way to cut down on the special effects budget – the aliens invading Moscow in The Darkest Hour are invisible. Brilliant!
There’s still a lot of 3D trickery and general eyeball amazement here, though, as five young and gorgeous party people making the most of the Russian capital’s nightlife are caught up in the invasion by the aforementioned invisible aliens who are intent on sucking up every bit of power they can plug into.
Fans of the likes of Cloverfield and Battle Los Angeles will feel right at home, and for once it’s a sci fi thriller which isn’t based in the States.
> You’ll need to concentrate if you opt for Margin Call, in which the likes of Kevin Spacey, Jeremy Irons, and Stanley Tucci slip into slick suits and do battle as an investment bank starts to fall apart.
Crisis meetings continue through the night as the big guys try to work out how to save their skins.
First-time writer/director J.C. Chandor is given enormous help by a terrific cast – think Glengarry Glen Ross updated to the present day.
> If you’re on a diet, contemplating Christmas bills and generally affected by New Year gloom, then comfort yourself that some people are in an even worse place.
They certainly are in Steve McQueen’s Shame, with Michael Fassbender and Carey Mulligan centre stage in a grim tale of addiction and desire.
Fassbender’s a shallow porn freak, Mulligan is his self-harming sister, you won’t find many laughs but there’s a sizzling soundtrack and both stars give it all they’ve got.
Saturday
The Magicians (BBC One, 6.35pm)
Four magicians – double act Barry Jones and Stuart MacLeod, alongside Pete Firman and Jason Latimer – team up with assorted celebrities to perform four illusions, two live and two pre-recorded, from the classic to the never-attempted before.
Darren McMillan takes over from Lenny Henry as host.
Sunday
Call the Midwife (BBC One, 8pm)
If the demise of Lark Rise to Candleford, Heartbeat and Downton Abbey has left you longing for a warm, nostalgic Sunday night drama, then you can do no better than Call the Midwife.
This new series, based on the books by the late Boxmoor author Jennifer Worth, is set in 1957, and delivers everything you’d expect, with the possible exception of a picturesque rural setting.
The drama takes place in the East End of London, where nurse Jenny Lee (Jessica Raine) has just arrived, believing she’s about to take up a post in a small private hospital.
Instead, she finds she’ll be living and working at Nonnatus House, which is home to an order of nuns.
Jenny, who comes from a posh background, is shocked by the poverty she encounters, but she’s going to have to adjust fast as she handles her first solo case – caring for Mrs Conchita Warren, who is pregnant for the 25th time.
Monday
Stargazing Live (BBC Two, 8.30pm)
Professor Brian Cox – one of the brains behind ‘big bang’ machine the Large Hadron Collider – and comedian Dara O Briain present this second three-part strand which aims to teach the public what’s what when it comes to heavenly bodies.
Tuesday
15 Kids and Counting (Channel 4, 9pm)
As the title probably suggests, families who have (to many of us) unthinkable numbers of offspring.
Noel and Sue Redford are forever keen to add to their ever-growing family, the couple have 14 children with baby number 15 on the way. Now 36 years old, Sue has spent half of her adult life pregnant and over the last 17 years has had a baby nearly every year.
Wednesday
Kate Thornton - Anorexic: My Secret Past (Channel 5, 10pm)
Kate reveals she became obsessed with her weight after moving from primary school to secondary education. She felt dumpy and was teased about her weight, and what started out as dieting turned into an obsessive mental illness that led to her starving herself. Look out for her Kate’s meetings with those still living in anorexia’s grip, including an 18-year-old who’s begun the rocky road to recovery.
Thursday
Gypsy Blood: True Stories (Channel 4, 10pm)
A fascinating insight into the hidden lives of the traveller communities, putting the spotlight on a far darker area of traveller life, one that even Big Fat Gypsy Weddings left well alone – the world of bare-knuckle fighting. And it really does pull no punches.
Friday
Room 101 (BBC One, 8.30pm)
An all-new format and overseen by Frank Skinner, who referees three celebrities each week as they compete for his approval to banish their top peeve, annoyance, irritation or worst nightmare to the depths of Room 101 forever.
THE new sixth form centre at a Daventry school has been hailed a success at the end of its first term.
Plans for a sixth form on the site of the Danetre and Southbrook Learning Village were first mooted around 18 months ago.
The director of 14-19 Partnerships and Achievement, Matt Ellis said: “We would have students who would head off and do their A-Levels at Northampton College but we wanted to bring them a bit closer to home where we could monitor them closely.
“It was a request which came from a lot of the parents and pupils to have a sixth form here, for the first time in 20 years.”
Transformation of the old languages block took place over the summer into the new sixth form centre which consists of two classrooms, an IT suite and a combined study area with kitchen to use during the break and lunchtimes.
Mr Ellis says there are plenty of advantages for the pupils choosing to stay at Danetre to study for their A Levels.
He added: “In terms of the number of subjects we can offer at the moment, it is not as many as other schools can offer.
“However, a lot of our pupils will have a good relationship with the teachers, they will also have established friendships and a lot of them will be very settled here.
“If they had to go to different schools then they would not have had that all of those benefits. Since we set up the sixth form, we have found a few of the pupils have come back because they have been unable to settle properly at other schools.”
The school is very pleased with how the sixth form has been going so far as it enters 2012.
Mr Ellis said: “I cannot emphasise how much of a tremendous success that setting up the sixth form has been.
“The pupils are starting to look at university choices and we had a few of them go to a talk about applying to Oxbridge. For us to be in that position after just a few months of setting up the sixth form is fantastic.”
The pupils are all convinced that they made the right decision.
Jack Smithson, 16, who lives in Daventry, said: “I had the chance to go to Lawrence Sheriff School in Rugby, but I decided to stay here instead.
“A lot of my friends were here and I knew all of the teachers.
“I am glad I made the decision. I was uncertain at first because it was a new venture but the school had put a lot of work into me and I felt it was time to repay that faith they had in me.”
Emma Furnivall, 16, who lives in Daventry, said: “I would have gone to Sixth Form elsewhere but I knew that the GCSE results were really good and knew there was a high quality of teaching. I am glad I came here.”
Georgia Wilson, 17, who lives in Daventry, said: “For me, I would have gone to Northampton College if there had not been this option.
“It would have meant a lot more travelling but this is right on my doorstep and it is a good school. I made the right decision.”
The future looks bright for the sixth form at Danetre School and they are already looking to next year.
Mr Ellis added: “We will be teaching four additional subjects, which will take it up to 19 and we will be hopeful of having around the same numbers for next year’s intake.
“I know everyone is delighted with what we have achieved.”
TWO people have been taken to hospital due to chemical fumes at the Royal Oak Industrial Estate in Daventry.
Two fire crews from Daventry and one from Long Buckby were called to AmegA Sciences in Daimler Close at 10am and remained on scene until 2pm. Part of the road was cordoned off during the incident.
Firefighters used breathing apparatus and decontamination equipment to deal with the spill and to ventilate the building.
The company at the centre of the leak said it is a “mystery” why two workers collapsed while working with “non-hazardous chemicals”.
AmegA Sciences said the staff were taken to Northampton General Hospital.
The two men are under observation but are expected to make a full recovery.
Both Northamptonshire Fire Service and the company’s laboratory are investigating what happened.
AmegA sciences make agricultural products such as fertilisers and pesticides.
THE latest book by Daventry- based author Mark Robson will go on sale next month.
The Devil’s Triangle: Eye of the Storm tells the story of Sam Cutler and best friend Callum who are stranded having crossed to a strange paralell world through a rift in the Bermuda Triangle.
It is a sequel to the first book called The Devil’s Triangle.
Mr Robson said: “I think this is probbaly the best book I have ever written.
“I always had a trilogy of books planned in my head but while I was writing the first book, I found the story went in an unexpected direction. It has made for a much better story.”
And fans of The Devil’s Triangle series will be happy to know he is already working on a final book.
But it hasn’t all been plain sailing for Mark’s 13th book.
He said: “Unfortunately, the acknowledgements were left out of the book.
“There are lots of people to thank but in particular Emma Wilding, Heidi Twynham and Nicola Stacey for their invaluable help with this book.”
Now Mr Robson is looking towards his next project.
He said: “I am currently writing the third book in the trilogy which I hope to finish in the summer and will be out next year.
“I am also hoping to write a book about martial arts next year.
“I have qualified as an instructor and will run my own club for children in Easter.”
The Devil’s Triangle: Eye of the Storm is on sale from Thursday February 2 and costs £6.99.
MOTORISTS in Daventry are being warned following a sharp increase in thefts from vehicles.
A total of 28 thefts from motor vehicles have been reported to the police since December 1, all in Daventry.
Police say they have largely been from unsecured vehicles and have included items like mobiles phones, sat navs, stationary, spectacles and sweets.
Sergeant Martin Treen, from the Daventry Town safer community team, said: “We are urging people to double check there are no items left on display and the vehicle is secured. The majority of these crimes could have been prevented by owners taking the extra few seconds to remove items from display and ensuring the vehicle was locked.
“We will be carrying out warrants, and dedicated officers will be conducting high visibility patrols, looking for potential victims.”
