John Plummer, Author at The Stray Ferret

Harrogate set for colourful fountains and WiFi-charging benches

Harrogate town centre is set to get water fountains and smart benches where people can charge their phones as part of the £10.9 million Station Gateway scheme.

North Yorkshire County Council is expected to approve the controversial gateway project next week.

Most of the focus has been on how the scheme will reduce traffic to single lane on a stretch of Station Parade and part pedestrianise James Street to encourage cycling and walking.

But documents sent to councillors ahead of next week’s executive meeting also reveal proposed changes to the public realm close to the train station.

They include creating a dry plaza water jet feature surrounded by new trees and seating at Station Square, where the Victoria monument is located.

One of the documents says:

“The fountain jets can be switched on and off by the council to cater to year-round events in the plaza. Lighting can also be controlled by visitors using a smart phone to connect.

“Smart benches are proposed in the plaza to allow visitors to enjoy the space whilst charging their devices. These smart benches can also have built-in WiFi and lighting so you can enjoy your time in the plaza.”

Other proposals include new lighting columns with built-in insect hotels for wildlife along with other green measures. The documents says:

“We want to celebrate how green Harrogate is by adding in new colourful planting and new trees along streets and in the new plaza at the station.

“Some areas of planting will be rain gardens. These are special planting areas that love collecting rain water to reduce the likelihood of floods around the town.”

Traffic disruption expected in Killinghall next week

Delays are expected in Killinghall next week when new electricity cables are laid for the village’s forthcoming Tesco Express.

Temporary traffic lights will be installed and buses and lorries will be prevented from turning in and out of Otley Road from Ripon Road.

The measures will allow Northern Powergrid to excavate a trench and install cables beneath the pavement outside the Tesco on Ripon Road.

Northern Powergrid has written to residents saying work is expected to last 10 days. The letter says:

“There will be a certain amount of disruption during the implementation of this work but every effort will be made to keep this to a minimum.”

The letter adds the traffic lights will “inevitably lengthen journey times” and buses will be affected.

A barrier and temporary walkway will operate outside the Tesco for pedestrians.

A spokesman for The Harrogate Bus Company, which is part of the French company Transdev, said:

“This will mean our service 24 will be diverted in the Killinghall area, while journeys on our 36 route may also experience some delays.

“Full details of alternative arrangements are being advertised to keep our customers informed, including on our Twitter feed ‘@harrogatebus’ and on the free to download Transdev Go mobile app.”

The Stray Ferret asked Tesco when the store was due to open. All it would say was “early 2022”.

North Yorkshire police officer touched breasts of woman he met on duty

A former North Yorkshire Police officer touched the breasts of a vulnerable woman he met on duty and discussed the possibility of forging a relationship with her.

PC Chris Bolton also exchanged sexual images with the woman, a misconduct hearing heard.

The hearing heard that PC Bolton interacted with the woman, known as Ms A, between August 13, 2020 and November 24, 2020,

He was also found to have dishonestly re-scored a risk assessment relating to Ms A on or around August 23.

The hearing took place at North Yorkshire Police headquarters in Northallerton last week. The panel concluded that the allegations had been proved and amounted to gross misconduct.

It found PC Bolton breached standards for discreditable conduct, authority, respect and courtesy, honesty and integrity and duties and responsibilities.

The panel concluded that, had Mr Bolton still been serving with North Yorkshire Police, he would have been dismissed.

It also ruled he will be placed on the College of Policing barred and advisory list.

Individuals remain on the list indefinitely, unless they win an appeal against their dismissal or make a successful review application, where they would have to provide clear evidence as to why they were now suitable to re-join policing.

North Yorkshire Police declined to reply to a question from the Stray Ferret asking where PC Bolton was based.

Confirmed: £11m Station Gateway to get green light next week

North Yorkshire County Council has confirmed that the £10.9m Harrogate Station Gateway will be recommended for approval next week.

The Stray Ferret revealed last week that the county council’s executive was expected to give the green light on January 25.

Now the county council, which is the lead partner for the scheme, has confirmed the executive is recommended to take the proposals forward to detailed design stage so work can start in spring or summer.

It says the move will save shops from decline, make the town centre more attractive and improve the town centre for cyclists and pedestrians.

James Street will be partly pedestrianised and traffic on some of Station Parade reduced to single lane.

The decision comes despite widespread opposition to the scheme from businesses and residents.

The results of the second phase of consultation, published last month, revealed that of 1,320 people who replied to an online survey, 55% feel negatively, 39% positively and five per cent neutral towards the scheme. One per cent said they didn’t know.

Nevertheless the scheme is expected to proceed with only minor amendments.

A report to councillors acknowledges there has been “a general reduction in the level of support for the changes”. It says the main concerns are the negative impacts on businesses, congestion, air quality and the attractiveness, accessibility and safety of the town centre.

It adds that officers believe:

“The proposals will have an overall positive impact on the local economy, air quality and the attractiveness, accessibility and safety of the town centre with a minimal increase in journey times and flows in the worst case traffic modelling.

“It is therefore considered appropriate that the proposals be taken forward through detailed design and implementation.”

The report adds the “overall impact on retail footfall is expected to be positive”, adding.

“Evidence suggests that the town centre retail sector is at risk of decline in the medium term. There is also a growing body of case study evidence which indicates that the scheme will increase footfall and economic value.”

Residents living near the town centre fear their streets will get more traffic.

Extra traffic in residential areas

Regarding concerns that the changes will displace traffic along the A61 Cheltenham Crescent into nearby residential streets, the report says traffic modelling looked at “significant changes (an average change of 3 vehicles per minute or more)”, adding:

“At the worst time of day (the afternoon peak hour) only East Parade experiences a significant increase in flow (5 vehicles per minute).”

The Harrogate scheme is one of three in Yorkshire being paid for with £42m from the government’s Transforming Cities Fund.

County Councillor Don Mackenzie, executive member for access, said:

These proposals represent the biggest investment in Harrogate, Selby and Skipton town centres in decades and aim to increase productivity by making it quicker, easier and safer for people to travel around and connect with economic opportunities.

“We want to encourage more people to travel by foot, bike and public transport because it is good for health and the environment by promoting fitness and reducing congestion. The spending will also provide a welcome boost for our town centres after two difficult years of trading during the pandemic.

“The entire project is a great example of partnership working between Craven District Council, Harrogate Borough Council, Selby District Council, North Yorkshire County Council and the West Yorkshire Combined Authority and is set to deliver real benefits to residents and businesses across our county.

“We have listened to feedback from the public consultations and are confident people will be pleased with the results.”

Lack of affordable housing ‘killing’ villages in North Yorkshire

Former Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron has said second homes and holiday lets are “killing” rural communities in places such as North Yorkshire.

Mr Farron told a debate in Parliament last week that more than a quarter of the housing stock in the Yorkshire Dales was not lived in.

He added the majority of properties in some towns and villages were empty most of the year.

Mr Farron, whose constituency of Westmorland and Lonsdale in Cumbria is severely affected by second homes, called for action to “shift the dial and save the dales and other rural communities”.

He said:

“Excessive second home ownership is a colossal problem in our communities.

“The collapse of affordable, available housing for local communities is killing towns and villages in Cornwall, Northumberland, Shropshire, Devon, Somerset, North Yorkshire, the highlands of Scotland and rural Wales, as well as in my home of Cumbria.

Mr Farron accused the government of “inexcusable inaction to save our communities” and outlines a seven-point action plan.

The measures included making second homes and holiday lets new and separate categories of planning use so councils and national parks could limit the number of them in each town and village, giving councils the power to increase council tax by up to 100% on second homes in the worst-affected communities and ensuring Airbnb properties “meet the same standards as any other rental”.

Housing minister Christopher Pincher said rural communities faced “some very specific challenges”, which was why the government had changed the tax system.

“Since 2013, local authorities have been able to levy 100% of council tax on second homes, where the people who own them do not necessarily use the local services that they might, but through the council tax have to contribute to them; 96% of local authorities make use of that opportunity.”

He added changes had been made to stamp duty to help first-time buyers and a surcharge had been introduced for foreign purchasers of property.

Mr Pincher added:

“This issue is also why we have reformed the planning system. It is opaque, slow, and is not predictable. That does not help small and medium-sized enterprises—often the builders who build different types of homes for different tenures in the places that the big builders do not want.

“We need a system that will help those SMEs and is far more engaging.

“We also want, as a reform to be introduced soon, a new infrastructure levy to replace section 106, which tends to favour the bigger developers that can afford the bigger batteries of lawyers.”

Family’s involvement in Harrogate charity ends after 100 years

A Harrogate charity has said goodbye to one of its trustees after 42 years, ending a century-long family connection.

At its latest AGM, Vision Support Harrogate District gave a special thank-you to Bob Sergeant for his long service, bringing to an end his family’s involvement since the organisation’s early days.

Bob joined in 1979, following in the footsteps of various family members including his father, Russell Sergeant, after whom the charity’s drop-in centre in East Parade is named.

Russell Sergeant

The Sergeants first became involved with the Harrogate Society for the Blind, as it was then known, in 1923.

The organisation had been founded two years earlier to support local soldiers returning from the First World War with visual impairments caused by mustard gas.

Bob’s grandparents, Henry and Marion Sergeant, were near neighbours of the charity’s founder Miss Fripp, who lived in Spring Grove.

Henry had a shop on James Street, where Waterstones is now situated, and offered to display and sell basketry work made by visually impaired people.

Henry Sergeant

Henry went on to become vice chairman of the charity for six years from 1932, while Marion continued to be involved as a committee member.

Later, their son — and Bob’s father — Russell, became a trustee, serving as secretary, chairman and president before being made honorary president in 1993. Russell’s sisters, Jean, Alison and Joyce, were volunteers at the charity’s social centre, while Jean’s husband Les Topham was on the committee.

Volunteers essential

Looking back over nearly a century, Bob said he was proud of his family’s connection and honoured to have been personally involved for so long. But he praised the hard work and commitment of many others in ensuring the society’s longevity and success. He said:

“There is no way that it could survive without the help of its loyal volunteers, some of whom have been there for a number of years.

“I also think the centre would not be here today without the very valuable help from the Rotary Club of Harrogate, which was formed in the same year as the society and has been involved since the start. The club’s members have been absolutely incredible over the decades.”

Bob said some of his highlights included the fundraising garden parties at Dacre Banks and the yearly trip to Scarborough for visually impaired people and their carers.

End of an era

He remembers big events like the annual Christmas party at The Lounge Hall, now Wetherspoons, which welcomed around 400 people. It was funded by the society, with transport arranged by the Rotary Club. He said:

“Funding has become more difficult now. But one of the society’s strengths has always been that over 90 per cent of the money we raise goes back to the direct benefit of the visually impaired people we support.”

Bob and his wife, Mary, still intend to be involved with the society in the future, but his resignation from the committee marks the end of an era as their two sons live too far away to continue the Sergeants’ active contribution. He said:

“Right the way through the charity’s history there has been the Sergeant family and the Rotary Club.

“It’s been part of my life and my family history for so long, but I feel that the time has now come to stand down.”

Harrogate Town to sell match-worn shirts tonight to fund defibrillator

Harrogate Town hopes to raise £1,500 tonight to fund a defibrillator on Commercial Street in central Harrogate by selling match-worn shirts.

Shirts signed by captain Josh Falkingham and long-serving midfielders Lloyd Kerry and George Thomson are among those on sale.

A club statement today said:

“The 2020/21 campaign was a historic one for Harrogate Town as it marked the club’s debut season in the English Football League.

“Now you have the chance to own a bit of Harrogate Town history.”

Shirts will be available online from 7pm today on the Harrogate Town club shop. They will be split into categories of £20, £50, £70, £100, and £150 and sold on a first come, first served basis.

Harrogate district business says Brexit has cost it £210,000

A Harrogate district horticultural business has estimated that Brexit-related bureaucracy cost it £210,000 last year.

Johnsons of Whixley, which sells over 5 million plants per year, said in a press release yesterday that the “bureaucratic burden” of Brexit had reduced revenue, increased cost and slowed its supply chain.

Britain left the EU at the end of January last year.

Johnsons said the company brought in 462 loads from the EU in 2021, which cost the company £210,000 more than it did in 2020 due to Brexit.

Of those costs, £150,000 was spent on EU plant health.

Jonathan Whittemore, head of production and procurement, said:

“This is money Johnsons is spending in the EU, with EU companies and authorities, on inspections and phytosanitary certificates.

“The EU phytosanitary certificate is a perfect example of the costly bureaucracy that doesn’t achieve its aim.”

Whittemore explained that although the certificate was required to bring plants into the country from the EU, it is not given any authority by the UK Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA). This leads to situations where plants are repeatedly delayed for duplicated checks and tests. He added:

“A robust stance is critical in disease control matters, and UK horticulture should be pleased that this is the approach APHA is taking. But if we are not going to put any credence on the inspections and testing done in the EU then let’s not ask for it to be done, and let’s not pay for it.”

Johnsons, which was established in 1921, has supplied plants for various high profile projects, including Studley Royal Water Garden, the Forth Road Bridge, the National Arboretum Centre and the athletes’ village at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games.

Harrogate competitive festival returns seeking new competitors

The Harrogate Competitive Festival for Music, Speech and Drama is set to return this year after a break due to covid.

The festival, which featured nearly 2,000 competitors when it was last held in full in 2019, will run over three weekends in March. The deadline for submitting entries is this Saturday.

Previous winners have gone on to perform in West End shows and compete in BBC Young Musician and BBC Radio 2 Chorister of the Year.

This year, young champions of music, speech and drama have the added incentive of a £250 prize and an invitation to a residential course in their respective disciplines.

The competition was cut short in 2020 by the first national lockdown and was cancelled in 2021.

With nearly 200 different categories to enter, festival chairman Paul Dutton hopes there is something for everyone this year:

“We have missed being part of Harrogate’s cultural legacy, it is one of the most prestigious arts events in Harrogate but, this year we are back with a bang. We really don’t want people to miss this opportunity to be part of our amazing festival.”

Paul Dutton

The festival began in 1936 as a music competition run by the borough council and a voluntary committee. Since then, the categories have expanded into speech and drama and the festival is now run entirely by volunteers as a registered charity.

The festival will take place at Harrogate High School over the first three weekends of March.

Further information is available here and hard copies of the syllabus can be found at local music shops and libraries.

Harrogate hotelier says hospitality grew ‘fat and lazy’ on cheap foreign labour

A leading Harrogate hotelier has said the hospitality sector grew “fat and lazy” on cheap labour from Europe and has been forced to pay better.

Peter Banks, managing director of Rudding Park, said some bar and kitchen staff were now earning £13.70 an hour and could earn almost £29,000 a year for a 40-hour week if they were prepared to work anti-social hours.

Mr Banks’ comments came during a speech at Harrogate District Chamber of Commerce last night about the lessons of covid.

He said the sector had suffered from the impact of lockdowns and ‘furloughitis’, whereby staff that had spent eight months of the year being paid 80% of their wages by government had reappraised their lives and decided against a career in hospitality.

Staff recruitment and retention, he added, was now a “serious issue” and had forced pay increases. He said Rudding Park now paid an extra £1 an hour for working after 7pm and an extra £2 an our for working weekends.

The hotel has also introduced service charges for the first time, further boosting staff wages, he added. Mr Banks said:

“We have grown fat and lazy on cheap labour from Europe. Whether you are a Brexiteer or not, the rules have changed. We are not going back.

“It’s no good raging against covid. It’s no good raging against Brexit. We’ve just got to get on with it.”

‘Thrown under a bus’

Mr Banks said Prime Minister Boris Johnson “threw us under a bus” during the first lockdown in March 2020 as hotels were forced to close without any support.

Rudding Park came within weeks of closing, said Mr Banks, adding that he told all 320 staff the business might survive until July if they accepted a 40% pay cut.

Chancellor Rishi Sunak then “rode to the rescue’ by introducing the furlough scheme, Mr Banks added.

He said the two years since has been a rollercoaster ride of adaptation.

Mr Banks said Rudding Park no longer accepted cash, which required three person days a week to count. It had also centralised ordering food “because we had five different kitchens and five different chefs ordering their own stock”.

He advised others in hospitality to “stretch the rules a bit, don’t just sit their passively and be creative”. He added:

“Don’t waste a good crisis. there’s always something you can learn from it.”

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Extra traffic in residential areas

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Volunteers essential

End of an era

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‘Thrown under a bus’