Pateley Bridge Town Council is looking for two new councillors without going through an election process to replace Chris Hawkesworth and Christine Skaife, who between them have served for more than 50 years.  Both have collectively been town mayor on eight occasions.

Councillor Mike Holt  said that the council, which also serves High and Low Bishopside, Fellbeck, Wilsill, Glasshouses and part of Wath, needs to “co-opt”  to bring the council to its full strength of 11 members.

The council, like all local government, is in lockdown because of the coronavirus crisis and the next elections are not due until May 2022.

The need to operate in isolation, has also meant that there was no council meeting at which councillors could thank their retiring colleagues for the many ways in which they have been involved in the local community.

Cllr Holt (pictured with Mayoress Dr Janet Holt) said:

“Chris  and Christine will both be greatly missed, they brought a lot to the council and as such the town over many years of civic service and we wish them all the best for the future.”

Cllr Hawkesworth served on the town council for 41 years – five of which he served as mayor, while Cllr Skaife was mayor on three occasions during more than ten years on the council.

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With their retirement, Cllr Holt pointed out to anybody thinking about putting their name forward for one of the vacancies:

“Becoming a councillor presents a fantastic opportunity to have a voice and influence the direction of the parish, the town and all our parishioners.”

The minimum age to be a councillor is 18 and applicants must be a British citizen; an eligible Commonwealth citizen or a citizen of any member state of the European Union. Potential applicants must also be a registered elector within the parish or meet any of the following criteria:

• Occupied as owner or tenant land or premises in the parish for the previous 12 months
• Had their main employement in the parish for the previous 12 month
• Lived in the parish or within three miles of it for the previous 12 months

Those wanting to apply for co-option to the council are asked, in the first instance, to send their CV and a covering letter to Sarah Adamson clerk@pateleybridgetowncouncil.gov.uk

Production at Ripon-based company Network Medical, is going at full pace, seven days a week, after a vital contract was won to supply face visors for front line NHS workers.

The contract, which safeguards jobs at the company’s Kearsley Road headquarters, was awarded six days after Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer, accused the government of being  ‘slow on protective equipment and slow to take up’ offers of supply of PPE from British firms.

Network Medical refocused its operation on the manufacture of face visors in March and had been in discussions with the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC).

The company’s wait for a decision on its contract bid was featured on Channel 4 News on 22nd April, the day the Labour leader raised the PPE questions at Prime Minister’s Questions in the House of Commons.

On April 28th, Network Medical and a sister company based in Swansea – both part of the Innovia Medical group – received the order from the DHSC to supply 1.3 million face visors.

Because of the size of the order, production has been split between Ripon and Swansea and both sites are now at full capacity, with 100% of production being sent to the NHS.

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Neil Mercer, chief executive officer of Network Medical said the company is pleased to have secured a contract to manufacture and supply the Innovia face visors to the NHS.

Mr Mercer, told The Stray Ferret:

“Due to the reduction in routine procedures  we have seen demand for our Ophthalmic and ENT products reduce over the last few months. The introduction of the Innovia Face Visor at our Ripon and sister site in Swansea has allowed us to help protect our NHS heroes  whilst keeping the business operating at full capacity during these challenging times.”

At the start of March, Network Medical geared up to making face visors and during a four week planning stage, contacted existing UK customers, who include NHS Supply Chain, local NHS trusts and private hospital groups. In addition to contacting local and national government to let them know about the visors.

Horseracing at Ripon resumes on June 20th, albeit behind closed doors and with strict social distancing measures in place.

For James Hutchinson, who is clerk of the course and managing director of Ripon Racecourse Company, it has been a long wait since the autumn, when the last meeting was staged at Yorkshire’s ‘garden racecourse’.

This season’s April and May meetings were wiped out by Covid-19, but James (pictured below, left at a pre-coronavius meeting) remains philosophical.

He told The Stray Ferret:

“There’s no point in looking back at what didn’t happen, we’d rather look forward and hope that it won’t be long before we can open our gates to racegoers once more.”

Before then, in addition to the evening meeting on Saturday 20th June, there will be meetings on 8th and 24th July and the 6th, 16th and 31st August – all behind closed doors.

On each date, there will be an eight-race card with a maximum of 12 runners per race, ensuring that the number of stable staff, jockeys and trainers present will be in manageable numbers, alongside the course’s own employees, stewards, clerk of the scales, starter, vets and ambulance crews required to attend.

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Social distancing and hygiene measures will be in force across the course, in the changing room and the parade ring and, like the first meeting since lockdown staged at Newcastle,  jockeys will wear face masks before, during and after each race.

While punters will be unable to watch the action on course, the races will be live on Sky Sports Racing Channel and with bookmakers due to reopen from 15th June, those who want a bet will be able to do so and watch the racing action beamed into the betting shops.

James, pointed out:

“We are pleased to be back racing again, though it will be strange not to have racegoers present. We simply hope to complete the fixtures through to the end of August as safely as possible for all involve and take it from there, but to paraphrase the words of Arnold Schwarzenegger, ‘we’ll be back!'”

Children’s nurseries across the Harrogate district reopened on Monday, with new arrangements in place to ensure the safety of children, parents and staff.

Busy Bees, which has four nurseries in Harrogate and one in Ripon, confirmed that all five opened yesterday, with health and safety plans in place that address the issues raised by Covid-19.

While there was no playdough, sandpits, or water games, staff were on hand to provide outdoor play in smaller groups, with no floor markings for children’s play areas or timed toilet breaks.

A spokesperson for Busy Bees, said children were not required to play in hoops, as some schools suggested may be required and pointed out that instead:

“The focus was on dividing children into close friendship groups, limiting the number of people children come into contact with, reducing the space that they can explore and increasing the time spent outdoors.”

The safety arrangements involve temperature checks for all children and staff on arrival and throughout the day; two metres social distancing for family members at drop off and pickup times, frequent hand-washing and disinfecting of communal areas.

At all times, the aim of the nursery’s staff is to keep life as close to normal as possible for children; give cuddles if they become upset during the day and to only wear face masks for temperature checks.

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The nursery, which has kept more than 100 of its centres open throughout the  coronavirus crisis to support key worker families and vulnerable children, has looked to its colleagues in Australia, North America and in particular south-east Asia for learning, and is confident its measures protect families in its care.

Emily Brimson-Keight, head of safety at Busy Bees, said:

“We are constantly sharing ideas and looking at best practice to ensure the personal and emotional wellbeing for children and team members.”

Ripon city centre cafe Oliver’s Pantry is welcoming customers once more with the launch of a takeaway service – and aims to do more in the coming weeks.

For owners Tim and Lou Grant, the hope, along with other businesses in the hospitality sector, is for social distancing restrictions to ease from the current two metres to one metre.

They are planning for the day when customers can sit in to eat the buns, cakes, pastries and meringues upon which the cafe has built its reputation.

Lou told The Stray Ferret:

“We are making tentative steps as we test the water and think about what can be achieved in the space we have available, while meeting all of the social distancing and hygiene requirements, brought about by the coronavirus crisis”

She added:

“We have had a purpose-made perspex screen put in place at the counter and it’s one customer in at a time for the takeaway service, where a one way system operates.”

Things have gone well and Lou and Tim and are quietly optimistic, while also being realistic as they adapt to the ‘new normal’ that will see them having to reduce the number of tables they have by approximately half to comply with the two metres of distance rule.

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The couple celebrate the eighth anniversary of running Oliver’s Pantry next month and will continue with their Wednesday to Sunday service between 10am and 3pm each day. They hope that members of the team currently on furlough will be able to start returning as business builds up again.

During lockdown, the Grants put many messages of hope in the window of the North Street cafe and have kept in touch with customers daily through social media, including cookery demonstrations run on line by Lou. She said:

“We have had some very kind messages from our customers and it has been lovely to see some of them again over the past few days.”

With social distancing restrictions in place, the coronavirus crisis has impacted on the way in which families and friends are able to say their final farewells to loved ones.

Harrogate Crematorium currently permits a maximum of 10 people to enter the chapel building for a service, but funeral directors are using the technology to ensure that meaningful services can still be held while ever lockdown limits reduce attendance at cremations and burials.

Sarah Jones (pictured) founder of Full Circle Funerals, of Skipton Road, Harrogate said:

” In recent weeks we’ve seen lots of innovations successfully enter the industry that would have been unheard of a couple of months ago.

“We are now helping to organise online ceremonies, using video conferencing software, which has been very successful. Friends and family can also provide messages, drawings, flowers from their garden, or even personal items to go on or in the coffin, which can all play a profound and significant part in the grieving process. It also helps people deal with the fact that they are not able to carry the coffin for the person who has died, which many people have struggled with.”

The technology means celebrants can still lead ceremonies, or people can do this themselves and share the event online and include as many friends and family in it, regardless of where they are in the world.

The family of father of four and grandfather of seven, Bruce Hammond, who died from Covid-19 aged 89-year-old, arranged his funeral through Full Circle.

Daughter, Jo Hammond, said that after considering the social distancing restrictions that would limit the number able to celebrate his life:

“We decided to fully embrace what we could do, rather than thinking about what we couldn’t do.

“As the hearse left the family home, family and neighbours lined the street. We then held a service using Zoom that approximately 60 people logged into, with a couple of people watching on each screen, and one of his grandchildren logged in from Germany.”

In 2018, Sarah Jones wrote and published Funerals Your Way: A Person-Centred Approach to Planning a Funeral, and the book quickly became a successful seller on Amazon.

Ripon Amateur Operatic Society, is determined that its show will go on.

The society, which is celebrating its 80th anniversary this year, was due to stage ‘Oliver’ at Harrogate Theatre – a major production that would have brought much-needed revenue to support other activities.

Committee member Hannah Ruddy, told The Stray Ferret:

“We were due to have a four-day run at Harrogate Theatre in April and eight weeks beforehand had sold 40 percent of the tickets for our performances – a very healthy position to be in two months ahead of the opening curtain, but then COVID-19 meant that we had to postpone.”

Harrogate Theatre, itself in lockdown, announced last week that it had raised £40,000 in an emergency fundraising campaign and has agreed alternative dates next April, when the society, will be able to come back once more with its ‘Oliver’ production.

The society, which moved to its new base in Allhallowgate, Ripon in 2015, where there is a maximum seating capacity of 120, has been staging its major productions at Harrogate Theatre for many years. It had other fundraising activities cancelled, including an 80th anniversary dinner scheduled for next month, so the search is on for other funding sources.

The fingers of members are tightly crossed in the hope that the lockdown will have eased sufficiently later this year, for the musical ‘Chicago’ be staged between 23rd and 29th November at the Allhallowgate venue.

To off-set the cost of holding eight performances over seven days, a fundraising  page has been set up at www.gofundme.com/f/ripon-operatic-society for anybody wishing to make a donation.

In addition to looking forward to the re-start of rehearsals and future performances, the society is in the process of making its Allhallowgate base a community arts hub, providing a rare space in the city that other performing and artistic groups can use.

Hannah pointed out:

“Though we have been temporarily held up in our plans, I think about Oliver and the first line of the musical, which asks: ‘Is it worth the waiting for?’  and I know that the answer from all of our members is a resounding yes!”

The Bishop of Ripon, the Rt. Rev Dr Helen-Ann Hartley, she says she’s received a call yesterday evening from the city’s MP Julian Smith.

Dr Hartley, told The Stray Ferret that ” it was good of him to be in touch” but did not want to share more details of the conversation.

The call from Mr Smith came at the end of a day which saw the Mayor of Ripon Councillor Eamon Parkin, and two of his mayoral predecessors Councillor Pauline McHardy and Councillor Stuart Martin all united in their condemnation of an email to the Bishop that read, ‘keep out of politics, or it will be the death of you’.

This death threat and similarly-worded threats made to the Bishop of Newcastle Christine Hardman and John Inge, the Bishop of Worcester, have been reported to the police in their respective diocese.

The Bishop, who took over her role in Ripon in 2018, received a number of hateful messages, alongside ones of support, after saying in a tweet that she disagreed with the way in which Prime Minister Boris Johnson had condoned the actions of his key adviser Dominic Cummings, who travelled 260 miles with his wife and young son from London to Durham at the height of the coronavirus lockdown.

Mr Cummings has subsequently come under fire from almost 40 Conservative MPs, who  have found his actions unacceptable and called for him to be dismissed. Among those making that call is Harrogate and Knaresborough MP Andrew Jones.

Following our initial story on Tuesday, the majority of Stray Ferret readers posting on Facebook, said they supported the bishop and her right to speak on the impact that politics has on people’s lives.

Dr Hartley, said:

“I am encouraged by the kind words that I have read and heard.”

News that local radio station Stray FM will be coming off the air later this year has been met with dismay.

The station, based at Hornbeam Park, has been serving the district for 26 years, but owner Bauer Media, which purchased Stray FM from UKRD last March has announced it will become part of a national network with “nationally known presenters” and will continue to provide news, travel, weather and other local information under the Greatest Hits Radio brand.

The change is a particularly heavy blow to Knaresborough Lions, which has been running Knaresborough Bed Race for many years with Stray FM as its media partner.

Kevin Lloyd, who is the Lions’ Bed Race Chairman, told the Stray Ferret:

“This is terrible news for us and other charities and organisations across the district, as a community-focused radio station, they have been fantastic advocates for all kinds of causes from their local heroes awards to the incredible support that they have given us over the years in making the Bed Race the highly successful and much-enjoyed event that it is today.”

The Knaresborough Bed Race draws in lots of visitors. Photo: Andrew Hawkes/Knaresborough Bed Race

Mr Lloyd, says that lines of communication are being kept open with Bauer Media, which has supported the development of the Virtual Bed Race to be held in place of the real event on Saturday 13th June. However, he doesn’t know if there will be a continuing relationship beyond this year, as Stray FM becomes Greatest Hits Radio.

John Fox, chair of Harrogate at Christmas, said he was devastated by Bauer’s announcement, which affects Stray FM and nine other local radio stations in the UK.

He, said:

“Stray FM is deeply-rooted in the Harrogate Community. In times of flooding, or disruptive weather, we could count on Stray FM to keep us informed, to get us safely to work or home. They are always there to promote and support community events.”

One such event, was the annual switch on ceremony for the Christmas lights in Harrogate at which Stray FM’s team were ever-present to support and cover the official start of the festive season in the town.

Mr Fox, pointed out: “Audiences grew from around 300 to thousands.”

Mark Smith, managing direction of the Ripley-based HACS construction group has been a listener for many years and said:

“Stray FM  have been a great asset to the local community, supporting many events across the locality from Knaresborough Bed Race to the Great Yorkshire Show, as well as many charities – they will be sorely missed.”

Three Mayors have spoken out in support of the Bishop of Ripon, the Rt Rev. Dr Helen-Ann Hartley, following news that she received a death threat after commenting on the way in which Boris Johnson, supported Dominic Cummings’ decision to travel from London to Durham at the height of the coronavirus lockdown.

Current Mayor of Harrogate and former Ripon City Mayor, Councillor Stuart Martin, along with Mayor of Ripon Councillor Eamon Parkin and three-times mayor of the city, Councillor Pauline McHardy, were united in their condemnation after Dr Hartley received an email  which read ‘stay out of politics, or it will be the death of you’.

Cllr Martin, whose wife, April  is recovering well after being seriously ill and hospitalised with coronavirus, told The Stray Ferret:

“Irrespective of the whys and wherefores of what the bishop had to say, we have a right to freedom of speech and people should be able to express their views without fear of retribution.”

Cllr Parkin said:

“As soon as I heard the news, I contacted Helen-Ann to offer her my support. I was shocked to read that she had been threatened for saying what she honestly believes. She is a very good friend to me and a very good friend to our city.”

Those sentiments were echoed by three-times Ripon Mayor and Harrogate District Councillor Pauline McHardy, who added:

“It is horrific to think that such a wonderful and highly-respected person as Bishop Helen-Ann should be threatened and frightened in this way. I’m absolutely appalled.”

While civic leaders in Ripon spoke out in support of Dr Hartley, constituency MP Julian Smith remains quiet. He was approached by The Stray Ferret yesterday morning and again this morning for his reaction to the threat made to the bishop and also asked whether he feels that Mr Cummings should be dismissed or allowed to stay on as senior adviser to the Prime Minister.

More than a quarter of Yorkshire’s 26 Conservative MPs have called for Boris Johnson to dismiss Mr Cummings – including Andrew Jones, MP for Harrogate and Knaresborough.

The death threats to Dr Hartley and at least two other Church of England bishops, have been reported to the police and she told The Stray Ferret that she had never previously received a death threat, felt frightened and thought about  the late Jo Cox MP, who was murdered in the street outside her Batley and Spen constituency office in June 2016.

We contacted the Bishop’s office and, at the time of going to press, she had not been contacted personally by Julian Smith.