A breakaway Anglican group that rejects premarital sex and gay marriage has started holding meetings in Harrogate. 

As yet, the group has only a handful of members, but its leader, Hugh Davis, believes more discontented conservative Anglicans will join as news of it spreads. 

He said:

“Since 2008, there have been progressively retrograde steps by the Church of England to accept more liberal interpretations of the Bible. We believe these behaviours and teachings are contrary to the traditional teachings of the Bible. As these ideas percolate down to the general congregation, more people will be discomfited and, like me, think ‘what do I do now?’.

“It’s not homophobic. I’ve worked for many years with people attracted to people of the same sex. I accept their views, but I also expect them to accept mine.” 

The issue of homosexuality has long been a contentious matter in the Anglican Church. In 2008, a group of conservative bishops, many from the global south, declined to attend the Lambeth Conference in protest at the consecration Gene Robinson, the openly gay Bishop of New Hampshire. They instead convened in Jerusalem for the Global Anglican Future Conference (Gafcon). 

Just last week, the Church of England’s General Synod agreed not to change its stance on gay marriage – same-sex couples will still not be allowed to marry in church – but it backed proposals to allow prayers of blessing for same-sex couples.

The new Life Group in Harrogate is one of several under the auspices of Trinity Church Scarborough, which is part of the Anglican Mission in England (AMiE), which in turn is aligned with the Gafcon movement of Anglican orthodoxy. 

Mr Davis, who is retired, said:

“The latest teachings in the Church of England are very different from what I was taught as a boy. I wasn’t happy – I couldn’t make sense of it.

“Things moved on, so I decided I would move on too.” 

Having attended St Mark’s Church in Harrogate for 30 years, Mr Davis finally left, but stressed it was not an easy move to make. He said: 

“It was difficult, and took several months of talking to and confiding with friends. It was very painful – I’d even say that leaving the Church of England was a bigger decision than getting married.” 

The new midweek Life Group meets fortnightly in a member’s home. For more information, contact Mr Davis on 07802 833977, or email him at hughthewildfowler@btinternet.com. 

Read more:

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• Harrogate gay men welcome chance to donate blood
• ‘Why I’m a Harrogate Quaker‘

The leaders of opposition political groups on North Yorkshire County Council have criticised plans to fill the void left by the abolition of seven district councils by launching 30 unelected and unfunded “community networks”.

A series of concerns have been raised ahead of the council’s executive next Tuesday, which will consider establishing community networks to act as the “engine rooms” for social and economic change.

The leaders of the Liberal Democrat, Labour, Green and Independent groups, which collectively secured 59% of the votes at last May’s election, said both they and some members of the ruling Conservative group, which has a two-seat majority, had significant reservations over the move.

A statement issued by the council on Tuesday, said the networks, which it is hoped will include representatives of organisations, such as parish councils, police and the NHS, were being seen as “a hugely important element of the new North Yorkshire Council”, which will be launched on April 1.

It is hoped the networks will build on existing relationships and partnerships between the public, private and community and voluntary sectors, including the close working arrangements that were developed during the covid pandemic.

Cllr Carl Les, leader of North Yorkshire County Council.

The statement highlighted how the networks would include councillors and receive support from senior council officers, but would be independent of the new authority and be responsible for driving forward action plans centred on a specific area’s priorities.

County council leader, Cllr Carl Les, said: 

“While North Yorkshire Council will cover the largest geographical area of any local authority in the country, we are committed to being the most local too.

“The community networks will be invaluable to ensuring that the voices of communities across North Yorkshire are heard, and that local needs and priorities can be addressed.”

‘Don’t seem to make much sense’

Labour group leader Cllr Steve Shaw Wright said while the proposed organisations were “a start”, due to their lack of powers the networks would “end up like talking shops where people come and tub thump” and feature parishes with vastly different budgets and priorities.

He said: 

“They don’t seem to make much sense at the moment. My patch is so diverse, trying to get something that works for everybody is going to be difficult.”

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Cllr Andy Brown, leader of the Green group, said he did not understand how community networks would help and that there was a risk of confusion between the roles of parish and town councils, the county authority’s area constituency committees and the unitary council and mayoral combined authority.

He said: 

“I don’t understand when they were approved or how their geography was determined. My biggest concern is nobody consulted the local councillors about the geography of these networks.

“If you are going to have community networks they have to be communities.”

Independent group leader Cllr Stuart Parsons said the community networks would have “no power to make decisions or determine anything”.

He said: 

“How these organisations are supposed to have any impact is beyond me. 

“For example, if a Community Network was to make a recommendation to increase bus services the unitary council’s executive could just turn round and say it can’t afford it. There’s nothing for these networks to have any bite.”

Cllr Bryn Griffiths, the leader of the Liberal Democrat group, said although it was positive that members of communities would be working together to achieve a common goal, there were issues over the networks’ governance, accountability and how they would be financed.

He said: 

“There is potential for these networks to be hijacked by individuals for their own purposes and the role of elected members could be circumvented. I also have concerns they will go their own way and do their own thing.”

The Otley Road cycleway in Harrogate has cost £2,234,000 so far  — almost triple the amount awarded to contractors to construct the first phase.

Hull civil engineering firm PBS Construction was awarded £827,000 in 2021 to build phase one from Harlow Moor Road to Cold Bath Road.

The much-criticised route opened in January last year but subsequent remedial work and design fees for phase two of the project — which has since been scrapped — increased the cost significantly.

The widening of the Otley Road and Harlow Moor Road junction was the main remedial work.

The figures are contained in a North Yorkshire County Council report, which raises questions over whether the council had sufficient funds to complete the second phase of the scheme.

Councillor Keane Duncan, the Conservative executive member for highways and transportation at North Yorkshire County Council, said phase two had been dropped because it lacked public support.

But the report reveals the council has just £565,000 remaining of the £4,275,000 it secured in 2018 from the government’s National Productivity Investment Fund for measures that enabled development and business growth in west Harrogate

The funding and spending figures contained in the report are reproduced below.

According to the document, council officers received “multiple reports” about the design and construction of the cycleway from residents and groups such as Harrogate District Cycle Action after it opened. It adds:

“These were then reviewed with our design consultants WSP, and a list of remedial works have now been prepared.

“These remedial works were planned to be completed in the early part of 2023. However, in May 2022 the fibre optic network company City Fibre contacted North Yorkshire County Council with a request to install fibre optic cables down the full length of the newly constructed cycleway.

“We have negotiated with City Fibre to reinstate the full width of the cycleway at their expense. We will therefore carry out our outstanding remedial works once City Fibre have installed their apparatus.”

The report adds £60,000 of the remaining funds are expected to cover these remedial works.

Read more:

• Harrogate’s Otley Road to be dug up again
• Confirmed: second phase of Harrogate’s Otley Road cycle route scrapped

The council has said it will come up with new traffic calming measures in the west of Harrogate to compensate for scrapping phase two of the scheme, which would have extended the cycleway from Cold Bath Road towards Beech Grove.

It still has aspirations to construct phase three out of town to Cardale Park at an unspecified time in the future.

North Yorkshire County Council’s highways area manager Melisa Burnham said:

“Although construction costs increased to £970,000 following completion, this was still within our anticipated budget. The increase was a result of additional design works and remedials found whilst on site.

“The remaining costs include design, feasibility, surveys and utility diversions required to deliver phase one and two of the cycleway, and the Harlow Moor Road junction improvement to date.”

North Yorkshire County Council has revealed plans to expand places at Springwater School in Starbeck.

The authority’s executive will discuss plans on Tuesday to create an additional 45 places at the school.

Springwater School, which is based off High Street, teaches children aged two to 19 with “profound and multiple, severe or physical difficulties”.

A report due before councillors says the move would help to provide “more local, quality in-house special school places” within the county.

As part of the plan, the council intends to spend £3.1 million from its High Needs Provision Capital Allocation, which is granted by government.

However, Gary Fielding, strategic director of resources at the council, said in a report it was “disappointing” the amount of funding allocated to the council.

He said:

“Whilst it is appreciated that the Department for Education has prioritised resources to address limited capacity in special schools nationally, it is disappointing that the level of funding allocated to NYCC is the lowest in the country (expressed in terms of £ per pupil aged 2 to 18).”

Senior councillors will make a decision on the proposal at a meeting on February 21.

Read more:

• Starbeck special needs school rated ‘good’ by Ofsted
• Children at Starbeck school plant new community garden

Police have issued an appeal after an attempted house burglary on Bramham Drive in Jennyfields this week.

The incident happened on Monday between 2.15pm and 3pm.

Officers said “significant damage” was caused to the doors of the house, but the suspect failed to gain entry.

Police added that a driver of a dark coloured Seat Leon with a registration containing “70” was seen at the time of the attempted burglary.

The driver is described as a young white man with a round face, about 5ft 8in tall, with short dark hair and wearing a dark hoodie.

A North Yorkshire Police statement added:

“Anyone with information that could assist the investigation should email elizabeth.parry@northyorkshire.police.uk or call 101, select option 2, and ask for Elizabeth Parry.

“If you wish to remain anonymous, you can pass information to Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111.

“Please quote the North Yorkshire Police reference number 12230027326 when providing details.”

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New Look is to close its store in Harrogate’s Victoria Shopping Centre.

Signs have gone up in the window of the shop saying it will close on February 26.

The fashion retailer sells women’s clothing at its large Harrogate site, which is particularly popular with teenage girls.

A source at the store said customers and staff were “gutted and upset” at the news. They added that the company wanted to remain in Harrogate but finding a vacant store large enough had proved difficult.

The Stray Ferret understands about eight jobs are affected by the news. The nearest New Look shops are in Leeds and York.

A New Look spokesperson said:

 “As part of the normal course of business, New Look occasionally closes sites, but also opens new stores when the right opportunities arise.

“Our most recent new openings were in November 2022 and we have plans for further openings in the first half of this year.”

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• Harrogate’s Crescent Gardens to get £21,000 makeover and new name

The Stray Ferret contacted the Victoria Shopping Centre this morning for further details but was told it had no information to share on the matter.

The news comes less than two weeks after River Island closed its Harrogate store.

New Look, which was founded in 1969, has about 440 shops in the UK.

The Unsung Hero Award is sponsored by The Big Bamboo Agency.

The Harrogate marketing and PR firm provides creative solutions to its clients.

The company’s expertise is delivering specialist strategies, brand development and website and social media management.

The Unsung Hero Award is designed to shine a light on individuals who are not only integral to the day to day, but are prepared to go the extra mile without prompt or payment.

The Finalists

Kayti Mewis, Mumbler

Kayti joined Mumbler as volunteer after moving to Harrogate and is now the Content Creator and Social Media Manager.

Sally Haslewood, Founder of Mumbler, said,

“Kayti immediately got stuck in and wrote countless blogs for me, all focused on her life as a young mum in Harrogate.

“Kayti is a joy to work with. To be honest, I don’t know what I would have done if she’d turned down the role, as she had fast become my right-hand woman”.

Kayti has added value across the whole company, including working in the sales sector, creating inspiration for parents during lockdown and is even due to co-present the Harrogate Mumbler Awards in November.

Kayti Mewis said:

“I’m absolutely delighted to be nominated for this award – let alone shortlisted!  Harrogate Mumbler is such an important resource for parents and carers in the area.

“Harrogate is a great place for families to live, and having a job which involves shouting about how great it is, is brilliant!”

Chris Ashby, Harrogate BID

In 2021, Harrogate BID recruited Chris Ashby to deep cleaning Harrogate town centre.

As the town’s Street Ranger Chris Ashby has delivered staggering results from his work and faced situations no one wants to face.

He has removed 126 graffiti tags, improved 38 building façades, disposed of 57 used needles and painted numerous bits of street furniture.

His actions in July last year hit the headlines when he rescued a person he found hanging from a tree in the town centre.

Matthew Chapman, Manager of Harrogate BID, said:

“We nominated Chris as, not only is the work he delivers top notch and making an evidential difference on a daily basis, but he is also somewhat of a Harrogate Ambassador. Chris reacts to the day job instantly, is offering regular and positive good mornings, hellos, helping with directions, alongside supporting some of the most vulnerable.

“As a sole person covering a huge area, Chris’s work has now become the norm. We have nominated him because, if there wasn’t a Chris, Harrogate would be very different place”.

Jago Wallace, Himalayan Garden

Jago Wallace’s “quiet determination” and passion for gardening has found him shortlisted for Unsung Hero.

Jago, a gardener at Ripon’s Himalayan Garden, began his horticulture career aged 17 and, six years later, has full responsibility for the gardens Plant Nursery. He also oversees the gardens National Collection of Rhododendrons. His duties involve knowledgeable plant care, training others, writing reports, keeping plant records and hosting talks and tours of the collection.

Jago always acts as a media spokesperson for the garden and is continuously developing new ideas for activities and features within the business.

Jago’s colleagues describe him as “a humble, gentle soul, who always surprises with his humour, willingness and knowledge”.

Jago said:

“It’s lovely to have been picked as a finalist for this award. Working at such an amazing garden with rare and incredibly interesting plants, the conservation we do helps these plants that are in danger in the wild from habitat loss, is hugely rewarding work.

“Being able to do this where I grew up and live makes what I do feel even more magical.”

The Stray Ferret Business Award event sponsor is Prosperis. To find more and to purchase tickets for the big night, click here.

A former local government ombudsman has launched a withering attack on two councils’ consultation over a North Yorkshire devolution deal.

Local government expert Anne Seex raised a litany of questions over the quality and results of the eight-week exercise to assess public support for a mayoral combined authority and government funding deal negotiated by City of York Council and North Yorkshire County Council.

However, a meeting of the county council’s executive heard just a single concern raised about the consultation’s mixed findings – that the deal could lead to an increase in bureaucracy – with numerous members instead expressing their excitement about the potential benefits of devolution.

Ex-ombudsman Mrs Seex told the meeting it was clear that those who took part in the consultation exercise in North Yorkshire had seen “more disadvantages than advantages” to the deal.

While the council has claimed “widespread support” for the devolution deal, Mrs Seex said online responses to the consultation amounted to just 0.3% of the electorate, which she described as a “pitifully small” sample.

She said advice from the Consultation Institute it had employed to help run the consultation that the consultation had been good was “a case of a private company marking its own homework”.

Mrs Seex told the meeting: 

“The exercise that you have undertaken is better described as marketing.

“The information to the public was purely promotional and omitted important contextual information about the scheme, such as the only directly elected position would be the mayor, that York city would have three times the representation of North Yorkshire with two members for 200,000-plus people and North Yorkshire having two members for 600,000-plus people.”

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She said the powers of elected councillors on the York and North York authorities would be “sucked up” by the mayoral combined authority, rather than being devolved down.

Mrs Seex said the combined authority was set to be allowed to call in planning applications and make decisions against local views, while the funding attached to the deal was £200 million less than the two councils had asked for, and that government funding could not be relied on and could be subject to reviews.

She said: 

“The funding amounts to £222 per person per year while council spending across the North has been reduced by £431 per person per year.”

She added most of the powers being trumpeted as being given to the combined authority were already in the hands of the councils.

Mrs Seex said the consultation results provided no breakdown of how York and North Yorkshire residents had responded and that it was crucial that elected community representatives across the county were aware of how their residents had responded to the exercise.

James Farrar, of the York and North Yorkshire LEP.

James Farrar, chief officer of North Yorkshire Local Enterprise Partnership, which helped run the consultation, said the structure and content of the consultation had been shared with government officials before being launched and that details of the full devolution deal had been shared with the public.

He said: 

“This was not a consultation on the relative merits of devolution. We were consulting on the scheme. 

“The scheme sets out how the devolution deal will be implemented, it was therefore important we focus on the key elements in the scheme.”

Mr Farrar added the Consultation Institute had been employed due its experience in helping authorities examine support for devolution deals.

He said the ultimate decision over whether the authorities had met legal requirements lay with the councils and it would be for the government to assess the suitability of the consultation.

Cllr Carl Les, leader of the council, said the executive would forego its power to send the results of the consultation to the government for consideration, and instead invite all the authority’s elected members to voice their views at a meeting later this month.

He said he was delighted the authority had reached a position where it could progress towards achieving beneficial devolution deals, such as the one in neighbouring Teesside, and a point where North Yorkshire and York would have a more powerful voice.

A tree has been planted at a care home in Starbeck as a living memorial to those who suffered or lost their lives to covid.

The tree, which is one of eight making up a new North Yorkshire tree trail, was planted on Monday at county council-run care home, Station View, by Councillor Michael Harrison, North Yorkshire County Council’s executive member for health and adult services.

The tree in Starbeck was the fourth of eight being planted by the council as part of its tree trail.

It follows planting ceremonies at County Hall in Northallerton, the Meadowfields Extra Care housing scheme in Thirsk, and the Fernbank Court Extra Care scheme in Selby.

Further ceremonies will be held at the county council’s Aireville Nurseries in Skipton, Sycamore Hall in Bainbridge, as well as Scarborough’s Cedear Court Extra Care complex and Deansfield Court Extra Care in Norton, Malton.

Cllr Harrison said:

“The covid-19 pandemic had tragic consequences for many people in North Yorkshire and it is important that we remember that loss, while also recognising the efforts of many people who worked to keep people safe.

“This tree trail will provide a permanent living memorial where local residents will be able to reflect on their experiences, if they so wish, and also to act as reminder of the way our communities pulled together to help each other.”

According to the latest data from the government, more than 1,700 people have lost their lives linked to the covid pandemic in North Yorkshire.

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• Covid doorstep photographers to open Harrogate town centre studio
• Harrogate district’s economic growth slow after £438 million hit from covid

The Stray Ferret Business Awards, sponsored by Prosperis, will be held on March 9 at the Pavilions of Harrogate. The event will celebrate success and business excellence across the Harrogate district. It’s a night not to be missed! There’ll be a fabulous prize draw for all attending and Richard Flinton, the incoming Chief Executive of North Yorkshire Council, is guest speaker. You can purchase tickets here.

Raworths solicitors in Harrogate has announced the promotion of Adam Colville-Robins to an associate in the Dispute Resolution team.

The new role will see Adam continue his work for commercial and private clients on cases involving property or contractual disputes, as well as debt recovery.

Adam’s appointment is the latest in a series of senior promotions over the past year overseen by managing partner, Simon Morris.

Mr Morris said:

“We are committed to nurturing talent across the firm at every level, from working with our trainee solicitors to complete their qualifications to supporting senior team members develop specialist knowledge in their chosen fields.

“In addition to providing legal training and support to its staff, Raworth’s has also trained three of its employees to become ‘mental health first aiders.”

Deborah Boylan, Raworths’ people partner, said:

“It’s a challenging recruitment market and candidates are now looking beyond salaries and client portfolios; it’s also about workplace culture and a supportive environment.”

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Bettys supports Brain Tumour Charity

The Bettys Bakery and Cookery School is raising money for Yorkshire’s Brain Tumour Charity (YBTC), which marks 20 years of supporting patients and carers in March.

The decision to support the charity comes after Bettys employee, Dave Smith, was diagnosed with a grade 4 glioblastoma.

Dave and colleague on walking challenge to raise money

Dave’s colleagues at the cookery school have raised more than £7,000 for YBTC since November, with a target to raise £20,000 by the end of the year.

The £20,000 goal commemorates both the charity’s 20th birthday and the 20 years Dave has worked for Betty’s.

During Brain Tumour Awareness Month, which coincides with the charity’s birthday in March, YBTC will encourage supporters to wear flat caps and meet for a pint or a cuppa as part of their Flat Cap Brew campaign.

Bettys will be hosting their own Flat Cap Brew in the bakery, and running a ‘wear your best hat’ photo competition.

Marie Peacock, CEO of YBTC said:

“We want everyone to get together for a Flat Cap Brew that is bigger, better and more ‘Yorkshire’ than ever to help us celebrate 20 years of funding research and support for patients and families.”