SLIP END VILLAGE HALL
MANAGEMENT COMMITTEE

Annual General Meeting
Monday 24th February
at 8.00pm in the Village Hall

The Village Hall is run by a Management Committee who, normally meet for about an hour at 8pm on the Second Monday in the month to deal with the day to day running of the hall on behalf of the Villagers. Volunteers are always welcome to become a member of the Management C’tee and all Parishioners are cordially invited to attend the AGM.


WOMEN’S INSTITUTE
Look out for the report from January in next month’s issue (sorry it arrived too late), but in February the meeting is a Mock Auction. Sothebys – eat your heart out! Ladies you are all welcome, come and pick up a bargain. We meet at the Baptist Church 3rd Tuesday in the month 7.30 – 10pm Members 70p Non-members £1.20
Patricia Crick


WATCH WIDE NEWS
January 2003
Caddington ‘s Citizen of the Year
At a parish council meeting earlier this month, the citizen of the year was announced. Congratulations are extended to Mr David Timms the area co-ordinator for the Caddington HomeWatch who was nominated and awarded this honour in recognition for all his work for the Caddington Community over the last 10 years.
David Timms has worked tirelessly on many initiatives in addition to his work (voluntarily!) as the Chairman for Home
Watch. He has been part of the Youth Forum, he works in conjunction with Wpc Carron Thompson (Caddington Beat Manger) to organise and participate in regular Caddington Community Safety days on the Village Green, where he can be found assisting with property marking, issuing general security advice and actively recruiting for new members for Home Watch. Congratulations David and thank you for all your hard work over the years, which have enabled the Caddington Home Watch to develop. Dunstable Crime Desk - by Pc Neil Cairns
From Community Safety Homewatch Dunstable. For information ring Lesley Webb 01582 473270 9.30 – 2.30 Monday to Friday.

Airport Expansion - So it's been decided!
LBC have finally taken a position on airport expansion. We quote from the resolution agreed at the Council meeting on 19th November, that will be sent to the government.

"1. The Borough Council supports the expansion of LLA to the maximum capacity in view of the regeneration of the local economy that will be delivered;
2. The new realigned runway option is preferred because it affects fewer people than other options, including use of the current runway, and because it removes the western Public Safety Zone from the urban area and places both PSZs over essentially agricultural land;
3. The Borough Council supports the development of Alconbury as a dedicated freight airport, and this should include constraining dedicated freight movements, especially at night, at other main airports in the SE."

So where does that leave local residents?

Firstly there are winners & losers. The winners are those in SW Luton, the losers are those in Wigmore, i.e. SE Luton. Of course there are also winners and losers outside the Borough too. Slip End and Caddington benefit but Tea Green is demolished as is Wigmore Valley Park. However, it is worth remembering that
this is only LBC's recommendation. South Beds are ambivalent and Herts County Council are positively against any

expansion at either Luton or Stansted. So in the end it will be the government who will choose. Their White Paper is expected in the Spring.

Where is this likely to leave LLA?
LLA have stated that they do not have the funding to build a new runway and they would prefer to extend the existing one. However, LBC's stance (if supported by the government) will give the airport the go ahead to expand on an unlimited basis even on its current alignment. What that means is more infrastructure, more pollution and more noise FOR EVERYONE. Unfortunately, LBC did not place any environmental conditions on expansion so we could have 5 years of growth with no environmental controls at all! However to be fair to LBC they do want an environmental review of all SE airports and would like a night time ban.

However there is also another alternative that could be considered, closer to the proposal in LLA's own Development Brief. This may affect even fewer people and benefit Wigmore in particular. We will pursue this with LBC. However any alternative means accepting huge expansion at Luton with all the consequences we know about. We are still of the view that any expansion must be conditional on Win Win, that is more flights for Luton but less noise and pollution for Lutonians. We will continue to pursue this as our policy stance unless you tell us otherwise.

Sent by Peter Hunt for LANAG


<

p>OPERATION CHRISTMAS CHILD - 2003
After a very successful start to their first season in charge of this area, Teresa Willson, Tony and all their helpers managed to check and pack the grand total of 2597 shoe-boxes from Luton and Dunstable. We are now thinking towards this years’ operation and are busy with ideas to encourage lots more people to help. If you would like to assist and have any spare time and can knit (only basic knitting skills are needed) we have managed to get a copy of a pattern for gloves and hats. The children are always in need of these so if you have any spare wool and would like to while away the time knitting please see the following patterns. Scarves are also needed which children might be able to help with and if anyone has a pattern for a balaclava that would be most helpful.
We are also starting to collect ‘fillers’ for any shoe-boxes which may need a bit more in and are looking out for small balls, cars, hair ornaments, stationery, small cuddly toys, toothbrushes, soap, flannel and anything else which might be useful. Also needed will be a large warehouse space – so if anyone is in the know – please remember this very worthwhile cause. It will be needed for approximately 6 weeks.
Some of last years’ team had a lovely meal at the Half Moon in Pepperstock and Tony and Teresa were given a collage of pictures taken from some of the events of last year.
Sue Cowell


REPORT FROM TERESA
By the second week in December all our hard work had came to an end and the last few Christmas boxes had been collected and were now in Chelmsford waiting to go to children in Russia. Both Tony and I decided it would be a great opportunity to revisit Operation Christmas Child at Chelmsford on the day the lorries were due to leave for Russia. After an uneventful trip we arrived at Chelmsford and to be greeted by one large articulated lorry already being loaded, Sheila Heaton, Colin Ridgewell and all the other helpers gave us a warm welcome and a hot cup of tea.( very welcome as it was a cold day) .'The atmosphere in the warehouse was electric, it was a hive of activity. The warehouse was much fuller on this visit, every where you looked there were pallets stacked with boxes waiting to be shipped out. There were still hundreds of shoeboxes to process and fortunately there was many people on hand to help. In the middle of the warehouse was a mountain of large teddies, too large for the shoeboxes and will be sent separately. Keith a man of many talents was whizzing around on the forklift truck scooping up pallets of cartons and taking then to be off loaded by a team of strong men into the lorry. While all this was going on we had chance to speak to the lorry drivers, one of which spoke very good English. He told us it would take 7days to get to Moscow and the only difficulty would be getting the lorries through the Russian customs, all the documents HAD to be in order otherwise they could refuse them entry. Sheila had done a double check of the documents just in case. To express our thanks each driver was given a parcel for their families, which contained among other things a cuddly toy. At long last the three lorries were ready to leave so we all rushed out side to wave then goodbye. The lorry drivers had put their cuddly toys in the windscreen of their cabs, which we thought was a lovely gesture. As the lorries drove away taking the 30,000 shoeboxes we were reminded on this cold morning just how much colder it is in Russia and how difficult life can be. The whole experience of being involved with OCC I have found to be very moving it has brought home to me just how important it is to love your neighbour as our self and just how powerful God is in all this and how he uses us to show his love to others no matter what their colour, creed or religion. The overwhelming generosity of giving by schools, churches, organisations and individuals; the helpers who have given their time, transport and much more; the companies who have supplied OCC with a warehouse with-out charge and a forklift supplied on loan for 6 weeks. We couldn’t have done it without you all. Thank you
Teresa Willson


EDITORS CHOICE
Happy New Year to all our readers and lets hope that it’s a good one.
Whilst browsing in one of the Charity Shops in Dunstable I came across an old ‘Friendship Book’ by Francis Gay. This one was from 1955 – 48 years ago, and I thought you might like to read some of the poems I found in it. These books are still going strong today and I wonder if some of the current books around at the moment will still be going strong in 50 years time. Somehow I think not!

To this sad truth you may as well
Be cheerfully resigned;
Although you seek, perfection is
The thing you’ll never find.
It seems to me that wisdom’s here:
To take what each day brings;
And, sighing not for heav’n below,
To make the best of things
* * * * * * * * * * * *
Should a deep depression centre
over you,
Feeling very sorry just won’t get
you through;
Raging, sulking, weeping ain’t
no use, that’s plain.
Sing! And while you’re singing,
skies will clear again.

Now, Monday morning’s something
You simply can’t evade
For every Sunday’s followed
By Monday I’m afraid.

Well then, it’s commonsense, folk
To smile your care away
And keep on smiling bravely
Until it’s Saturday!
* * * * * * * * * * * * * *
If there’s a job you simply hate,
A task you’d like to shun
I guess the sooner you begin
The sooner you’ll be done.
But when the wretched job is done,
And there’s an end of it,
My aren’t you thankful that somehow
You’d too mich pride to quit?

* * * * * * * * * * * * *
I cannot tell you how to make
A lot of money friend;
But I can tell you how to find
A joy that has no end.
You’ve but to help and cheer and bless,
And get the giving itch,
For making others happy means –
You can’t help being rich!

Hope you enjoyed them – Sue Cowell Editor



Village Diary


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