Darcy is the star of the show

23/08/2009 by Steve Barclay.

Opened the Wimblington Village Fun Day on Sunday.  Darcy, a popular trainee guide dog for the blind was there with trainer and South Cambridgeshire County Councillor John Reynolds.  Chatting with John I discovered that each guide dog takes 13 months to train, with Darcy already 9 months into her training.  A pure bred golden retriever, Darcy is sponsored by BBC Radio Cambridgeshire with listeners having donated their old mobile phones to raise the £5,000 required for training.  To find out more about Darcy click HERE.

Whilst at the Wimblington Fun Day I catch up with a number of familiar faces including Sylvia Mansfield who is doing such great work with Breathe Easy Fenland, and meet up with event organiser Maureen Davis.  Community events like this take a great deal of work and it is thanks to Maureen and her helpers that the children are all enjoying the bouncy castle, face painting and other facilities they have arranged.   It is also surprising to see the fantastic new allotments in Wimblington - they have been in place less than a year and it is the first time I have seen them.  It is clear from the allotment holders that there is a wonderful community spirit, and the produce being grown looks very impressive.  The next step is to get a hut, and the fun day will have helped with raising funds.

The day before on Saturday involved my regular programme of coffee meetings, with a morning meeting in Gorefield and an afternoon meeting in March.  A wide range of issues raised and it is really helpful to get an update on what is impacting local businesses and families.  These range from economic issues - it is for clear for example that there are no signs of any green shoots in the building trade where bank finance remains a problem - to the specific such as the lack of a lottery machine in the local post office.  A lottery machine would help get people to go into the village store to buy other products.  Where rural post offices have recently closed their services have not been allocated to those remaining which is another missed opportunity.  A chance for me to flag the new policy the Conservative Party has set out which raises the bar with tougher criteria before a rural post office can be closed, recognising the wider community value they offer. Another issue raised was that only one student from Wisbech had enrolled on a brick laying course at King’s Lynn.  At some point the building trade will pick up and we should ensure planning is joined up so that students are training now to take advantage of these jobs when they emerge in the future.  This is an issue I know Cllr Alan Melton and Fenland District Council are keen to tackle with more support for vocational training, so a point to mention to him when we next catch up.

Throughout the week-end it is perfect sunshine - whether sitting in the gardens at the Gorefield and March coffee meetings on Saturday or at the Wimblington Fun Day on Sunday.  The Fens look stunning.

Sunday evening was an opportunity to catch Griff Rhys Jones on BBC1 completing his Rivers programme by canoeing on the Fens - including the Forty Foot.  It showcased the Fenland landscape, and hopefully this sort of coverage will encourage more tourists to pay us visit in the future.  I am not sure however how far he canoed for - Graham Chappell put in a superb marathon canoeing effort to raise funds for the Road Safety Campaign but Griff looked like he had not even worked up a sweat.  And rather like Darcy, I think most viewers thought Cadbury was the real star of his show.
  

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