The Glaven Valley Benefice CLEY PARISH COUNCIL
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The decision has been taken. Alea iacta est. The council has voted to not keep the flood warning sirens. The reasoning was simple: the main part of the village is now well-protected from surge tides and has no need of such a system while those who are still vulnerable probably wouldn't be able to hear it; there are doubts as to the robustness and longevity of the operating systems behind the sirens, the expected high cost of taking them over and the likelihood that even if we did pay to retain the sirens the police would not let us use them - when there was a flood at Walcot not long ago, the police refused to allow the sirens to be used even though the poor residents were by that time waist deep in water. There will be no cost to this parish when the system is finally dismantled.

On the subject of the boys in blue, PC Blakeley from the Wells Safer Neighbourhood Team came to talk to us about crime in Cley. It didn't take long. For the record here are the crime statistics for the last 12 months, or at least I hope they are: my notes got a bit garbled so I e-mailed PC Blakeley from the SNT web-site a week or so back to confirm the figures... and he hasn't replied. Anyway, I think this is what he said: Three burglaries, all committed at unoccupied premises.

• Three thefts, one of heating oil, one of an outboard motor, and the third from a car at the NWT visitor centre.
• In addition there were a couple of 'domestics' and the odd bit of mindless vandalism by local yobs.

Not a lot really. It would be even less if villains didn't take holidays, particularly when they turn into working holidays - one of the thieves nabbed recently lived in King's Lynn. In the past others have been from Newark and the Leicester area.

While browsing the police web-site (www.norfolk.police.uk), I discovered that this last month they have been running a `spamnesty' [groan] in conjunction with Norfolk Trading Standards where residents are, or rather were, encouraged to take in copies of dodgy mail, either conventional or electronic, in the probably vain hope that some of the perpetrators might be within their jurisdiction and thus catchable. There is an awful lot of the stuff around these days particularly on the intemet, all of it aimed at parting you from your money, so be careful. By the time you read this the spamnesty' will be over which will save them being snowed under by a lot of misleading junk mail designed to part people from their votes. Yup the elections are coming, presumably on 6 May.

There was another missive from the Boundary Committee. Their proposal to abolish all the district councils and to make the County into a Unitary Authority has been sent to the Minister for her decision. At the beginning of the process, the Minister (it might even have been the same one) laid down five conditions that had to be met by any proposal: that it be affordable, that it should have the broad agreement of the people of Norfolk, that it should give neighbourhood empowerment, that it should result in strategic leadership, and give value for money. At least two of those criteria are so nebulous as to be frankly meaningless, and even the Boundary Committee have expressed doubts about the their scheme's ability to fulfil the first two criteria, which means the only logical thing for the Minister to do is to put the whole sorry scheme in the rubbish bin where it belongs. Which is precisely what she has done! In addition she has granted Norwich City Council the unitary status they so desperately wanted (subject to parliamentary approval). Yes, a last minute check of the Ministry web-site revealed the following statement from Rosie Winterton and saved me from a fateful of egg:

"Across Norfolk; Devon and Suffolk we listened carefully to all views and it was clear the options of unitary structures for the whole of Norfolk and Devon had no support. As a result the Government had no option but to rule out unitary authorities for the whole of Norfolk and Devon as we did not feel these bodies could succeed without local support".

So, a good result for all, except possibly the power-hungry droogs at County Hall, and much needed proof that they do actually listen - if you shout loudly enough. It almost restores my faith in the political process. Almost.
The last time I checked, the bottle bank was almost full and indeed overflowing. It gives me no pleasure at all to report that the 'Clear Glass' container still receives about 5% coloured glass which means either that there is more than one twerp who can't read, or the one-and-only must be so paralytic it's a miracle he could even find the bottle bank. Hey ho.

The next meeting of the Cley Parish Council will be on Tuesday 2 March, starting at 7pm, Councillor Eeyore in the chair as usual.

Richard Kelham