CLLR MHB BLOG

Saturday 11 July

At 8 am, before the sun got too high, I went down to our local river to do my monthly water-test for the West Country Rivers Trust. The river was low, slow and 17.7 C. - two degrees higher than last month. Salmon and trout cannot thrive at 18-19 C.

Local Green Party members reported seeing ‘Reform’ posters attached to lamp posts on Eastern Avenue in Barnstaple and beside the Link Road near South Molton. Presumably they are elsewhere in our division too. I emailed our excellent county cllr Ed Tyldesley to ask if he can inform the appropriate team at Devon Highways: he emailed back straight away that he’ll do that.

Sunday 12 July

Another draining epic - England 2 Norway 1 - with Jude Bellingham the hero once again. How splendid that Bellingham now represents heroic Englishness while Kylian Mpappé does the same for France. I greatly enjoy the Guardian’s match commentaries by text and, as a special treat when I have time, the Guardian Football Weekly hosted by Max Rushden. Watching England is not always a pleasure but it is something like an obligation for many, I suspect - part of a long narrative that stretches back to pre-teen years kicking a ball about in a garden and being (in my case) Bobby Charlton.

Monday 13 July

The novelist Geoff Dyer wittily remarked that much of a writer’s life is clerical. That’s true of the part of my life spent as an author and even more of my time as a cllr. The continuing heatwave was an ideal prompt to catch up on desk work. I also attended a Cllr Advocate briefing on the imminent introduction by Devon & Cornwall Police of a Facial Recognition Unit. This technology has already been used in London and some other counties. It is not covert surveillance and it is subject to strict governance rules. I think the main benefit will be in apprehending shop lifters - which is, unfortunately, rampant in our area.

As the day cooled down at last I was able to do some work around the garden, including lifting a couple of rows of my First Earlies. I planted them in not-completely ready compost but they came through well, with few blemishes and generally of a good size.

Tuesday 14 July

Green Press briefing: Analysis by the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) found that nearly three-quarters of UK media coverage of June’s record-breaking heatwave failed to mention climate change, despite the record-breaking temperatures.  

Green cllrs from North Devon and Torridge met Kate Jardine, a planning lawyer, to discuss the rights of rivers. Left to right: Cllr Sara Wilson, Kate, Cllr Huw Thomas, Cllr Wendy Lo-Vel, moi, Cllr Ricky Knight. Baroness Natalie Bennett has put forward a private member’s bill on Nature’s Rights in the House of Lords which has passed its second reading and is in the committee stage. Councils in Herefordshire, Kent, Oxfordshire and Sussex have acknowledged the rights of rivers and this has proved beneficial in planning decision-making.

Wednesday 15 July

The planning committee went on its annual sites visit, starting with a housing estate being built on the outskirts of North Molton. A major benefit of these visits is meeting developers and understanding their problems. The man from Cavanna Homes, a one hundred year old business based in Torquay, explained why so little housing is being built at present: there are still not enough buyers. (This is something a developer told us last summer). Costs are even higher. Ground works now cost 20-30% more because of the switch from red to white diesel. While the price of land has stayed much the same, materials and labour costs have risen steeply. I asked what solutions could be introduced. Lowering stamp duty would help immediately, Help to Buy would take longer. He spoke of ‘Additionality’ as a means by which developers can access government funding by offering more affordable housing than originally planned in a scheme. This route can make struggling developments viable. Large housing developments in Witheridge and Landkey - of some 150 dwellings each - have been reassigned from open market to social housing because housing associations are the only viable buyers. Good that all the houses Cavanna will build from now on will have air source heat pumps.

I have often referred to the strange lack of interest in current affairs shown by the BBC’s current affairs’ presenters. This week’s stand-out example was the Today programme’s Jonny Dymond questioning a climate change expert on the lines of ‘why should the UK set net zero targets when China is emitting carbon on a huge scale?’ Dymond and the editors who brief him were presumably unaware of the big and widely-reported change in the last couple of years: China’s carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions fell by 1% in the final quarter of 2025, likely securing a decline of 0.3% for the full year as a whole. This extends a “flat or falling” trend in China’s CO2 emissions that began in March 2024 and has now lasted for nearly two years. The major factors behind this shift include:
1. The Clean Energy Boom: China has more than doubled its combined wind and solar capacity in recent years. In 2025, additions to clean energy capacity outpaced the massive increases in peak electricity demand.
2. Electric Vehicle Adoption: Over half of all cars sold in China are now electric, which is curbing oil demand and reducing transportation emissions.
3. Industrial Slowdown: Reduced activity in traditional heavy industries, particularly in cement and steel production, has led to noticeable emissions drops in these sectors.

Vigil: week 139. Over 30 valiant souls bore witness despite the intense heat. The genocide continues. 82 MPs including our Greens have called for the government to end arms sales to Israel and impose trade sanctions. Why only 82?

The BBCTV’s commentator at the end of Argentina 2 England 1 uttered a cliché about ‘the wait, the pain, goes on’. Really? I look back on our World Cup triumph of 1966 with the fondest memories and have not been suffering any ‘pain’ since then - I’d just like some more glory. We certainly had many fabulous moments in this cup run but Argentina were the better team - even though Gary Lineker is surely right to call Thomas Tuchel’s tactics last night ‘unfathomable’. Argentina will provide very worthy opponents to Spain on Sunday. There are always might-have-beens: Jude Bellingham was so close to blocking the Enzo Fernandez shot.

Thursday 16 July

This morning the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government announced its long-awaited decision on our future governance. There will be four unitary councils: three greatly enlarged urban areas - Plymouth (dark green), Torbay (blue) and Exeter (red) - plus ‘Coast & Country’ (a suitably wan pale green) for the rest of us. Huge amounts of money were spent on consultants by Devon’s district councils to work out what income the larger new unitaries would need to be able to provide the services required, including social care, SEND, highway maintenance, etc. Our council joined with others to propose three new unitaries that would have had sufficient funds - ours included Exeter, for example - to help us pay for our services across a huge rural area. Will central government provide adequate funding to make its chosen system work? The Secretary of State, Steve Reed, has said that areas undergoing local government reorganisation will receive more than £1 million per new unitary created. That does not seem adequate considering the amounts necessarily paid out by the district councils on consultants, nor to deal with compensation to any redundant staff. These momentous decisions affecting communities around the country were not on The World at One. Nor was this upheaval, with very uncertain outcomes, in the Labour manifesto. Why should we trust them? The decision document refers repeatedly to growth in Devon’s urban areas but how about wellbeing for the rest of us? Will rural Devon be relegated to a dumping ground for Data Centres (aka ’national infrastructure’, not requiring local planning permission only ministerial approval)?

Friday 17 July

In the morning we helped transform our Grade 1 listed church of St James, Swimbridge into a souq for tomorrow’s jumble sale.

Wildlife. A couple of years ago I fashioned a hedgehog shelter, as above. I have cleared away the debris that had covered its entrance and placed a bowl of water nearby. I noticed today that leaves in the entrance had been displaced so something has entered the shelter - a hedgehog I hope. I’ve seen them around the garden from time to time. A hose pipe ban was announced earlier this week so I have been using water from our three rain butts to replenish the bowl and two small pools for wildlife nearby. Thank you for reading.