REPORT TO FULBROOK PC – MAY 2025
FROM CLLR NICHOLAS FIELD-JOHNSON
GENERAL OCC REPORT
END OF TERM REPORT
I would like to thank all the residents for their continuing support and I am pleased to announce that I have been re-elected as your County Councillor for the next four years or when there is a further reorganisation in Oxfordshire of local Government.
Over the next four years, I will continue to campaign on several key issues: to stop the dumping of raw sewage into our rivers; improve our roads, which are in a dire condition, by reducing the number of potholes with better, lasting repairs and continue to work on a Countywide plan to limit HGV’s using our villages and market towns as cut-throughs.
The main issue and message on the door-step during my campaign was the awful condition of the roads in Oxfordshire and the multiple re-occurring potholes. I will campaign to find a better material to mend these potholes and look towards the material used in Europe which is a combination of asphalt, rubber silicon and re-cycled tyres. This last much longer and adheres to the pothole. We need to improve on the current 60-year-old material used for potholes in the UK.
BURFORD BRIDGE PAVEMENT AND HGV UPDATE.
In the April meeting, Burford Town Council has approved for OCC to go ahead and install bollards on either side of Burford bridge to provide a better pedestrian walkway. This is an interim measure prior to a more permanent solution to be found (which will require further funding).
The County-wide HGV study continues and slow progress has been made which remains frustrating to us all in Burford. Data collection is the current priority and recommendations should be forthcoming later this year.
LOCAL GOVERNMENT REORGANISATION AND DEVOLUTION
Councils across Oxfordshire have agreed a reply to a government request for interim proposals on the shape of local government reorganisation in the county – with OCC outlining its preferred option for a single county unitary council.
What are the options being submitted?
Each cabinet or executive endorsed a joint response to government that sets out how local authorities in our area are collaborating to develop proposals for new unitary structures. The response included information on each of the three options being developed for Oxfordshire, in line with the criteria set out in the government’s statutory invitation.
The options are:
A single county unitary council for Oxfordshire – Oxfordshire Council. This is the preferred option of OCC.
North Oxfordshire Council (created from the existing district councils of Cherwell, Oxford City and West Oxfordshire) and Ridgeway Council (created from the existing district councils of South Oxfordshire and Vale of White Horse and the unitary council of West Berkshire).
Three unitary authorities – with a unitary city on expanded boundaries as well as northern and southern unitaries, also including West Berkshire.
Further detailed discussions will take place between the councils so that final proposals can be submitted by 28 November 2025. The government will then decide what form unitarisation will take in Oxfordshire.
SURFACE DRESSING PROGRAMME TO BEGIN THIS MONTH
Some roads across Oxfordshire will be improved as part of a highway maintenance programme beginning this spring. Surface dressing involves applying bituminous emulsion onto the road as a binder. This is followed immediately by the application of chippings to dress the emulsion layer. Details on the OCC website here: https://news.oxfordshire.gov.uk/road-resurfacing-programme-to-begin/ There is also an additional £1.5m as part of the February budget which will allow our gullies on the highway network to be cleaned once per year.
OCC Cllr Nicholas Field-Johnson, Burford & Carterton North
nick.fieldjohnson@oxfordshire.gov.uk and nfjuk3@gmail.com