Local News

Young people in Swale, with a project idea that improves the environment, or encourages others to help the environment, are being offered £500 as part of Swale’s Great Big Green Week activities, funded by the Climate Coalition.

The youth climate competition gives young people aged 11-16 years old the opportunity to get together in small groups to develop a project that benefits the environment and local community.

Cllr Julian Saunders, chair of the environment committee at Swale Borough Council, told SFM News: “We want to hear from young people about what they think we can do to improve our local environment, so we’re offering them the opportunity to turn their idea into a reality. In groups of four to six people, anyone aged 11-16 years old can take part in the competition, with the winning team being awarded £500 to carry out their plan.”

Cllr Tim Valentine, vice chair of the environment committee at the council, told SFM News: “We’ll be looking for how the project improves the environment, what benefits there’ll be for the local community, and how they plan to deliver the project, including where the materials and resources come from and how they’ll market it. We encourage applicants to be as creative as possible, using presentation slides, word documents, videos and photos to outline their ideas. You have until Thursday, 15 September to enter your idea, with the top entrants going on to present their project to a panel of judges two weeks later on Thursday, 29 September.”

Applicants must submit their ideas by Thursday, 15th September, and be available to present their project on Thursday 29th September at Swale House in Sittingbourne.

For more information about the competition, including how to apply, visit https://cee.swale.gov.uk/community/gbgw/competition.

National Highways South East have announced that soon they will be starting work on the new slip roads, and to do this safely they will be closing the eastbound (coastbound) entry and exit slips between the M2 and A249 from Monday 12th September 2022 until Friday 13rd January 2023. 

This means that there will be no access to the Stockbury roundabout from the M2 eastbound or the ability to join the M2 eastbound from the Stockbury roundabout at junction 5 during the closure.

They go on to add "we know there’s never a good time to complete this kind of work at a busy junction like this, and understand these closures will cause disruption to journeys, for which we apologise".

They say that they have "been working closely with the local authorities and emergency services to plan how we do this work, and we’ll be avoiding the main summer holiday peak. Closing the slip roads is the safest approach and causes least disruption, as it reduces the amount of time traffic management will be in place to complete this work".

In January 2023, both slip roads will re-open and access from the M2 eastbound to the A249 northbound (towards Sittingbourne) will temporarily be via the Stockbury roundabout, until the dedicated slip opens in spring 2023. 

For more information stay tuned to 106.9 SFM for the latest or visit the dedicated website link at: https://nationalhighways.co.uk/our-roads/south-east/m2-junction-5-improv....

A day of enforcement action to combat the incorrect and fraudulent use of Blue Badges has been carried out in Swale.

Kent County Council’s Counter Fraud team joined Swale Borough Council’s Parking team as they visited several streets and car parks last Thursday (4th August) to check that the badges were being used by the authorised person and in the correct way.

Throughout the day civil enforcement officers were trained on how to inspect blue badges and taught about the importance of establishing if badges were being used in accordance with the scheme. The inspections took place in Sittingbourne, Faversham and Isle of Sheppey.

Blue badge holders spoken to throughout the day, welcome the news and gave positive feedback about the need for badges to be inspected on the Borough.

In total 209 people had badges inspected and most people spoken to were using the badge in accordance with the scheme. The civil enforcement officers ceased 13 badges that had expired and spoke to an additional 13 people regarding blue badges and answered any queries that arose regarding the scheme.

The eligibility criteria change has increased the number of badges used in Kent and KCC feel that "it is paramount that available spaces are used for legitimate purposes".

Clair Bell, KCC’s Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care and Public Health, told SFM News: "The Blue Badge scheme is there to support vulnerable people in maintaining independence and access to services. Abusing the scheme by using badges not belonging to you, deceased people’s badges and stolen badges for personal gain is unacceptable and will not be tolerated. The Blue Badge Scheme is an important service for people with disabilities or health conditions that enables badge holders to park close to where they need to go. While most blue badge holders respect the rules of their use, KCC along with Swale Borough Council will not tolerate the abuse of the system by the minority who take advantage of the scheme.”

Cllr Elliott Jayes, vice-chair of the community committee at Swale Council, told SFM News: “We were pleased to be teaming up with KCC to tackle the fraudulent use of blue badges. The majority were used correctly and those who were found to be abusing the scheme were dealt with appropriately. We will be cracking down on the misuse of blue badges in Swale, and this joint enforcement day is just the beginning.”

Anyone suspecting misuse of a blue badge can report it directly online at: www.kent.gov.uk/reportfraud.

A plan for futureproofed, accessible, and affordable electric vehicle charging has been agreed by Swale Borough Council.

Councillors have approved the council’s electric vehicle strategy, which outlines how they plan to meet the future demand for electric vehicles in Swale by creating a network of charge points that meet the needs of residents, businesses and visitors by 2030.

The EV strategy was approved at the council’s environment committee meeting last month (Thursday 30th June), the first since it moved to a committee system earlier this year.

Cllr Julian Saunders, chair of the environment committee at the council, told SFM News: “The electric vehicle strategy has been in the works for a while, and I’m pleased to say that we have a futureproofed plan that aims to provide the infrastructure we need to support the move to electric vehicles ahead of our target of net-zero across the borough by 2030. Of course, we have limitations that we must work around, but what we’ve got now is a plan we can start on as we continue to have conversations with Kent County Council and other key stakeholders. We don’t manage the local road network, so when finding solutions for on-street charging such as chargers on lampposts like you see in cities, we need to work with KCC to find and implement solutions. In the meantime, we’re installing council owned charge points in our car parks, which helps us keep charging prices lower for residents.”

Cllr Tim Valentine, vice chair of the environment committee at Swale Borough Council, told SFM News: “We’re delighted to have a strategy that outlines how we create the infrastructure needed as people make the move over to more sustainable vehicles. We’ll be focussing on areas with high levels of on-street parking demand, air quality management areas and solutions for rural areas. As part of the strategy we also agreed on how we move forward installing 18 new charging bays with funding we received from the Government’s Office for Zero Emission Vehicles (OZEV) in car parks near areas without driveways for charging.

He went on to add: “We received more than £100,000 from the OZEV and contributed £42,000 from our improvement and resilience fund, and plan to install new Pod Point charge points at Albany Road in Sittingbourne, Queens Hall in Faversham, and additional charge points at Rose Street in Sheerness. To meet the funding criteria, we’re installing 7kw chargers - which are suitable for a slow overnight charging - in our car parks by the end of the year.”

You can view Swale Borough Council's strategy at:- www.cee.swale.gov.uk/what-were-doing/planning.