I would like to thank Owlthorpe Community litter pickers for keeping Owlthorpe cleaner and greener. I would also like to thank all the voluntary litter pickers in our area. I was surprised when I visited Birley Spa Bath House at the amount of litter that was picked up. Sheffield City Council show support for voluntary litter pickers, but I just wondered how much support there would be if Sheffield City Council had to pay the hourly going rate for the job? Remember council workers that did this type of work were made redundant.

We turn to the police to stop this antisocial behaviour but the police explain their budget has also been cut and they no longer have the resources to help. 

Our parks and open spaces have also been neglected please view this video by Dr Nicola Dempsey, Senior Lecturer, Department of Landscape Architecture, University of Sheffield:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6p1SwS5orno  Also I have highlighted in yellow the main points about how cutbacks in Council funding are affecting parks and open spaces. 

“Parks are well-visited sites of an urban nature in our cities where users can gain positive social and ecological benefits from vegetation including trees, grass, flowering plants and shrubs. However, ongoing financial public sector budget pressure is adversely affecting the management and quality of parks in the UK,”

https://www.ecological-owlthorpe.org/EO-14NicolaDempsysustainability-11-00360-v2.pdf 

“However, financial pressures on urban parks are adversely affecting the management and quality of parks. According to UNISON (2018), 59% of the UK’s local authorities had cut their parks and green spaces budgets between 2016/2017 and 2018/2019 where the biggest cut was in Warwickshire County Council (from almost £110,000 to just over £14,000). This has led some local authorities to change how their parks services are delivered with fewer staff and an increased focus on lower maintenance.” 

“UK, parks budgets are often an easy target when local authority budget cuts have to be made.” Owlthorpe Heritage & Nature Trail has been neglected, but research shows Sheffield City Council received government funding from 2013. This is one of many questions I am asking the Parliamentary Ombudsman to resolve. Please help save Owlthorpe Heritage & Nature Trail by

Signing our petition to Parliamentary Ombudsman: https://chng.it/FPc7X4Nq

also, our petition to Sheffield City Council: https://chng.it/6vXHqcGG4S

Thank you for your support

Michael Meredith