Blog-Sept 21

Parish Council Blog

September 2021

This month we wanted to look into where the Parish Council spend the money that we receive from your Council Tax Payments. 

You will notice that when you get your Council Tax Bill part of the money you pay goes to the Parish Council. You may have wondered what this money gets spent on, read on.

Generally speaking, we use the money to keep the village amenities running and the village clean and tidy, and to make improvements in the village to benefit the community.

This includes, but is not limited to, Recreation Ground Maintenance, MUGA expenses and equipment, grass cutting and Pocket Park and Allotment expenses. So, when you use the MUGA on those dark winter/summer days and need the lights on they will (hopefully) always come on, or when you play football or cricket on the Recreation Ground you can see your ball on top of the cut grass and not have to search through long grass to find it, you will know that the Parish Council are making sure that all these spaces are usable to everyone all the time.

Other expenses would include printing of the wonderful Gretton Life, insurance (Public Liability), room hire (for the Committee Room at the Village Hall) and Councillor training.  You may also not be aware that the limited Bus Service we have is part funded by the Parish Council along with other village councils along the route to enable a bus to come to the village.

I think all the councillors would agree that the most important money we spend is for our excellent Clerk Jackie who is the only paid employee for the council. She is the one that keeps us all informed, writes up the minutes and agendas, picks up all the queries we receive and liaises with official bodies, and a lot of other things in between. We wouldn’t work as well as we do without her.   Jackie’s pay is aligned to a national pay scale and we think she is worth every penny.

At this time of year, we are setting our budget for the year ahead.    At the moment we already have a few things in progress: disabled access to the Village Green, a speed warning system and lamp post poppies for Remembrance Day.   Further ahead we are looking at extending the facilities at the Recreation Ground (a skate park and/or external gym) as well as setting up a Youth Parish Council.

So, as you can see the money we receive gets spent on many various and important things.

As always, if you have any questions, views or concerns regarding anything, the Parish Council would love to hear from you, please email our Clerk Jackie on clerkgpc@btinternet.com