Last week was mostly housekeeping. We finished off delivering our Christmas cards, Actually they are "Seasons Greetings" cards. This is nothing to do with not offending other religions, it just means we are not restricted to getting them out before Christmas.
You will have read in our last post about the "Cock Inn" in which we praised the food there. Unfortunately in the early hours of Boxing Day someone broke in and stole several thousand pounds in takings. As most of the cash is not covered by insurance this is a big blow to Damien and Rob as well as the staff and customers. It will mean a difficult time for them and higher prices all round. There is an appeal for information and I would not advise anyone in the neighbourhood to go around flashing a big wad as everyone is well p....d off.
New Years Eve proved even worse. There was an incident outside the Lickey Banker, another one of our local pubs, involving 5 youths. This resulted in a man being badly assaulted. Following this another man, apparently an innocent passer-by was very seriously assaulted and taken to hospital were he is fighting for his life. Another young man was later arrested and remains in custody.
All this because someone thought that the law does not apply to them and they can do what they damn well like. When is this Government going to take crime seriously and at an early enough stage to make kids realise that they too have to abide by the rules. We have so many easy steps, leading up to a custodial sentence for a serious crime, that young people see no deterrent in the law. That, in our humble view, is why we have jails bursting to capacity with people who have long histories of criminality and are set on a course from which it will be almost impossible to turn them.
Now it is back to reality, Group meeting this evening and full Council tomorrow. The big one for us is the Longbridge Action Plan which will be discussed and that will be another step to getting the plans up and running.
The diary looks full for the rest of the week so we should have a bit more to post soon.
