As the summer comes to its close, look forward to Autumn with the latest edition of Community News.

In this edition we shine the spotlight on two of the sporting activities that are held at the Community Centre – Rugbytots and Sports Karate. Rugbytots’ fun, structured play sessions take girls and boys aged 2-7 years on a  journey of sporting imagination with engaging and energetic coaches supporting them every step of the way whilst teaching how to catch, pass, kick, run with the ball and play as part of a team. Sport karate is the competition aspect of karate training. The students train both mentally and physically very hard to compete against other trained karate-ka. Sport karate will be showcasing at the 2020 Olympic games in Tokyo.

Highlights of our other news

BFOBRCA reports that during the year they have nearly completed the change-over to LED lighting and that the work has started on the toilet refurbishments at the Community Centre. The Centre is now 30 years old and work needs to be done to bring it up to modern standards; future improvements being looked at include a redesign of the boiler configuration and improvements to the kitchen. Badger Farm Pre-School were chosen by Sainsbury’s as their charity of the year. This meant Sainsbury’s working with the Pre-School on various activities and projects throughout the year and their first mission was to help tidy and supply new planters for the garden. Jan stepped down as Editor of Community News at the beginning of the year and Berenice Kenny has been welcomed to this role.

Your local churches invite you to celebrate with them this year’s Harvest. On Saturday 30th September we are holding a Harvest Party at St Luke’s, and on Sunday 8th October a Family Harvest Event at St Mark’s. A little later in the year all the local uniform groups will be parading for the Remembrance Sunday Service in St Luke’s at 10.15, to include the 11.00 silence. You would be most welcome at any of these gatherings; look out for details.

Since the Oliver’s Battery WI Group last article, the group have enjoyed a colourful and informative demonstration by Barbi Colson on flower arranging. As is traditional in the summer, they had an evening visit to a Hampshire garden, The Deane House in Sparsholt. In the autumn, Mr Alan Jones will talk on the ‘History, Mystery and Therapy of Hypnosis’ at St Peter’s Primary School at 7.45pm.

Could you spare a couple of hours a week to help at Badger Farm Toddlers? They are looking for volunteers to assist in the kitchen making refreshments, washing up and clearing away at the end of the session. It’s an ideal opportunity to make new friends and spend a couple of enjoyable hours.

With the pressures of SATs testing and transition to secondary and concerns over the wellbeing of young children, Oliver’s Battery Primary School has implemented a course of mindfulness for the current Year 6 children. This term Year 4 (have been taking part in the Fiver Challenge, run by Young Enterprise. The class were given £5 and were tasked to make as much profit as possible. Year 6 took on the challenge of raising money for The NSPCC. As part of this, they had to design and set up a big work out. The children raised a grand total of £364.55. The school are also in need of volunteers to help in looking after our grounds including: pond work, clearance, working on the allotments, scrub bashing, coppicing and cutting grass in the wild flower meadow. If you have any interests in these areas, please do get in contact with the school.

Stanmore School‘s inaugural careers day for Year 6 pupils was a resounding success. The children met professionals from lots of different types of employment and had the chance to quiz everyone about their choice of career and what they liked most about it. During June, the whole school took part in a writing project based on William Shakespeare’s The Tempest. Lots of imaginative, fantastic pieces of writing appeared and in a fun activity linked to the project everyone came together on the back field for a shipwrecked banquet. As the new term begins, the school are looking forward to their annual Book Week which begins on Monday 16th October 2017. This will include a Book Fair, a dressing up day and a visit from Peter Bently. He has written fantastic picture books and is an enormously entertaining speaker. It should be great fun!

Membership for the Badger Farm Social Club is now half price! “We are a social club for all the family hidden within the Badger Farm Community Centre, run for the Community by the community. We always welcome new members from the local area and have lots on offer for you to enjoy. So do come in and see what we have to offer!”

In our new Local Interest section you can Get to know our local House Martins and read about the successful open day held by the Badger Farm Art Group.

Our MP, Steve Brine, thanks to his constituents for re-electing him as our MP back on 8th June. He will be working in the Department of Health as a Parliamentary Under Secretary of State, picking up the role of Minister for Public Health, Primary Care and Prevention. He is so pleased this will also allow him to also be the Cancer Minister. It was a pleasure to officially cut the ribbon at the opening of the new children’s play area behind Elder Close in Badger Farm. Many congratulations to the Parish Council for making it happen – and making a difference.

Badger Farm Parish Council are delighted to announce that the Central Kick About play area is now open and being used enthusiastically in all weathers! The contractors worked very hard to make sure that CKA was open in time for the school summer holidays and the children are certainly enjoying it. Their new website is up and running, but is still very much a work in progress. The parish council is concerned that the Royal Mail does not plan to replace the post box stolen from Elder Close during recent building work. If you feel strongly about losing this local amenity, please contact the Royal Mail sorting office in Winnall to register your complaint.

Come and join the Hampshire and Isle of Wight Wildlife Trust this autumn to find out more about our wonderful British wildlife and unfortunately for some, such as bumblebees, the difficulties they are currently facing. Indoor meetings are held in the Bushfield Room at Badger Farm Community Centre. Non–members are always very welcome.

Charity status has been granted to the Oliver’s Battery Community Centre. This is a great endorsement of the project to replace St Mark’s Church hall with a modern community centre for use by the residents of the parish. St Mark’s Parochial Church Council has indicated recently that the current building has only a few more years of useful life remaining, but even this projection could be overtaken by another major roof leak or the failure of the heating system, for which funds are no longer available. More fund-raising events are being planned for the autumn and beyond including a Quiz and supper, an evening of community carols with mince pies and wine and the return of the popular ‘Little Big Band’ playing the arrangements of jazz greats such as Count Basie and Glen Miller.

Our local councillors report that new gates will be installed on Whiteshute Ridge and fencing will be erected during October/November. The vegetation survey and condition assessment of Whiteshute Ridge has now been completed so that the council can accurately judge the improvements to the area in the forthcoming years. Everyone will be no doubt be pleased that the appeals against the proposed developments of Pitt Vale and development at Otterbourne have failed so this threat has now been put back, at least at present. Your councillors worked very hard for this outcome and will keep a watching brief going forward.

Oliver’s Battery Parish Council reports on a number of community events including The Annual Parish Meeting in May, attended by over 60 residents, which included an informative and interesting talk on the Saxon Execution Cemetery discovered on Oliver’s Battery. There was also a presentation on the work of the Ramblers and a report on the footpaths in our parish. In June, a Great Get Together was held at the recreation ground to officially “launch” the new play equipment for younger children and to join with communities around the country in honouring the memory of Jo Cox. Tesco, whose Bags of Help initiative helped finance the cost of the new equipment, supported the event. The name of the ship, Stormchaser, was chosen by children at Oliver’s Battery School. Families attending had an enjoyable afternoon picnicking together, whilst the children used the play equipment and played games in the warm sunshine. The monthly film nights at the School and social gatherings at the South Winchester Golf Club have also continued during the last quarter.

Ann’s Computer Corner analyses the anatomy of a phishing email, showing you the warning signals you should be aware of if you receive a suspicious email.

Nature Notes shares that residents were heartbroken by the early cutting of the fields around Texas Drive while skylarks were still singing above. Under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 it is a criminal offence to destroy active skylarks’ nests but the Law has no teeth without hard evidence. Brexit is a unique opportunity for Government to respond to the needs of the UK environment. Michael Gove is the new Secretary for the Environment, an unpopular move in many quarters but his eleven page speech to the WWF makes interesting reading.

Neighbourhood Watch highlight the fact that there are only two Neighbourhood Watch schemes in Badger Farm but a few more in Oliver’s Battery. This means that most of us are not getting the benefit of regular news bulletins, crime incident reports, Hampshire Alert messages and crime prevention advice which are sent out to Coordinators across Winchester. The article shares some advice on how, when and who to report a crime to plus some useful links to further information.