Botley News – July 2025
With thanks to Chair of the Council – Cllr Chris Cooper for this update.
This month’s update from the Parish Council is a review of Botley’s Big Sweep undertaken in late May. Along with news regarding the Neighbourhood Plan.
Botley’s Big Sweep started as an idea in 2023 with a prompt from Steven Cooper, the landlord at the Dolphin Inn, suggesting the community comes together to do a volunteer led litter pick. Steve also offered to help pay for equipment. No excuses not to start. However, life is never easy in local government, due to a need for risk assessments to keep volunteers safe, then some organisation of people, things and rubbish clearance. Safe to say, it was not organised as quickly as I wanted, and the moment was gone.
Then in August 2024, Cllr Kyrle, myself and the ex-head of StreetScene at Eastleigh Borough Council, Paul Naylor came up with a cunning plan, hatched in the Dolphin Inn. This involved pulling together a group of volunteers, coordinated with Eastleigh’s support (they collect the rubbish after all) to have a Community Big Sweep. Paul suggested April would be the best month.
So how come we did our Big Sweep in May? That was because the team were organising the Parish Meeting in March, instantiating the new council in April and before that having a new clerk join us in February. We simply timed out plus; we did not quite have that impetus to act. This came later.
The trigger for the Big Sweep was the Twinning Association. They wanted to dress the high street with ribbons. For me however, this would be like putting lipstick on a pig. The underlying public realm looked scruffy and unkempt. Hence, the parish Team dusted down the Big Sweep idea. Picking the date was made easy by Hamble Valley Rotary as they undertake a regular volunteer led litter pick. So, their next session was the date we focused on – Tuesday 27th May. Luckily this was just before our French friends arrived.
A serendipity moment then occurred with a visit to the Parish Council by the project director for the bypass James. M-Group the bypass contractor encourages their employees to undertake volunteer work. They give them the time to give back. James joined a gang of his team from the bypass construction to help us on the morning of the 27th May too.
This meant we had 20 volunteers to weed, sweep and clear the high street of debris and make it look smart. The Big Sweep was completed by 11:45 having started at 10:00, with volunteers retiring to the Dolphin Inn for a well-earned drink. The twist in the story is that Steve kindly donated the drinks to us all, so the Parish Council donated £50 to Botley Neighbourcare as a thank you (Steve’s nominated beneficiary).
Lessons learnt from this year’s Big Sweep? When the community comes together, awesome stuff can happen. As we see with the Community Events (Revels on the Rec and Carols in the Square). Although the weather was not kind the feedback on social media was. Thank you Botley for the great response. Thank you to all the volunteers for participating in the morning’s efforts. The High Street looks superb and is a great foundation for the future.
A picture of the M-Group team at the Big Sweep.
What are the plans now we have a cleaner High Street? The Parish Council has agreed to fund a new role for a part time street cleaner to work 5 days a week (Thursday to Monday) for 1-2 hours a day to keep our public realm tidy. Plus, we intend to host another Big Sweep in 2026, but this time in April. If you are interested in this new role, please get in touch. If you want to volunteer for council activities, please click on this link Volunteer Opportunities for more information.
An update on the Neighbourhood Plan. The Plan Examiner appointed by Eastleigh Borough Council has informed Botley parish Council that a new Strategic Environmental Assessment is required. This means the referendum is now due from the Autumn. A new leaflet is being designed with a call to action for residents to back the Neighbourhood Plan at the referendum when it is held. Please do meet with the Parish team if you have any questions about the Neighbourhood plan.