Etchingham

Many people feel it is important to keep a distinct Etchingham magazine going and you can support it by either writing something for inclusion or committing to buying a copy regularly. Can be delivered to most areas for the cover price of the magazine which stands at £4.20 per annum, payable each February. Email [email protected] or text 07772584608 to be put on the delivery lists.

SPEEDWATCH: The Speedwatch operators continue to run as many sessions as possible with the currently reduced number of available operators. The number of volunteer operators is currently reduced, due to some operators not able to as many sessions because of health issues or work commitments, and other operators moving away. So we could do with a few more volunteers to enable a useful number of sessions to be run each month. It is not complicated to volunteer as an operator and you do not need to commit to a lot of time, if you can only do an hour occasionally it is just as useful as being available for several hours a week. If you are interested in considering joining our volunteer team contact [email protected] or phone 01580 819532 for details, or take a look at the Community Speedwatch website https://www.communityspeedwatch.org

BUS TIMES: Compass Travel are making a number of changes to bus services from January 7.

Compass Travel is unable to continue to provide all of their current provision of services due to financial pressures. This has been caused by higher fuel and insurance costs, along with reduced levels of income because of declining passenger numbers. Several services have few or no changes, with the main alterations affecting the worst performing journeys.

231 Uckfield-Framfield-Blackboys-Heathfield-Broad Oak-Burwash-Etchingham; The journeys from Uckfield at 17:15 and 17:50 are withdrawn and replaced with a new journey at 17:35 to Etchingham Station. The 17:00 and 18:03 journeys from Etchingham Station are retimed to depart at 16:45 and 18:20 instead. The 18:20 journey will run only as far as Heathfield, meaning that the last bus from Heathfield Fire Station to Uckfield will be 17:10.

PLAYGROUNDS: Etchingham Recreation Ground Trust (ERGT) is the charity responsible for Queen’s Garden and the Viper site. ERGT are working on fund raising for repair and replacement of equipment. There are a couple grant applications in progress that if successful will help build the total. You can generate funds for ERGT whenever you shop online and it does not cost you anything extra. You register at Give as you Live https://www.giveasyoulive.com/join/ergt then whenever you shop online you sign in to the Give as you Live website first and use the link on the site to access the retailer you are purchasing from, there are over 4,000 online retailers available so your favourites are bound to be there, a small percentage of your purchase will be donated to ERGT, the amounts are quite small but if lots of people remember to use the system for every purchase it will soon add up to a useful sum of money. You will find more details of how to use Give as you Live on the ERGT fundraising page of the village website www.etchinghamvillage.co.uk/playgrounds/give-as-you-live EVERY PENNY COUNTS. There is also a fundraising page online where you can make a donation https://www.everyclick.com/etchinghamplaygrounds if you are a tax payer please remember to fill in the Gift Aid form when you make your donation so that ERGT get an extra 25% from HMRC. If you want to make a donation but do not have the ability to do it online, you can a payment with cash or a cheque payable to Etchingham Playgrounds and deliver it to the Parish Office at Parsonage Croft, or in a sealed envelope clearly marked ‘playground appeal’ at the Post Office. The target to be raised is £25,000, at the time of writing just over £660 has been raised, with some more donations and gift aid waiting to be approved, so quite a way to go yet. If you have any fundraising ideas, and more importantly, time to help organise fundraising, email [email protected] . The annual safety inspection for 2018 has just taken place and as expected it was not good news, more items may now have to be taken out of use.

CHURCH SERVICES: Church Service for January, all services are at 11am unless otherwise noted, this Sunday January 13, Reverend Sally Epps. Sunday January 20, Reverend Christopher Channer. Sunday January 27, Canon Lucy Murdoch.

CHURCH CONTACT: Churchwardens, Mary Barnes 01580 819142 and Geoffry Lucas 01580 819439. For Baptisms, Weddings, Funerals and Pastoral Matters contact Reverend Sally Epps 01435 882301 [email protected]

CHURCH OPENING: The Church is open every day for visitors from 11am to 4pm.

YOUR EVENTS: Now is a good time to send me your dates for the year when your group or organisation has events planned, no need to send all the details, just the planned date and what the event is, I can add the dates to this column and people can put the dates in their diaries, it might help to avoid some date clashes.

HURST GREEN: As you will be aware there is not currently a Village Voice correspondent for Hurst Green. If you are connected with with a Hurst Green group, or organising an event in Hurst Green, I am happy to add the details to the Etchingham column if you send the information to me. Or, even better, perhaps there is someone in Hurst Green who would like to take on the Hurst Green column, if you want to know more you can contact me or the Battle Observer.

SENDING INFORMATION: Thank you to everyone who has sent me information for this column during 2018, please keep your contributions coming in during 2019. Get information for this column to me as soon as possible. There are several ways to get your info to me, but email is preferred because there is less chance of errors during copying. I need information by 10pm on Monday to be sure it will be in time for inclusion, I can sometimes add extra items on Tuesday morning, but this cannot be guaranteed. You can deliver to 2 Park Farm Close, telephone 01580 819532 or 07484 635014 or email [email protected] you will also find a form on the village website ( http://www.etchinghamvillage.co.uk/village-voice ) to send your information from there, look for the Village Voice link near the bottom of the column of links on the left-hand side of the website page.