Bedford Borough Council is seeking your views about your local pharmacy.

The Council would like to hear about your own experiences of pharmacy services in the borough and what improvements you would like to see in the future, by completing a short survey.

Your responses will help the Bedford Borough Health and Wellbeing Board to produce its local Pharmaceutical Needs Assessment (PNA). This document will help to ensure that your local pharmacy provides the services residents need both now and in the future.

Worthen church have been very fortunate to obtain an original signed painting from Penelope Timmis to raffle for Church Funds.

This is a very special prize and most generous of Penny, who is keen to raise a significant sum of money for the Church.

She is coming to the Christmas Tree festival on 18th December, to pick the winning ticket and hopefully present the prize to the lucky winner.

A grant scheme is set to be launched by Shropshire Council in a bid to help protect community assets in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.

The Community Asset Grant Scheme Pilot will bid to help the sustainability of some community assets which are vitally important in achieving post-pandemic recovery with grants of up to £15,000.

Please find below the link to the latest update on rural grant funding opportunities. This includes changes to garnts provided by Locality for Neighbourhood Development Plans, changes to the electric vehicle charging point grant, opportunities for Church and heritage conservation and grants for woodland development plus others..

The Liberal Democrats have today accused Education Secretary, Nadhim Zahawi, of breaking more promises as new statistics from the Department for Education (12:00 noon) revealed 216,000 children have missed school over two weeks, a rise of 47%.

Despite the Education Secretary's promises to tackle these absences "head on" in October, these figures show 1 in 50 students have missed school during the last two weeks.

We have joined with the LGBT+ groups of the Conservative, Labour and Green parties in a joint statement for World AIDS Day.

LGBT+ political groups statement urging the UK Government to take action to end new cases of HIV by 2030

This year marks 40 years since the first cases of HIV were reported globally. Since then, thanks to the tireless and tenacious efforts of people affected by HIV, HIV activists, allies, and people living with HIV, huge progress has been made. It has taken us to the point where it is now scientifically possible to end new HIV transmissions in the UK.

This week saw two council byelections for Morecambe Town Council.

The council had just one Lib Dem councillor at the start of 2021 - now it has six!

Lib Dems gained both Heysham North and Westgate wards from Morecambe Bay Independents - meaning MBI no longer have an overall majority on the council, and the Lib Dems are the official opposition on the council with 6 seats to MBI's 11.

Big thanks to the voters of Oxton who backed the Lib Dems in yesterday's byelection!

The election was caused by the death of Lib Dem Councillor and former North West Policy Officer Andy Corkhill at the tragically young age of 36.

It saw a 19% swing from Labour to the Lib Dems:

Liberal Democrat (Orod Osanlou): 1666 [68.3%, +8.4%]
Labour: 460 [18.8%, -10.7%]
Conservative: 168 [6.9%, +1.9%]
Green: 147 [6.0%, +6.0%]

Christmas in Bedford starts the first weekend of December with Love Bedford and Bedford Borough Council, in collaboration with Made In Bedford and EAT Feast.

Saturday 4th & Sunday 5th December - Saturday is Small Business Saturday- the perfect time to get some Christmas shopping done with our fantastic independents. The traditional Charter Market will be on, and in Harpur Square Lingers Butchers will have a hog roast, alongside the Salvation Army Band bringing that festive feeling to town.