Each month, the Waitrose Supermarket in Abingdon chooses three community groups (often charities) for a head to head to see who gets the lion’s share of the £1000 on offer for the month.

Shoppers get a green token and vote in a transparent ballot box. Shoppers can see how well the parties are doing and change their vote as a result.

Sometimes one community group wins by a landslide. Last month there was a very close contest between Stonewater, Friends of Stowford, and PHAB, which Stonewater just won, possibly because of the use of a human interest story.

Here were their manifestos …

Stonewater got £366.

PHAB got £329

Friends of Stowford got £305.

A quick mention that on Tuesday two groups will be at the Unicorn Theatre at 7:30pm to tell you about their work. They are the Good Neighbour Scheme and Street Pastors.

There is a mini-ring of bells on the Market Place this morning.

The Stallpits Mini-Ring, from Shrivenham in Oxfordshire, began touring in 2013 with a ring at the Faringdon Corn Exchange. The bells are in Abingdon today to help promote the Hope within Us events, that begin in a week. Everybody can have a go, and sign the visitors book.

Also on the Market Place was a stall raising money for Christian Aid, and for the Gerontius Amenity Fund – a charity founded in 2012 by people with contacts in Sierra Leone to provide health care for poor people.