At Preston Road Community Centre this afternoon people came along for the second event in “Abingdon For All,” the Community Led Plan for the town, run by the Town Council.

There was a big map on which people could put green, red or yellow numbered stickers showing what they liked, disliked, and hoped for the town. Most of the stickers were clumped round the town centre.

People could also fill in more detailed surveys. There are online surveys anybody can fill in – if you did not manage to go to the event.

The Town Council were also looking for people to get involved in various ways to drive the project forward.

Outside the centre there were also people getting signatures for a petition.

The petition read “THE ABBEY HALL and GUILDHALL

1. We wish the Town Council to renovate the ABBEY HALL, as promised. We want the residue of the Vale grant to be invested to help fund a large town centre space to serve a growing population of 38,000 people. The Hall is needed for civic functions, for Abingdon’s many clubs and societies, and for activities for all ages. It should have disabled access to public rooms. A cinema space would be good.

Do not sell the Abbey Hall for development.

2. We need the Council to maintain and preserve the beautiful and historic GUILDHALL and its 18th century staircase intact for future generations.

The online petition is at http://chn.ge/2wkAH4V

There was a meeting of Abingdon Town Council this evening. I could not get there but will do my best to do a report by reading committee minutes

The most significant current happening at the Town Council are the plans for the old part of the Guildhall. Once Abingdon Music Centre have moved out, the old Magistrates Court would be redeveloped as an extension to the County Hall Museum with space for art exhibitions.

The old staircase near the Roysse Room could also become a lift giving access to the upstairs rooms like the old Council Chamber.

The remaining money left from the £1.2m, given as a parting gift by the VWHDC (Vale of White Horse District Council) when it handed over the Guildhall, would be spent on the old part of the Guildhall. There are also proposals from the leader of the Town Council, Cllr Mike Badcock, that the Museum and Guildhall Committees combine and operate as one committee.

However there seem no plans for the new part of the Guildhall, closed down currently to save on business rates and other expense.

Another venture the Town Council is involved with is the South Abingdon Children’s Centre. They have offered a grant of £90K over three years to secure its future, and, before parting with the money, have asked some questions about governance to the group called Abingdon Carousel who are planning to run the centre.

It is important that this centre be open by September and continue to operate for the community and children that needs it.

Given the recent County Council election results, which saw the Lib-Dems winning all three seats in Abingdon, the victory of Lib Dem candidate Layla Moran last night was not completely unexpected. BBC South Today showed that while most of the region is now Conservative blue, Oxford East remains Labour red, and Oxford West and Abingdon has turned Lib-Dem orange, and now has Layla Moran as MP.

Nicola Blackwood has worked hard as MP and very much hoped to continue as she showed in her passionate end of hustings speech on Monday. However this constituency can switch sides, as it did suprisingly to Nicola in 2010 when she beat Dr Evan Harris by 176 votes on a turnout of 65.3%.
In 2015 she got a larger majority of 9,582, beating Layla Moran, as the Lib-Dems suffered after being in coalition with the Conservatives. This time round Layla Moran got 26,252 votes, and won the seat by 816. There was a record turnout for the constituency of 79.6%.

The polls have closed after the snap election called by Theresa May. She wanted to increase her majority ahead of Brexit negotiations, and called it at a time when she was a long way ahead in the polls.

Outside the hustings on Monday, members of the Hunt Saboteurs were protesting. Theresa May pledged a free vote on repealing the ban on fox hunting in the Conservative manifesto.

As mentioned yesterday the Greens formed a nuanced ‘progressive alliance’ with the Lib Dems in this area, and there was the unusual sight of Green and Lib-Dem posters in the same gardens, and windows.

Outside polling stations Conservative and Lib-Dem tellers took down polling numbers.

The parties seem to be using the phone more than door to door these days. But the pile of literature in our letter tray was as big as usual. It even included two letters from 10 Downing Street asking us to trust Theresa May with the Brexit negotiations.

There was an out of reach poster of Nicola Blackwood outside the Conservative Club. Lib-Dem posters outnumbered Conservative here in Abingdon. I did not see a single UKIP poster. I liked the Labour’s simple “I’m Voting Labour”, and was impressed by their candidate – the only candidate I met during the campaign.

We went to the polling station at the Guildhall at about 6:30. There was a steady flow of people but no queue. Other people on twitter reported queues elsewhere. We now await the result with interest.