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Clarion Weekend, 4 September 2026

Clarion Weekend, 4 September 2026
Our photographer reflects on Oxford’s current scaffolding epidemic. Photo by Roger Close.

Did you miss us? It was unusually quiet over the Bank Holiday and then the news came back with a vengeance – we’ve pretty much filled next Tuesday’s edition already. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves…

This week's long reads

We know our readers love animals and have big hearts. In the first of an occasional series, we profile local pets looking for new homes, and ask if you might have room on your sofa for any of these? 🐾

Oxford pets to steal your heart
We at the Clarion are clearly fans of animals – the at-home sorts, the farm sorts, and the outside don’t-touch-me sorts. We also know that we feature a lot of cats, because. Well, because. But in an effort to broaden animal representation and location (not just cats in colleges!), we
Oxford ClarionOxford Clarion

Limited space, urban heat islands, heavy clay, weird and wonderful trees… the life of an Oxford garden is a tough one. Our expert Amandine Lepers-Thornton shares her top tips on how to get the best from a city garden.

Five challenges with Oxford gardens… and how to turn them into opportunities
With the summer over, and the merciful reappearance of rain, our thoughts turn to gardens – as we move to a more outside-in lifestyle to accommodate the changing climate. We asked our resident horticulturist Amandine Lepers-Thornton for her thoughts. I’ve lived in Oxford for over a decade but I really
Oxford ClarionOxford Clarion

This week’s top stories

A multi-million pound budgeting error has led to Oxford City Council having to dip into its reserves. In February’s budget, housing rental income was calculated with the wrong inflation figure – meaning that the expected surplus has become a deficit of £2m.

At an emergency meeting last night, councillors approved taking £3.5m from the housing account reserves in order to balance the budget. This will reduce the reserves from £7.8m to £4.3m, just above the £4m legal minimum. The council stresses that the technical error has had no impact on tenants. Council finance chief Cllr Ed Turner (Labour) said:

“Our group finance director is looking to bring on extra capacity so this can’t happen in future. The good news is we absolutely have the reserves to cover it. The motion on the agenda today is to spend those reserves. That’s why we keep reserves – for unforeseen eventualities.”

But although the motion was backed by the City Council opposition parties and passed unanimously, it was criticised elsewhere in Oxfordshire. County Council leader Cllr Tim Bearder (LibDem) said:

“At a time when Oxfordshire is preparing for the biggest change to local government in a generation, every council should be demonstrating the strongest possible financial discipline. Oxford City Council appears to be using up its financial headroom. The people of Oxford deserve better than financial problems being tucked away in the small print of a Bank Holiday announcement.”

At the same meeting, city councillors agreed an extra £410,000 for community projects around the city, including renovating public toilets, maintaining notice boards, and supporting Summertown Arts. A programme of free swimming lessons will be introduced as a direct response to May’s tragic death at Donnington Bridge. Evening refuse collections will be stepped up in the city centre, as Cllr Nigel Chapman (Labour) explained:

“We have had an issue in Cornmarket and the High Street in the evenings around both commercial and public waste which I think we can now tackle. It’s not purely money, but also where to store the waste overnight. [Services company] ODS has been working hard to find a solution to this.”

Several of the measures were initially proposed in the Green and LibDem amendments to February’s budget. Though the Labour administration rejected them at the time, May’s election results, in which the Greens and LibDems together overtook Labour, gave the opposition parties a stronger position to demand changes. Council leader Cllr Susan Brown (Labour) said: “We’ve been trying very hard to make sure we are respectful of all parties in this chamber, recognising we are not a majority party.”

Whitecross Green Wood near Otmoor; butterfly conservation training (photos by Hannah Broad and Eliza Ader via BBOWT); the project area.

The ancient landscapes of Otmoor and Bernwood Forest are at the centre of an ambitious plan by Berks, Bucks & Oxon Wildlife Trust. A new project aims to reconnect one of the last ecologically coherent landscapes in southern England, lying between Bicester, Oxford and Aylesbury. BBOWT says it has the scope for nature recovery and habitat reconnection at a strategic scale.

The area contains nationally important but increasingly fragmented habitats such as ancient woodland, species-rich grassland and floodplain meadows, with rare species including black and brown hairstreak butterflies, curlew, Bechstein’s bats and great crested newts – but, as part of the Oxford–Cambridge corridor, is under threat from development. An introduction to the project is being held at the Ashmolean Museum on Monday. The scheme is currently in development for a round 2 bid to the National Lottery Heritage Fund.

The National Audit Office should investigate the Botley Road bridge and find out how the rebuild went “catastrophically wrong”, according to Oxford West & Abingdon MP Layla Moran (LibDem). In a video address to a public meeting on the bridge this week, she said “I want to make sure they understand the lessons that should be learned.” The road is currently forecast to reopen on Sunday 20 September.

Also in a video address, Baroness Deech of Cumnor added: “I’m so angry about the way ministers and politicans treat us. There’s no insight, no empathy, no understanding. And we still haven’t got a west-side entrance to the station or a new platform.” She has tabled two questions in the House of Lords, asking for a completion date, and cost estimate, for the new entrance and platform 5. The ‘Botley Road Mess’ event, organised by My Jericho, took place on Tuesday at Lula’s on Frideswide Square – just a few metres from the bridge site.

Ryan Bridge, national leader of Raise the Colours, says he is being charged with harassment in Oxfordshire after the Crown Prosecution Service authorised 14 charges. In a video posted to a subscriber-only channel (£9.49/month), clips of which are circulating on social network X, he said “I won't stop and I won't give up.” He is currently being taken to court in a civil matter by Birmingham City Council, over raising flags on lampposts – but claims he won’t “do an Oxford” and give up, and that he is securing legal backing to fight it. We wrote about Raise the Colours in a long read earlier this year.

A second giant solar farm is proposed for Oxfordshire. Cearn Solar Farm would provide 500MW power from a 2,800-acre site between Grove and Faringdon – enough, the developers say, to power 143,000 homes. It follows the Botley West proposal, northwest of Oxford, for 840MW and 2,500 acres.

Cearn would link to the same new Farmoor substation as Botley West. It would include an on-site battery energy storage system, to store energy for use at peak times. As a Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project, the decision would be made by central Government, not local councils. The promoters say they are talking to Thames Water about the “close interaction” with the nearby White Horse (Abingdon) Reservoir. Stakeholder discussions will start this month followed by public consultation next year.

Meanwhile, the Government decision on Botley West Solar Farm has been postponed by another two months, until 10 November. Energy minister Martin McCluskey said more time was needed “to consider further information received from the applicant”, Photovolt Development Partners. The decision had already been postponed from an initial target date of 10 May. We looked at the plans for the colossal solar farm, set to be among Britain’s largest, in a long read last year.

The LibDems held the County Council seat of Chesterton & Launton in yesterday’s by-election, increasing their majority after a contest fiercely contested by the Conservatives and Reform UK. Jim Hartley is the new councillor. The win restores the LibDems’ majority on Oxfordshire County Council – in practice rarely an issue for votes in the council chamber, but significant for allocating committee seats.

🔶 LibDem 985 (41.7%)
🔵 Conservative 683 (29.0%)
➡️ Reform 547 (23.2%)
🌹 Labour 75 (3.2%)
💚 Green 71 (3.0%)

Around the city

  • An emergency barbecue ban comes into force today in Oxford’s parks and open spaces, following wildfires at Burgess Field (Port Meadow) and Redbridge Paddock. A Public Space Protection Order bans fires, barbecues, fireworks and sky lanterns at 42 locations across the city. The order will remain in force for three years. Anyone breaking it without a “reasonable excuse” will be subject to a fixed penalty notice. The use of PSPOs was recommended to local councils in a letter from central Government.
  • Record loss: Oxford’s second-hand vinyl store, Riverman Records, is to be converted to a 1-bed flat after Oxford City Council approved an application by the landlord. Planning officers said that the Walton Street shop was “the anomaly in a row of terraces”. 28 members of the public objected to the conversion. City planners admitted that it would contradict the council policy of prioritising retail use at street level in the city centre, but wrote “it is not considered that this shop in particular contributes to the ‘city centre’ usage… In this instance, the planning balance should afford great weight to the creation of a dwelling over the loss of a Class E [retail] unit in the city centre… the shop front detracts from the character and appearance of the historic terrace”.
  • Thames Valley Police said they were called to Oxford’s Natural History Museum after reports of it being targeted by petrol bombs on Saturday night. Six fire trucks and five police vehicles were involved, but it turned out to be a hoax. Police said on social media: “Thankfully, there was no threat to the museum, or the dinosaurs.” They added that they would would rather not send vehicles and officers to “fake jobs”.
  • South Oxford WI is recruiting new members. They say they make very little jam and never sing ‘Jerusalem’, but meet at South Oxford Community Centre, with cake and wine. Upcoming speakers include Darragh Ennis from ITV’s The Chase and city archeologist David Radford.
  • More details have emerged of the new brewery, taproom and smokehouse restaurant at Osney Mead, thanks to CAMRA’s ever informative Oxford Drinker. Hosted in the former Symm building company headquarters, Oxbrew is targeting opening in late autumn, with the brewing equipment and food smokers already on site. A former incarnation of Oxbrew operated as a micro-brewery in Enstone, later merging with Little Ox in Freeland. An Oxbrew micropub in Witney followed, now trading under new management as Crafty Pint.
         The new premises will brew cask ale as well as kegged and canned beers. Oxbrew will be the first bar and brewery to operate in Osney Mead, but opens at an opportune time with the new foot/cycle bridge from Oxpens set to be built next year.
  • Oxford Hindu Temple and Community Centre held a vigil on Monday evening in support of Nepal, as devastating floods and landslides continue to claim lives and destroy homes and livelihoods across the country. Almost £8,000 has been raised to help so far. The event was organised jointly by Oxford Hindu Temple, Help for Nepal and Nepalese Community Oxfordshire, and brought together members of the Hindu, Nepalese and wider Oxfordshire community. Diyas were laid out spelling the word "Nepal" before the temple's shrine as part of the tribute. Retired captain Tulasi Prasad Paudel from Help for Nepal said that though they were thousands of miles from Nepal, “our hearts are there, with the families who have lost their loved ones, homes and livelihoods, and with all those who are still suffering from the devastating floods and landslides”.
Alistair Morris, Anne Lloyd, Pete Hennessey and Tessa Hennessey, caring for trees in Marston.
  • Save the trees: After a fire in July damaged around 30 young trees at Croft Road Recreation Ground in Marston, the local community has stepped up to care for the trees to help them recover. The Community Wood, of native trees, was planted in 2019 by Marston Community Growing and Oxford Friends of the Earth.
         Although the fire was extinguished thanks to Oxfordshire Fire & Rescue, the ground around the trees looked badly scorched and some of the trees were damaged. Volunteers and ODS’s Tree Team stepped in to water and mulch the trees through the summer to help them recover. Alistair Morris, tree lead for Marston Community Growing, said: “We are so relieved that the damage wasn’t any worse. These trees are precious for so many reasons: cooling our city, flood mitigation and increasing biodiversity in Marston. I know that our local volunteers will continue to care for them.” Green Party city councillor, Kate Robinson, said the incident demonstrated “that climate change is ramping up and our planet, including people and trees, is starting to suffer”.
  • Dozens of Rejoin Europe campaigners will walk through Oxford on Sunday, starting at 2pm, and visiting European sites between Leiden Square and the Spanish civil war memorial. The Walk to Rejoin Europe is being organised by Oxford for Europe. “We want Britain to rejoin the European Union as soon as possible for the benefit of Oxford people,” says its chair, John Tanner. “The universities, the car industry and holiday-makers will all do better once this country is back in the EU.”
Gal Hope Inspired’s swimming lessons. (Photo by Jane Gallagher.)
  • A community group is encouraging women from all cultural backgrounds to learn to swim. Abbie Mumbi from Gal Hope Inspired has so far has taught more than 100 women from traditionally “non-swimming” communities to swim and to have confidence in water, operating out of Barton and Leys pools.
         Qualified swimming instructor Abbie says: “I teach women to swim who have not had the same chances as others. Women and girls may have not been allowed to swim in their original countries. So when they come to the UK, many of them are nervous of water – and they are then less likely to take their children to the pool. As a result, their children are also at a disadvantage when it comes to learning to swim or being in water. We break the cycle of them being non-swimmers.”
         Abbie explains that for some women, there may be further barriers to them getting in a public swimming pool. Some may want to be covered; some of Oxford’s swimming pools have installed blinds that can be pulled down during the women-only lessons. Some women choose to swim in modest swimwear. Abbie hopes her lessons will contribute to reducing water deaths in the county, as women who have been taught to swim now come in regularly, bringing in their children. You can contact her on 07727 017809, or at galhope@yahoo.co.uk.

Around the county

  • Thames Water discharged sewage for over an hour during Saturday's rains, including at Islip and Botley, and into the River Evenlode. You can check your local river for sewage here. Thames Water has already dumped raw sewage into Oxfordshire's waterways for hundreds of hours this year; we have previously written about the county's sewage problem.
  • Wallingford Town Council has taken the unusual step of setting up a crowdfunder. The money will go towards fighting its corner at a planning inquiry for 400 homes on land north of the town by developer Croudace Homes. The Council has already committed £15,000 from public funds towards preparing for the inquiry, but has a shortfall of £10,500. The application was initially rejected by South Oxfordshire District Council but goes to appeal in January.
         SODC rejected the proposal as the site was not allocated for development within the Local Plan, would prevent the extraction of minerals for which the land is safeguarded, and would result in harm to the setting of the North Wessex Downs. Croudace counters that the Downs are some distance from the site, separated by a major road, and the land has been promoted for development previously.
         Wallingford Town Council say that the proposals have generated significant local concern over traffic and transport and pressure on local infrastructure. A spokesperson said: “The Council has already made a significant financial commitment of £15,000 because we believe it is important that Wallingford and the surrounding communities are properly represented. We recognise that there are differing views, but this campaign is about ensuring the communities affected can be properly heard and considered.”
  • Five brightly-coloured, life-size skeletal sculptures of Oxfordshire's iconic dinosaur species Megalosaurus have been installed in the gardens of Blenheim Palace. They strike some unusual poses: play-fighting, sitting down and even lying on their backs scratching their ears.
         The ‘Dinosaurs Are Forever’ exhibition was created by artist Jay Jay Burridge in collaboration with the Oxford University Museum of Natural History. Lightweight articulated frameworks will allow them to be re-posed during their three-month stay. Oxford geologist William Buckland named Megalosaurus in 1824, based on fossils found in nearby Stonesfield; Richard Owen only coined the term ‘dinosaur’ years later, in 1841. The original Megalosaurus fossils are on display in the OUMNH.
  • Beers from social enterprise Tap Social are coming to more retailers near you, reports the Oxford Drinker. Listings in a further 50 Waitrose stores will bring the total to over 300, as well as 80 Co-op stores, and finally, from September, on Ocado.
  • Oxfordshire County Council's thoughts have turned to winter. Residents are being encouraged to take up the offer of a free electric blanket check, with sessions held at 10 locations across the county in September and October. Cllr Kate Gregory, cabinet member for public health, said: “This is something we have been offering for 26 years, free of charge. Even quite new blankets and throws can fail. This is why it’s important to have them regularly tested."
  • Eight new partners have joined the Zero Carbon Oxfordshire Partnership, a countywide group to cut emissions and adapt to climate change. They include the Earth Trust, CPRE Oxfordshire, Beard Construction and Velocity Cycle Couriers. ZCOP works on areas including sustainable travel and transport, energy management, and making residential and non-residential buildings more sustainable. For Oxford City Council, Cllr Anna Railton said: “Tackling climate change requires action across every part of our economy. These new partners will strengthen the partnership and help turn shared ambitions into practical changes that reduce emissions and make Oxfordshire more resilient.”
  • Six Oxfordshire secondary schools are to receive funding to go ‘phone-free’. Police & Crime Commissioner Matthew Barber said the initiative “reduces opportunities for anti-social behaviour, and helps decrease the potential for young people to become involved in more serious crimes”. Money for the Phone Free Schools Fund has been taken from criminals, funded by the sale of seized items that cannot be returned to their rightful owners. The schools will use the funds to install “secure storage solutions” such as lockers or lockable pouches/boxes.

Walking and cycling

  • The main road through Kidlington could be “transformed from a vehicle-dominated corridor to a more balanced and people-focused environment” under plans being drawn up by Oxfordshire and Cherwell councils. Cherwell’s cabinet will be asked next week to sign off £45,000 towards a new study.
         The study will look at ways to improve pedestrian and cycle facilities, as well as landscaping and the “public realm”, along the Oxford Road/Banbury Road (A4260) from the Kidlington roundabout to Langford Lane – and particularly the town centre area around the High Street junction and Exeter Hall. A recent report commissioned by the Oxford Growth Commission said development had been piecemeal, calling for “coordinated infrastructure delivery” instead. It suggested Oxford Road could support better pedestrian and cycling infrastructure, and recommended “a new network of active travel routes”.
  • The cycling ban on Bicester’s Sheep Street has formally been revoked after a trial period. Pedestrianised since 1994, the road is 25m wide in places and forms part of the National Cycle Network. A review of Thames Valley Police collision data showed that no injuries had been recorded on Sheep Street during the trial. Local Conservative councillor Sam Holland, arguing for the ban to be reinstated, said “There are perfectly viable alternative routes on either side of Sheep Street for cyclists to use safely” – a claim disputed by cycling groups.
  • Oxfordshire’s first new Quiet Lane is moving ahead with the approval of a 20mph limit on Shepherd’s Pit Lane, on the outskirts of Oxford near Stanton St John. The next stage of the plan, supported by the parish council, will see a road closure to through traffic.

The contested path on the Ridgeway.

  • The Friends of the Ridgeway National Trail say they “strongly object” to a home-owner’s attempt to divert the long-distance path away from a property in Nuffield, near Wallingford. The path passes by the garage, which the owner has recently converted to accommodation.
         The Friends write: “The owner would have been aware of the trail when he purchased the property in 2020. It is not credible to argue the route has become inconvenient when it was a known and established feature at the point of purchase. Claims relating to theft, injury and dog fouling are anecdotal.” Oxfordshire County Council has issued the diversion order but it has not yet come into force. A consultation closed on 31 August, and could result in the diversion being sent to Government for consideration.

This weekend

  • Bunkfest (£), all weekend, Wallingford. Roots music, camping and beer at the amazing town-wide free festival. Plus the famous ‘singing train’ on the heritage railway from Cholsey.
  • Oxonmoot, all weekend, St Anne’s College. The Tolkien Society’s annual event. In-person attendance is full; you can still participate online. But mostly we’re just alerting you in case of unexpected wizards in the Bag End area.
  • Headington Beer Festival, all weekend, the Mason’s Arms. 28 cask ales and a handful of ciders.
  • Moreton Show (£), Sat, Moreton-in-Marsh Showground. Massive country fair, billed as 'The Countryside in a Day'. Just across the county border but only half an hour from Oxford by train.
  • Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (£), Sun, St Mary's Church, Kidlington. Sussex-based This Is My Theatre bring Alice back to Oxfordshire.
  • HOxStock (£), Sun, Tap Social, Botley. One-day fundraiser for Homeless Oxfordshire with local musicians including Peerless Pirates and Maisy's Rainbow Dream.

This week

Coming up

Mark your diary for 12/13 September: Oxford Open Doors, Binsey Fête, East Oxford Farmers’ Market 20th Anniversary, Come and Sing Fauré at Dorchester Abbey. More next Friday.

Oxfordshire’s independent media

Notes from Clarion HQ

“All politics is local”, they say. Electors are more concerned with practical everyday issues than abstruse aspects of council budgets. We get that. That’s (mostly!) why we’re here. Still, we were still a bit surprised to hear City Councillors devote much more time last night to £40,000 of public toilet improvements than to a £3.8m accounting error. Another maxim might be “sh-t happens”, though we’re not sure whether to apply that to the accounting error or the public toilets.

We’re continuing to work the feedback from your survey responses into the newsletter; you might have spotted a little more community news this week. This is entirely thanks to readers contacting us with tips and suggestions, for which thank you! If you have a story or a comment, we’re at news@oxfordclarion.uk. See you on Tuesday.