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Clarion Weekly, 12 September 2025

Clarion Weekly, 12 September 2025
All the fun of St Giles’ Fair (photograph by Roger Close)

This week’s top stories

Oxford’s £5 congestion charge is set to come into force by 10 November. The County Council cabinet unanimously approved the scheme at a special meeting on Wednesday.

We covered the meeting live on Bluesky. Proposing the motion, Cllr Andrew Gant said “This doesn’t cure everything but it delivers significant benefits. It brings into play, for example, introducing new pedestrian crossings which aren’t possible with current congestion.”

Cllr Sean Gaul, cabinet member for young people, added: “I spent the first 10 years of my life growing up in Barton. We were one of many families who could not afford a car: we were wholly reliant on buses. As someone who wants to do the most for those who have the least, I’m struggling to see how I could not support this proposal.” (Oxford City Council says that 32% of Oxford households have no car.)

Public speakers covered all views, often colourfully expressed – from “Those who drive often do so because they intend to spend. They don’t want to use the bus – as is their right, by the way” (Emily Scaysbrook, proprietor of Hoyle’s board games shop) to “The most repeated opposition argument is Schrödinger's traffic: ‘traffic doesn’t exist making the charge unnecessary, while also being so bad that the LTNs need to be removed’. I haven’t heard a single constructive alternative. I urge Cabinet to push ahead.” (Aeron Buchanan)

In a press statement, the Labour Party strongly opposed the decision, with Oxford East MP Anneliese Dodds saying “Oxford is not London – because of our geography and also because our public transport isn’t up to London’s standard.” Cllr Liz Brighouse, Labour group leader on OCC, said “Residents will now have to either pay a congestion charge to get around their own community, or go miles around the bypass which is already congested.” Conservative leader Liam Walker, meanwhile, called it “a deeply disappointing decision… this administration is out of touch with everyday lives”.

The congestion charge is intended to speed up bus journeys. (Photograph by Roger Close.)

A solar farm that could have powered “all the households in Witney” has been refused permission by West Oxfordshire District Council. The application, by Ampyr Solar Europe, was for a site at Curbridge, south of Witney. The planning committee focused on the risk of a fire from the proposed battery storage, which they said could contaminate the water supply at a nearby wedding venue.

Cllr Nick Leverton (Con, Carterton South) said: “Most of you will have seen on the motorway the sight of an electric car burning away… there are too many incidents where it was just a small chance and it becomes a big chance. I’ll remind you of Aberfan in 1966; 144 people died, 116 of them children.” The chair of the meeting, Cllr Michael Brooker (Lab, Witney South), is himself a firefighter and replied “I’ve never been to an EV fire. I’ve been to plenty of ICE vehicle fires.”

Cllr Andrew Lyon (Lab, Witney Central) said “Water is the stuff of life… what do they do if they wake up in the morning and can’t turn the tap on?” Meanwhile, Cllr Adrian Walsh (Con, Ducklington) said “Month after month as a committee we get bombarded with these solar farm applications, and we don’t appear to have any strategy as to where they should be located.”

The council’s officers had recommended that the application be approved, but 9 councillors voted against, 1 for, and 3 abstained.

Church of the Holy Family, Blackbird Leys.

The listed 1965 Church of the Holy Family in Blackbird Leys is to be demolished. One of Oxford’s most distinctive modern buildings, it suffered a roof collapse in 2018 and has been closed for worship since.

As “an experiment in joint evangelism”, the church hosted five denominations. Redevelopment was first proposed in December 2018, but shortly afterwards, a third party applied for Listed Building status which was subsequently approved by Historic England for the “technical interest of its hyperbolic paraboloid roof”. The roof is said to have leaked from its earliest days.

After consulting Tottenham Bennett Engineers, successors of the original architect, repairs were estimated at £2.4m; TBE said “Engineers in the 1950s and 1960s had difficulty designing shell roofs accurately because they did not have computers powerful enough to crunch the numbers.” Instead, Oxford City Council has approved plans for a replacement church, together with 20 flats, a 4-bed vicarage, office space, a community hall and “social infrastructure space” including for drugs outreach. The church will have strips of stained glass and 1960s-themed entrance gates.

St. Giles' Fair attracted crowds to the city this week. (Photographs by Roger Close.)

Around the city

  • Crowds flocked to St Giles’ Fair on Monday and Tuesday. It was opened by Lord Mayor, Cllr Louise Upton, with a call for “laughter, connection, and wonderful memories”. Keith Carroll of the Showmen’s Guild thanked the emergency services for making the fair possible and presented a cheque in memory of the firefighters who lost their lives at Bicester Motion. We took a look at the 400-year history of the fair.
  • The pedestrian and cycle zone on Market Street, outside the Covered Market, has been made permanent. Since April 2024, motor vehicles have been banned as a trial, except for deliveries, taxis and Blue Badge holders.
  • A social media clip purporting to show “illegal migrants being given PlayStation 5s on behalf of Oxford City Council” is actually from the US in 2018 and has nothing to do with free PlayStations, says fact-checking charity Full Fact. “We often see old content reshared with misleading captions claiming it depicts current events circulating on social media,” says Full Fact’s Charlotte Green.
  • Extinction Rebellion (XR) Oxford and other climate action groups staged a demonstration in Cornmarket against the Rosebank fossil fuels development. Two XR supporters had fake oil poured on them to highlight their case that Rosebank’s oil is for export, will not strengthen UK energy resilience, and will prevent the country hitting carbon targets; they say in one year, this one oilfield would produce as much CO2 as the world’s 700m poorest people.
  • Labour Littlemore councillor Tiago Corais has called for a temporary one-way system on Oxford Road every morning while roadworks for electricity cables take place. He said “bottlenecks from Cowley Road to Newman Road have ballooned between 7.45am and 9.15”.
  • County Hall has been sold. Oxfordshire County Council have exchanged contracts with L&G (Legal & General), who have in turn commissioned hotel developers Reef Origin – one of the firms behind The Store hotel in what used to be Boswell’s department store. The sale includes both the 1970s building and the 1841 Old County Hall. OCC staff are due to move to refurbished offices at Speedwell House, off St Aldates, in spring 2027. For the developers, Will Rohleder promised “a mixture of restaurant, bar and gallery uses as well as a roof terrace open to the public to enjoy the stunning views across the famous city roofscape”.
  • Almost 100 new affordable/social homes on derelict land are being lined up for Oxford. The City Council has identified four sites around the city, from Cutteslowe to Barton, which will provide mostly 1-bed homes. Elsfield Hall, a vacant office building by the ring road in Cutteslowe, will be demolished to provide 30 homes; the former site of an enterprise centre on Cave Street, off St Clements, will become 19 homes; 9 homes are planned for a vacant garage site at Underhill Circus in Barton; and the disused office block at Knights Court on Between Towns Road, anomalously owned by West Oxfordshire District Council, will be acquired and converted to 34 homes. We wrote about repurposing brownfield sites last year.
  • A new garden at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford has officially opened, providing a small 'oasis' for patients and staff at the Women's Centre. The improvements have been co-funded by the Silver Star Maternity Fund, which provides extra support for sick newborns and their families.
  • Oxford Town Hall is to fly the Cross of St George this weekend in support of England’s women’s rugby team, who are playing Scotland in the World Cup quarter final. Prop Maud Muir was born in Oxford, playing for Oxford Harlequins and Gosford All Blacks youth teams. The Union Jack flies from the Town Hall on 11 days a year, and from Carfax Tower on 14 days. The St George's Cross usually flies only on St George's Day.
  • The George Street Social café/bar is closing after owners City Pub Company were acquired by pub group Young’s last year. No bookings are being taken for dates after 19 September. The Plough on Cornmarket and St Aldate’s Tavern, part of the same group, remain open.
  • A late night Big Mac & fries is to return to Oxford after McDonalds won a planning appeal allowing their Cornmarket “restaurant” to open until 3am. Oxford City Council had refused 3am opening at the new McDonalds premises due to the proximity of college and other accommodation. But the inspector said “The nearby Plush nightclub already operated until 0330… this contributes to a high baseline of early morning activity and ambient noise.” (Just in time for May’s City Council elections, so activists and councillors can enjoy their mid-count McFlurry…)

Raymond Blanc (Poppy Thorpe/Belmond); the Red Lion at Cropredy.

Around the county

  • A 1,500-home development on the edge of Bicester is moving forward after the site, which already has planning permission, was acquired by Barratt Redrow, the largest housebuilder in the UK. The land is on the south-east side of Bicester, between the A41 and the Chiltern mainline railway. The development will include a new primary school, shops, and an “extra care” facility for older residents and those with additional needs. Construction is expected to start in 2027.
  • A 58-home development is planned for Broughton Road in south-west Banbury, between Easington and Bretch Hill. Houses would be built east-west to align with contours. Planning consultants Savills says it is “a logical extension to the town”.
  • Speed limits are to be cut around junctions on the A4260, the old main road from Oxford to Banbury. Oxfordshire County Council is making the changes as part of its Vision Zero plan to eliminate deaths and serious injuries on the county’s roads. Separately, OCC is proposing to cut the limit on the A361 through Banbury to 20mph following a fatal collision in 2023.
  • Wantage Community Hospital is to be refurbished thanks to £950,000 of developer funds, with a dedicated area for children and adolescent mental health services. Cllr Jenny Hannaby of Wantage Town Council said: “It is fantastic news that we have the funding to start transforming the ground floor.”
  • A pub in the Oxfordshire canalside village of Cropredy says it has been forced to close its kitchen due to the lack of trade from holiday boaters. The Oxford Canal has been closed since mid-August due to lack of water. The Red Lion says “passing trade from the canal has ceased”. The canal is expected to remain shut until at least the end of September; the Canal & River Trust says the closure is necessary to preserve canal infrastructure and ecology.
  • Watlington could be getting a new public art trail. The Parish Council has applied for planning permission for five sculptures along a walking route between the historic centre and newer areas to the west of the town. The application has attracted objections from residents concerned about the replacement of a “diseased cherry tree” with sculptures of “disembodied heads” in the context of “the quintessential English view of a church”.
  • A battery energy storage system has been approved as part of the new Tar Farm Solar Farm, near Stanton Harcourt in West Oxfordshire. The developers say the BESS will provide “an invaluable balancing service to the local grid network, charging when electricity demand is low, and releasing into the grid when energy demand increases”.
  • Destination restaurant Le Manoir aux Quat’ Saisons in Great Milton has announced it will close for redevelopment. Original chef Raymond Blanc will transition to a role of ‘Founder and Lifetime Ambassador’; he said he remained “deeply committed to guiding and nurturing the spirit of Le Manoir”. The restaurant is scheduled to reopen in summer 2027 .
  • South Central Ambulance Service (SCAS) is appealing for members of the public in Oxfordshire to volunteer as Community First Responders – local volunteers who provide vital help in emergencies before an ambulance arrives. Training is fully funded. Dave Lester, SCAS, said: “Every second counts in an emergency. Community First Responders can be the difference between life and death, starting essential care before the ambulance arrives.”

Van Mierlo with some cows; Moran with a tractor; Woodcock with NO CAT (but it is an excellent pet shop)

Oxfordshire politics

Oxfordshire’s Green Party councillors raised concerns that local military bases, such as the Defence Academy in Shrivenham, are being used to train Israeli military personnel in a motion at this week's County Council meeting. Though the motion was voted down, the Greens have renewed their call for the MoD to disclose any Israeli military presence in Oxfordshire. Cllr Emma Garnett, Green councillor for Parks, said: “Under no circumstances should Israeli military personnel be visiting UK military sites while war crimes continue in Gaza. We must exert pressure on the UK Government to exert pressure on the Israeli Government to end the genocide in Palestine.”

The two official opposition groups (Labour and Conservative/Independent) on Oxfordshire County Council will now receive half the opposition budget each, ending the anomaly where – due to an equal number of councillors – each received a full payment. Councillors voted through the revised arrangements on Tuesday. The Green group expressed concern, with its leader Ian Middleton saying that although opposition leaders deserved an allowance, “it’s difficult to see what the shadow cabinet members actually do for the money. Groups above a certain size need financial and operational support.”

At the same meeting, a proposal to reinstate the dedicated cabinet post for special educational needs was narrowly defeated. Bringing the motion, Conservative councillor James Plumb said “children and young people with SEND deserve a dedicated champion at the highest political level”.

Oxfordshire military accommodation was in the spotlight as the House of Commons debated the Renters’ Rights Bill. Bicester & Woodstock MP Calum Miller criticised Labour’s decision to block an amendment ensuring military housing meets the formal ‘Decent Homes Standard’. In 2024, the MoD took ownership of over 36,000 privatised military homes, many substandard. The Government's contention is that local authority inspections would be a security risk. Miller commented:

“I have seen first-hand how bad conditions are in military housing in Ambrosden. Families are living with damp, mould and leaks. This Bill is supposed to protect renters, yet Labour’s hypocrisy is staggering: one rule for civilians and another for those who serve our country."

Sean Woodcock, Labour MP for Banbury, countered:

"We're making the biggest investment in military personnel since the end of the cold war. Serving personnel are receiving the biggest pay rise in 20 years. Our new veterans programme, VALOUR, means they will receive help on housing, mental health services, and more".

Wednesday was Back British Farming Day. Oxfordshire is south-east England’s most rural county, and its five LibDem MPs – who mostly represent rural constituencies – called for the Government to “stop neglecting our farmers and start standing up for them. British farmers deserve better.” Among their requests were scrapping the ‘Family Farm Tax’, restoring Defra funding for Young Farmers’ Clubs, and introducing mandatory country-of-origin labelling on all beef products, including in large shops and large restaurants. (They illustrated their PR with a full suite of pictures of MPs in farms. Good work, media team.)

Onto our elected representatives’ doings:

  • Banbury MP Sean Woodcock bought a cat tree (but inexplicably did not post a picture of his cat… Banbury Labour, have a word?). In Parliament, he raised the issue of Russian drones overflying Polish airspace and said he stood with the Polish community in Banbury. He's nominating Bridget Phillipson to be Labour’s deputy leader.
  • Bicester & Woodstock MP Calum Miller As the LibDems’ foreign affairs spokesperson he met Palestinian President Abbas, confirming their support for the recognition of Palestine. He wrote to the Secretary of State asking for action on water companies, saying homes in Kidlington and Yarnton were living under constant threat of flooding.
  • Witney MP Charlie Maynard is campaigning for the path between Madley Park and Witney town centre to be surfaced, to improve access for buggies and wheelchairs. As a member of the Business & Trade Select Committee, he raised an eyebrow at none of the new ministers in that department ever having held a job in business. He's asking people to sign a petition to get the Government to invest more in brain cancer, the biggest cancer killer of children and the under-40s.
  • Oxford East MP Anneliese Dodds has been out on the doors in Courtland Road. Together with Sean Woodcock, she wrote to the new Secretary of State to urge a rapid sign-off for the new OUFC stadium.
  • Oxford West & Abingdon MP Layla Moran is still off on parental leave, but she thanked Labour MP Paulette Hamilton for meeting with her constituent Diane who tragically lost a son to suicide. On National Emergency Services day she thanked emergency services workers.
  • Didcot & Wantage MP Olly Glover was on ITV Meridian's The Last Word (we're still waiting for it to air as we write this). He attended the Palestine Solidarity Campaign's mass lobby event for MPs at Westminster, and shared his 'first week back' roundup.
  • Henley & Thame MP Freddie van Mierlo has slammed national Government plans for a new town in Chalgrove, saying it puts national security at risk. Chalgrove Airfield is currently home to the Martin Baker Aircraft Company, which makes ejector seats for military aircraft. Plans for 3,000 homes were included in a Local Plan devised by the then Conservative administration at SODC: the current LibDem-run council is seeking to remove the site, but this would require Government approval. Van Mierlo said “To disrupt Martin Baker’s operations at a time of such global uncertainty and rising tensions is completely nonsensical”, while County Councillor Judith Edwards added “Chalgrove is entirely the wrong place for a new town. It is a rural location without the kind of public transport needed to support thousands of new homes. The site requires a vast road building programme to support it.”
  • Thames Valley Police & Crime Commissioner Matthew Barber focused on rural crime this week, saying it has fallen by 17% across the Thames Valley. He credited TVP’s Rural Crime Taskforce, plus efforts by Community Safety Partnerships, the National Farmers’ Union, and farmers for the change. Barber commented: “I made tackling rural crime a priority when I was elected, and now Thames Valley has an outstanding Rural Crime Taskforce, which has conducted hundreds of investigations and provided invaluable crime prevention advice to rural residents.” Elsewhere, he weighed in on Oxford’s congestion charge debate saying the LibDems didn't have a congestion charge in their manifesto.

University and research

  • Oxford Brookes University has inaugurated a new Vice Chancellor. Professor Helen Laville has held senior academic leadership roles across a number of universities. Most recently, she was Provost and Deputy Vice-Chancellor at Kingston University.
  • A new fellowship will fund a journalist from Wales to study at the Reuters Institute of Journalism in Oxford. The Cynefin Fellowship centres on projects to “inspire systemic change in the interests of marginalised people and communities”. Cynefin is a Welsh word often translated as “habitat”, but with connotations of environment and rootedness. Applications for the Cynefin Fellowship are open now; there are around 30 other fellowships, for which 2026-27 applications will open in January.
  • And finally, The Critic has a lavishly illustrated article on Oxford's libraries.

Trains and buses

  • Architects are being sought to redesign Oxford railway station. Network Rail has put out a £1.9m tender seeking a “suitably qualified and experienced architectural practice to lead the design and planning application for the redevelopment of Oxford Station and its surrounding area”. Plans for the station have evolved in fits and starts over recent years, before being placed on hold while the Botley Road bridge works take place. By November 2026, Network Rail expects the architects to submit a detailed planning application for what it’s calling Phase 1 of the redevelopment, including “station entrances, public realm, multi-storey car park, cycle hub, offices, life sciences, hotel, and residential elements”. We looked at overcrowding in Oxford station and new railway schemes across Oxfordshire in a long read recently.
  • Construction will start this winter on bus priority improvements to Cherwell Street in Banbury. For Oxfordshire County Council, Cllr Andrew Gant said: “Banbury's Cherwell Street is heavily congested, causing frequent bus delays.” The project complements work underway at Banbury railway station and a proposed ‘eastern active travel corridor’. Work is expected to finish in summer 2026.

Charity begins at home

  • Oxfordshire charity Asylum Welcome has expressed dismay at the Home Secretary’s decision to suspend the family reunion visa, one of the few safe routes available to sanctuary seekers. Dr Hari Reed said: “Every day we work with families separated by war and persecution. Their needs remain urgent, and so does the UK’s moral obligation. The prospect of reuniting family is often what sustains refugees on their difficult journeys to the UK; for many men, the decision to risk their own lives is made so their children do not have to board unsafe boats.”

Dates for your diary

Romans in Abingdon; Ride & Stride; Oxford Open Doors.

This weekend

Oxfordshire’s independent media

Notes from Clarion HQ

Our story on WODC refusing planning permission for a solar farm went spectacularly viral this week, being retweeted by FT journalists, political commentators, Cardiff politicians (who were very unimpressed by the Aberfan analogy) and 1,500 others. It’s probably the most attention any West Oxfordshire planning decision has had since Clarkson’s Farm.

Still on planning, this week we reported on a proposal for 1,500 new homes in Bicester. The original press release didn’t actually say where in Bicester these would be. A little bit of digging and we worked it out (it’s by Rodney House Roundabout on the A41). More notable was that no one else bothered, just reprinting the release verbatim. Evidently PR folk could write “the homes will be hand-built from jelly by monks” and it would make it into Trusted Local Newspapers™ verbatim. Maybe we should try it?

We’ll be out and about at Oxford Open Doors this weekend, taking pictures for a few long reads we have lined up. Enjoy the week; see you next Friday.