Clarion Weekly, 13 June 2025

It is Friday 13th (insert your own joke here) and this has been an epic week for news in the shire. If you read nothing else, read the top stories. But if you make it to the end, there is an excellent joke about quantum computing buried in here, and an Ozymandias kitten update. Settle down and enjoy!

This week’s top stories

Switching off some streetlights, some of the time, in some locations, is once again being proposed for Oxfordshire. The County Council says that lighting contributes one-third of their direct carbon emissions, even with LED lights across the county. Part-night lighting will be implemented on request from local communities where a councillor supports it, similar to the process for 20mph speed limits. We wrote about the pros and cons of part-night lighting in a long read in November.

The landowners of Jericho Wharf by the Oxford Canal are planning to turn it into student flats, according to local campaigners. The derelict site has been proposed for a community centre, boatyard and housing in a saga lasting some 20 years.

Campaigners for the Save Jericho Wharf campaign say that they have discovered plans by landowner Cheer Team to sell the Jericho Wharf site for student flats, which would allow them to avoid planning obligations for affordable housing, a community centre and a boatyard. They say the landowner has already engaged with City Council planners, and neighbours Worcester College, regarding the proposal. Cheer Team are believed to argue that student flats would more than double the development’s value.

Last December the Jericho Wharf Trust asked the City Council to break the impasse by compulsory purchase – but they say there has been no progress since. “The need is more pressing than ever for a development for new housing, modern community facilities and a repair boatyard to stop boats sinking.” We reported on the ongoing saga in a long read last year, looking at the history of the site and the repeated failed attempts to develop it.

A low-carbon heat network for Oxford could provide alternative energy for the city’s historic buildings which, according to the City Council, are “incredibly hard to decarbonise without considerable cost or heritage impact”.

Developer 1Energy has won £21m of Government funding for the project. The network will move heat via underground water-filled pipes. Construction is expected to start next year. Working with local councils and the universities, 1Energy says it will invest an initial £100m of private capital. The network could cut emissions from connected buildings by 80%.

1Energy CEO Andrew Wettern said “Oxford has more than 1500 listed buildings across the city, so the decarbonisation challenge for Oxford is much harder than many other cities. The Oxford Energy Network will be invisible and silent, and maintain warmth in the winter.”

Oxford City Council is looking to capitalise on the city’s “lab space” boom by raising the charge payable on new office and R&D buildings from £33.74 to £172.28 per square metre. It would be the first change in the Community Infrastructure Levy for such buildings since 2013. Cllr Alex Hollingsworth said “As well as providing jobs for Oxford people, new developments need to contribute fairly to the infrastructure that supports the whole city.” The proposal, put forward after an independent review, will go to the Council’s Cabinet for approval.

The Government says it wants to more than double the size of Campsfield House, the “immigration removal centre” near Kidlington/Oxford Airport it plans to reopen. A Phase 1 refurbishment programme will see 160 beds installed, expanding to 400 with a new-build Phase 2. A statement says: “The IRC will hold a mixture of time-served foreign national offenders and immigration offenders while we prepare to remove them from the UK. Detained men will be held under immigration powers and will not be free to leave or access the local area.”

A £70m contract for the works was awarded to construction company Galliford Try last year. Campsfield closed in 2018 after 25 years: the Keep Campsfield Closed group is campaigning against its reopening.

Around the city

• Councillors and residents of Morrell Avenue in Oxford say a speed camera is needed “as a matter of urgency” – with most drivers speeding and some even reaching 95mph. Last week a collision in which a BMW driver hit a taxi from behind resulted in hospitalisations and significant damage to property. Though the speed limit is 20mph, 40% of motor traffic on the road is travelling faster than 25mph. Residents say drivers are “regularly recorded exceeding speeds of 50mph”. They are now asking Oxfordshire County Council and the Police & Crime Commissioner to collaborate on installing a speed camera. They are also asking local MP Anneliese Dodds to lobby for a change in the law so new speed cameras can be more easily installed, saying that the Vision Zero target of no road deaths is “a vision that, irrespective of political affiliation, we should all be working on together”.
• The Vaults & Garden Cafe is crowdfunding to try and bring an end to a legal dispute with its landlords, the University Church. The cafe has been located in Old Congregation House, the first building owned and built by the University, since 2003: they were given three months notice to quit two years ago. The case is due in the High Court in October. The founders say they are “calling for a fair and peaceful resolution to our dispute - one rooted in dialogue, not eviction”. The church had previously announced that it wished to develop the building and run the cafe as a social enterprise.
• 10 tern chicks have hatched on rafts installed by volunteers at Hinksey Lake. Local residents took action a month ago to save one of the most important breeding sites for the Common Tern in Oxfordshire, a raft on Hinksey Lake. The floating raft in which the birds nest had fallen into disrepair: residents refurbished it and added a second, towing it into place by kayak.
• Littlemore Matters, according to a new mural painted by pupils at John Henry Newman Academy with street artist The Big Orange M. The mural beneath Littlemore Bridge features lyrics by poet Steve Larkin. Littlemore Bridge was built in 1958 to carry the eastern bypass over Oxford Road. The mural was completed following concrete repairs to the bridge in April.
• Organisers of East Oxford's Magdalen Road Festival called for residents to support local retailers every day “come rain or shine” as the festival drew crowds despite the rain on Saturday. Highlights included a show at the Pegasus Theatre, a beekeeping Q&A at Wild Honey, music from street entertainment guru Dave Seamer, plus street food from cafes and charities along the road from the Porch to Taste Tibet and the Magdalen Arms. Local resident and former Lord Mayor Craig Simmons said: “Our amazing community of residents showed up to celebrate the fabulous organisations we have on Magdalen Road. This street is an amazing place to live, shop, eat and drink.”
• Oxford’s Waterstones bookshop closed on Wednesday. The long-established shop at the junction of Broad Street and Cornmarket is relocating to Queen Street in the autumn, with the new shop expected to open in September. Sister company Blackwells’ three branches in the city centre remain open.

• Around a thousand people marched in the Pride parade on Saturday at Radcliffe Square. Oxford Pride said: “We are witnessing a disturbing rollback in LGBTQIA+ rights, and trans people are bearing the brunt. This year, we stand with our trans community. We protest. We remember why Pride began.” Luba from Canada was flying a flag for Kyiv Pride & Kharkiv Pride with the slogan ‘Prides #StandWithUkraine’ There have been no Pride parades in Kyiv since the invasion. The party continued in South Park where spirits remained undampened even if umbrellas were up.
• Music shop PMT, a fixture on the Cowley Road since the 1990s, has closed after the chain went into administration. Latterly rebranded from Professional Music Technology to Play Music Today, the company had 15 stores across the UK. The shop sold guitars, keyboards and drums to some of Oxford’s best known bands. A 2013 Spin headline reported “Radiohead’s Beloved Music Shop Won’t Be Turned Into a Mutant Travelodge”. PMT moved to a larger unit on the Cowley Road three years later. Independent music shop the Music Box remains on Cowley Road, while for urgent balladry needs, Roberts Pianos is still open on St Clement’s and Magdalen Road.
• Botley Road’s Thames Water saga took an unexpected twist on Thursday evening with the rupture of a 6in water main just west of the station at Cripley Place, the designated route for cyclists heading west. Contractors say they believe a cast iron pipe has cracked but that there were no records showing the route of the pipe. After two hours the shutoff valve was located and water levels are subsiding. Commenters have pointed out that Cripley Place, usually a quiet residential road, is currently being used by heavy buses turning before the station.

Around the county

• NatWest has announced the closure of its Abingdon and Bicester banks at the end of September. Just three branches will be left in the county: Oxford, Banbury and Witney. A ‘community pop-up bank’ will operate for 12 weeks after closure.
• The Bicester Motion site has been fully handed back to the businesses operating there following the tragic deaths in a fire on the evening of 15 May. Thames Valley Police continue to work with fire investigators and the Health & Safety Executive.
• 40 new homes are proposed for the West Oxfordshire village of Aston, south of Witney. The development by Croudace Homes, on the western edge of the settlement, would be 40% ‘affordable’ and have a mix of 2, 3 and 4-bed homes. Aston is served by the hourly Pulhams 19 bus. The planning statement says that cycling to Bampton or Witney is also an option for “cycling enthusiasts”. The plans are now with West Oxfordshire District Council for consideration.
• A Witney firm of accountants with four employees has been appointed as auditors of ferry firm P&O, replacing multinational KPMG who resigned the role in April. Just Audit & Assurance says it specialises in “smaller company and charity audits”; P&O had revenues of almost £1bn last year. ITV spoke to Just Audit director Jonathan Russell, who said: “You can have a big name, yes, you can have a small name. Does it mean that the audit’s done any better or worse? I don’t know. I can tell you now that the average experience in auditing of my staff is over 20 years.”
• Oxford coffee shop Missing Bean is to open in Charlbury, replacing local restaurant Chloe’s. Owner Chloe Horner commented “Ori (Missing Bean founder) and I have been firm friends since my Oxfork days. We share many of the same values; their coffee is traded directly with farmers, their bakery uses local flour.” The chain currently has three cafes in Oxford, Abingdon and Woodstock. A further Banbury outlet closed in April but was reopened by the former manager Eliza as Coffee Corner.

University and research

• Sir Stephen Fry, Visiting Professor of Creative Media, has opened the new Bodleian Libraries exhibition, ‘Treasured’. “A treasure,” he said, “is something you want to hug or hoard, to be gloated or drooled over.” The free exhibition, celebrating the centenary of the Friends of the Bodleian, has half its exhibits from outside the Western world. It runs until Sunday 26 October.
• Quantum computing news from Oxford: Oxford Quantum Circuits has published a roadmap to reach 200 logical qubits by 2028 and 50,000 by 2034. Quantum computing has applications in defence, cybersecurity, drug discovery and fraud detection. Founded in 2017, OQC spun out of the University of Oxford and uses its own ‘Coaxmon’ three-dimensional architecture, rather than 2D circuits, to simplify fabrication and improve the coherence of quantum systems. Gerald Mullally for OQC said “This roadmap is a landmark for quantum computing, in the UK and globally. It shows that the moment when quantum computing begins to transform people’s lives is closer than many realise.”
• Separately, US company IONQ announced its acquisition of Oxford Ionics for just over $1bn. The combined entity plans to expand its workforce in Oxford to further develop the UK’s position as a leader in quantum computing.
• And as we published, a third piece of quantum news hit our radar. Oxford Instruments has agreed to sell its NanoScience division to Quantum Design of California for £60m. Quantum Design says NanoScience's ultra-low-temperature cryogenics instrumentation will complement its own measurement systems, while Oxford Instruments will concentrate on its core markets of materials analysis, semiconductors, and healthcare and life sciences. We wrote about its incredible founders recently. The Clarion Science Editor wishes us to point out, in Pride Month, that quantum computing is particularly powerful because it is non-binary. 🌈
• A vaccine developed by scientists at the University of Oxford for the Nipah virus may soon be available having been granted support from the European Medicines Agency's regulatory fast track scheme. Nipah is fatal in up to 85% of cases and a WHO priority due to its pandemic potential.
• Hedgehog droppings collected from gardens can measure biodiversity, according to Oxford biologist Dr Hedgehog (real name Dr Sophie Lund Rasmussen). She is crowdfunding DNA analysis at £172 per fecal sample.
• Oxford University has confirmed that most of its Humanities faculties will move into the new £185m Schwarzman Centre, between Walton Street and Woodstock Road, this summer. English, History, Lingustics, Medieval & Modern Languages, Music, Philosophy, and Theology are all to move in. The opening date will be the end of September 2025, in time for Michaelmas term. Also housed at the centre will be the Bodleian Humanities Library, the Institute for Ethics in AI, and the Oxford Internet Institute. We have not been able to find out about any planned seagull mitigation measures.
  

Oxfordshire politics

There has been an unprecedented outbreak of consensus across the MPs of Oxfordshire this week who are in glorious agreement that Good Things Have Been Done. Of course they're all trying to take credit for it...

MPs across Oxfordshire welcomed the expansion of free school meals. Over 30,500 children in Oxfordshire are set to benefit from the plan to provide free school meals for children in households on Universal Credit, worth up to £500 a year.

Banbury MP Sean Woodcock said: “I know from the doorstep and my casework how much the stain of child poverty has impacted families in Banbury Constituency. Children across Banbury deserve the best start in life, and I’m proud that Labour is delivering this through the Plan for Change.”

Oxfordshire's LibDem MPs commented: “This is a victory for so many families. We’re glad the Government has listened to Liberal Democrat pressure on their behalf. For years families have had to choose between heating or eating. But this can’t be the finish line: the next steps must be automatic registration for those entitled to free school meals, cutting the cost of school uniforms and crucially, ending the two-child benefit cap."

Anneliese Dodds and Sean Woodcock both celebrated the repeal of the 1824 Vagrancy Act which criminalised rough sleeping. Layla Moran spoke of her “pure joy”, saying “After 7 years of dogged campaigning, this barbaric law will be consigned to the history books. A petition by Oxford students began the campaign, which has ended in real change for society's most vulnerable. Our voices do matter.”

On to what our elected representatives have been up to – a curated feed:

• Thames Valley Police & Crime Commissioner Matthew Barber said that chronic underfunding of the Ministry of Justice is undermining the criminal justice system and putting public safety at risk. He claims that day-to-day spending on justice in 2025–26 is forecast to be 24% lower per person than in 2007–08, and the current backlog of court cases is nearly double that of 2019. “The system is buckling. Justice doesn’t end when an offender is arrested but when a victim sees a resolution and with rehabilitation or punishment Right now, the cycle is broken.” He was disappointed by the spending review this week, saying it left the Government’s Safer Streets Mission in tatters and acted as a real terms cut to police funding, forecasting “problems in our courts and prison for many years to come, heaping more pressure on police forces and risking damage to public confidence”. He posted a recap of his week here, and met with the Policing Minister to talk about shoplifting (there is an excellent picture of a police horse on his post on the subject, though we want to know how horses stop shoplifting, because that would make an excellent long read).
• Banbury MP Sean Woodcock posted a roundup of his week here. He met with Brian May to talk about Bovine TB (not a typo). Please visit his Bluesky feed for some classic MP photo-op pictures this week like this and this. A masterclass in the genre, we salute you. (But we had to go with Brian May.)
• Oxford East MP Anneliese Dodds visited the Botley Road rail bridge site to monitor progress, which is perhaps best described as “slow and steady”. She talked up Labour's campaign to build more homes, saying “The biggest problem in Oxford is housing and Labour is dealing with it: £39bn investment in affordable homes – part of the biggest wave of affordable and social housing in a generation plus investing to tackle root causes of homelessness.” (No arguments from us on Oxford's housing problem.)
• Henley & Thame MP Freddie van Mierlo called for the government to protect chalk streams in its planning reforms, and sponsored a debate on recognising humanist marriage, speaking movingly about his own wedding in Scotland. He posted this update from his week.
• Bicester & Woodstock MP Calum Miller celebrated the new roof on the village hall at Launton, delivered by the parish council. Was he trolling Kemi Badenoch? He called for the acceleration of decarbonising public transport.
• Witney MP Charlie Maynard spoke up for community bus services in his constituency in Parliament, citing Witney’s West Oxfordshire Community Transport.
• Didcot and Wantage MP Olly Glover said he was backing investment to enable more people to cycle; spoke up in Parliament on retail crime and police response; and ate an excellent looking pizza at Avanti in Wallingford. (We bring you only the most important news. )
• Oxford West & Abingdon MP Layla Moran is on parental leave but apparently still issuing statements and keeping constituents updated on flooding. She was at Pride with her new baby (awww).

Walking and cycling

• Two new cycle routes are being drafted for Banbury. A “western active travel corridor” around the wide Ruscote Avenue, and an eastern route from the town centre to Grimsbury and Overthorpe, have received Government funding for design work. Cycling levels in Banbury are currently low, with very little dedicated infrastructure in the town centre and poor connections to nearby villages. A local cycling and walking infrastructure plan (LCWIP) was signed off by Oxfordshire County Council in 2023.
• Liberal Democrat leader Ed Davey visited Oxfordshire on Friday to lend support to the campaign by Henley & Thame MP Freddie van Mierlo for a traffic-free cycleway from Thame to the railway station at Haddenham. Progress on the route, which crosses into Buckinghamshire, has been held up by land issues. He rode along the Phoenix Trail, the existing traffic-free cycleway from Thame to Princes Risborough which forms part of the National Cycle Network. Davey called for national Government to support schemes like this, while van Mierlo pointed to joint work between Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire councils.

Trains and buses

• The Government has announced £2.5bn funding to extend East West Rail to Cambridge. The first stage will open from Oxford to Milton Keynes later this year – we were expecting September but hearsay is that delays with the new Winslow station may push it back towards December. The Treasury said it was “confirming” the Cambridge link, and funding would “unlock the potential of the Oxford to Cambridge Growth Corridor”.
• Stagecoach is introducing a new bus route from Horspath Road and Redbridge Park & Ride to the city centre in July. The 800 will broadly run every half hour, taking 12 minutes from Gloucester Green to the P&R. It formerly served as a staff-only shuttle bus.

Dates for your diary

• Twelfth Night, 23 June–5 July at Oxford Castle as part of the Shakespeare Festival. One of the most accessible Shakespeare plays: Viola, a stranger in a strange land – shipwrecked, heartbroken, and alone – disguises herself as her lost-at-sea brother to serve in the court of Duke Orsino, setting off a storm of mischief, mistaken identities, and barely disguised longing. (Their Instagram looks amazing.)
• I Pledge Allegiance to Angry Women. Thursday 19 June, Jacqueline du Pré Music Building, St Hilda's College. An evening of women's rage, in words and music. Content warnings include screaming, loud noises, and profanity. (Hell yes!)
• Thame Pride. Friday 20–Sunday 22 June. Thame's first ever Pride festival, featuring the London Gay Men's Chorus & a Rainbowsaurus treasure hunt for children. 🌈🦖
• Oxford Civic Society talk. Tuesday 17 June, Rowley House. 8pm. Free. Estelle Bailey (CEO of the Berkshire, Buckinghamshire and Oxfordshire Wildlife Trust) will be speaking on the topic of "Nature’s Recovery – A Challenging Headwind".
• Christ Church Tudor Fayre. Saturday 13 July, 11.30am–5.30pm. Immerse yourself in the Tudor life of 1525 in celebration of 500 years since the foundation of Christ Church as Cardinal College.

This weekend

• Beer, sausages and marmalade. Walking tour of Oxford from the Museum of Oxford with local historian Liz Woolley. Saturday, 2pm (booking required). There's another one in September if they sell out.
• Banbury Show, Saturday. Spiceball Park, 10am–5pm. Music, kids’ activities and food stalls.
• Ramsden Summer Fete & Dog Show, Saturday. 12pm–4pm: “the biggest (and friendliest!) Summer Fete in West Oxfordshire”. A proper village fete with morris dancers, welly-wanging, loveable dogs, and music from (it says here) Charlbury Ukulele Disaster. Between Witney and Charlbury, just off the X9 bus route.
• DIY Pride, Sunday. 1pm-5pm, Florence Park Community Centre and after dark at the Old Fire Station. Click here for a fabulous looking line up for all ages. A community-led, grassroots alternative to sponsored Pride events; in their words, "Pride doesn’t belong to sponsors, it belongs to us."
• Oxford Eid Extravaganza, Sunday. Blackbird Leys Park, 12pm–7pm. A community festival regularly attracting 15,000 visitors, with activities for children and some of the best food stalls around.
• The early summer crops are coming in. Fancy visiting a market? Our directory is here. In June, you should be able to find broad beans, chard, early courgettes and summer squash, plus currants and strawberries, which are absolutely at their best when you buy them locally and they don't have to travel. (If you visit your local market, send us a photo and a few words at news@oxfordclarion.uk and we'll update our listings.)

Oxfordshire’s independent media

• The Oxford Sausage looks at Morris dancing in Headington Quarry. We know we link to this blog often, but this is vintage sausage and a must-read.
• Daily Info speaks to the organisers of DIY Pride, taking place this weekend.
• Cherwell asks if “it’s ok to hate tourism in Oxford”.
• The Oxford Blue sits down with the Principal of Somerville, Baroness Jan Royall.
• The Oxford Student visits Amathus, the new wine shop on the High.
• Nightshift’s June issue is out.
• The satirical Witney Gitzette took a look at devolution with this zinger: “Oxfordshire to be Split into Lord of the Rings-Style Fiefdoms Under New Council Reforms. Oxfordshire County Council has announced it will abandon traditional local government boundaries and instead divide the county into distinct Lord of the Rings-style realms, based on cultural identity, property prices, and how smug people feel about their local deli.” Do read the rest of the article.
• Dark Oxfordshire previously featured Charlbury’s anti-vaccination riots of 1897, which were picked up by the BBC this month in a short listen.
• And finally, not strictly news, not strictly Oxfordshire, and not strictly independent, but nonetheless please enjoy this news article and all kinds of bonkers video about the wedding of two miniature Highland cows (they said “I moo”) and their “honeymooon” in Oxford, Ontario.

Ozymandias update

It has been quite the week. Perhaps you'd like a kitten update – the latest episode on our occasional series following Magdalen's newest fellow. You can see he's being very helpful in the running of the College.

Notes from Clarion HQ

Artificial intelligence is coming for your local news. Google, amongst others, is rolling out ‘AI Overviews’ which summarise current events in an easy-to-digest format. Try googling ‘Oxford congestion charge summary’ for an example: Google will present you with a bullet-pointed list, citing OCC’s press release, the BBC, and indeed, the Clarion.

The Wall Street Journal wrote about it this week, saying “News Sites Are Getting Crushed by Google’s New AI Tools” (archive link). They report:

“Chatbots are replacing Google searches, eliminating the need to click on blue links and tanking referrals to news sites. As a result, traffic that publishers relied on for years is plummeting… When [two American publishers] merged in 2021, Google search accounted for around 60% of the company’s traffic. Today, it is about one-third.”

Your Clarion team do share some of the concerns of those in the news industry about the ‘AI apocalypse’. But we wonder if publishers have partly brought this upon themselves. Google’s bullet points might be more reliable, and less partial, than the stream of clickbait served up by Britain’s big three local news companies.

Of the three, Reach (publishers of the Mirror and Express, but nothing in Oxfordshire) are the most active in seeking new ways of delivering the news, and this year they’ve been launching Clarion-style newsletters in cities across Britain. Here’s Bristol’s, for example, and Nottingham’s. They’re not bad at all.

We’ll leave you with a fun challenge: Hunt the Local Plan! This week Oxford City Council said it has “published the first draft of its Local Plan 2042”. The press release promises: “The full draft Local Plan 2042 is available on the Council’s website.” Can you find it? We can’t. (Though we confess we haven’t yet looked in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying “Beware of the Leopard”.) Send us a message if you do manage to locate it.

(12.30pm update: An hour after we went to press with the newsletter, we’re happy to say the City Council has linked to the plan on the website! It’s under agenda item 9 here. We’ll have a longer write-up in due course.)