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Clarion Weekly, 6 June 2025

Clarion Weekly, 6 June 2025
Thames Valley Police on patrol in Oxford city centre. (Photo by TVP.)

This week’s long reads

Not one but two long reads! We're spoiling you! And they are very different.

Make Oxford Great(er) Again – that’s the cry from Oxford City Council which wants a single council on expanded boundaries. But would it work? We take a close look at the proposals. Now, we know that devolution and unitary authorities don't necessarily make for sexy copy. But we think Clarion readers are better than that. And while this stuff might at first seem dry (this article is not), it is absolutely critical to the future of the city and county we live in: our council tax, the roads we drive on, the traffic, railways, future employment prospects, housing, sewage and even, maybe, trams?

Did you know much of East Oxford used to be a huge allotment site? We looked at the noble art of allotmenteering in a short piece of escapism, and explained how you can find a plot for yourself. Thanks to guest writer Louise Thomas. We are all the Clarion. This caused some debate on Twitter, on whether allotment sites should all be built on for housing or kept for “the wonky vegetable brigade”. Over on Bluesky it had allotment holders posting about where there were spare plots. Read the article and decide…

Allotment life (photo: Louise Thomas).

This week’s top stories

Plans for a new nightlife venue on George Street, the Underground Bar under Gourmet Burger Kitchen, were approved this week after Thames Valley Police substantially withdrew their objections.

TVP’s original objection stated that “Another late night venue… will add to the overall cumulative effect of crime, disorder, antisocial behaviour and nuisance. The site itself historically proved to be exceptionally problematic owing to its physical location and the layout of the street outside, once labelled as ‘vomit alley’ in national media… demarcation between those queuing for buses and customers of the venue led to disorder.” An objection was also received from the owners of the adjacent George Oxford Hotel.

However, the City Council’s licensing committee meeting on Wednesday evening heard that TVP no longer had significant issues with the proposal after the decision to take a previous “cumulative impact” policy out of the equation. They did raise concerns with queue management, dispersal, and smokers congregating, which will be kept under review.

Other discussions at the meeting centred around body-worn cameras and the number of security staff to be employed late at night. TVP praised applicant and owner Yola Kucel for being “very engaging and very supportive” at her previous venue Kiss Bar, which closed last year. The Underground Bar will be licensed for recorded music and sale of alcohol until 2.30am Mon–Thu, 3am Fri–Sat and 2am Sun; live music will finish at 11pm.

The promoters of Botley West Solar Farm say they will increase their Community Benefit Fund to £440,000 per annum. Previously they had pledged £200,000. The fund is intended to “deliver long-term financial support to local initiatives across Oxfordshire”.

A petition by Oxfordshire’s Low Carbon Hub has called for the fund to be raised to 2% of project revenue, which would be £840,000 in the first year but could increase to £2m. The organisers say a fixed sum “isn‘t linked to the actual revenues of Botley West”. The case for and against Botley West is currently being heard at a six-month Planning Inspectorate examination. We looked at the proposals in a long read earlier this year.

Vertiport unveiling at Bicester Motion.

Flying electric taxis in Oxfordshire took a step closer to reality as Skyports unveiled its new vertiport at Bicester Motion this week. Vertiports support vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft, such as electric air taxis, drones, or other advanced air mobility (AAM) vehicles.

The vertiport at Bicester is a ‘living lab’ for testing eVTOL ground infrastructure and flight operations and is planned to play a significant role in enabling the next generation of electric, low noise aviation in the UK. The vertiport includes a compact terminal, passenger processing facilities, an operations room for scheduling and a situational awareness module with tools for airspace, weather and perimeter monitoring.

Separately, this week the government announced the creation of a new UK Airspace Design Service. While its first task is to focus on the congested airspace around London, it will focus in a later phase on reorganising UK airspace to include flightpaths for AAM vehicles. James Richmond, head of AAM at AtkinsRéalis added: “The vertiport is a pathfinder project for the UK, setting new precedents and providing infrastructure insights. The lessons learned here will be critical for streamlining the development of other vertiports, to scale Advanced Air Mobility.” We wrote about Bicester Motion in a long read last year.

Around the city

  • The site of the University of Oxford Shop on the High, vacant since 2021, is finally to come back into use. Camelia, a continental-style patisserie and coffee house, has been given planning permission for internal and external alterations to a building that dates back to 1320, when it was an academic hall known as Tackley’s Inn. Just down the street, the Amathus wine shop recently opened in the former OUP bookshop.
  • A playground in East Oxford could be developed to encourage play in nature. Iffley Fields Residents Association is asking for views on the NaturEscape plan by Monday 30 June. A mini golf course in nearby Florence Park became a NaturEscape area in 2021, since renamed Kate’s Place.
  • Cult toy store Pop Mart is understood to have finalised a location in Oxford city centre. The Chinese company sells themed figurines, often through ‘blind box’ mystery buys. It currently has UK stores in London, Cambridge, Reading, Manchester and Birmingham.
  • Oxford's central Post Office on St Aldate's will stay open, but now as a franchise operated by stationery company Universal Office Equipment rather than a directly operated branch. Services will remain the same, with a minor change to opening hours on Tuesday mornings. The Post Office says “we have made our decision and therefore, we are not inviting feedback on this change”.

Party for the Planet on Broad Street.

  • Rain on Thursday couldn’t dampen the atmosphere at Party for the Planet, an event on Broad Street celebrating local action to fight climate change. A programme of speakers including Professor Elisa Morgera, UN Special Rapporteur on Climate Change & Human Rights, was followed by a series of world music acts from Guerilla Ceilidh to Sol Samba. Dr Alice Evatt spoke about a 24-hour online global climate conference, which enabled participation from many more people than an in-person event would: “We heard from a 13 year old boy saying ‘we live in a world where companies seem to have more rights than people’.”
  • The Oxford Gamelan Society is giving a free concert on Tuesday 17th June. This will be the last concert in the current building before the Music Faculty, with the gamelan and the rest of the Bate Collection of Musical Instruments, moves to the Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities. Christ Church will then develop the site as graduate accommodation.
  • The Defend Our Juries campaign, including members of Extinction Rebellion Oxford, held a vigil in Broad Street on Thursday. A town crier in attendance proclaimed the right of juries to acquit climate protestors.
  • Playground campaign Oxplay has renewed its call for a permanent city centre play space. It says the success of pop-up playgrounds proves the need: “We have heard many stories of families spending time together in the city centre with play stops between shops, or one parent playing while the other shops. We urge Oxford City and Oxfordshire County Council to take this positive experience of running playspaces and accelerate through into finding a permanent location as soon as possible.”
  • The Beefy Boys, the second best burger restaurant in Hereford, has announced they are opening a branch in Oxford’s Westgate Centre. (Here’s the best.)
  • And finally, not strictly news, but this week we learned that the Weston Library in Oxford (part of the Bodleian) has a small baby play space. And they've called it the Toddleian. Beautiful. Hat tip to that copywriter.

Around the county

Artist's impression of the EV charging station.
  • A former Little Chef and petrol station by the A34 could become a hi-tech EV charging station with its own solar farm. Family Farm, on the south side of the road at Weston-on-the-Green (near the M40/Bicester junction), is earmarked for a service area with 115 charging bays. A rest stop building will have food halls and rest rooms, with a grassland feature outside: the application states “It is envisaged that visitors may occupy themselves with a meadow walk whilst waiting for their vehicle to re-charge, expanding on and creating greater distinction between the proposal scheme and most modern service stations.” Plans are with Cherwell District Council for consideration. And in other North Oxfordshire solar news…
  • A solar farm at Stratton Audley, northeast of Bicester, is to go ahead after the developers won an appeal against Cherwell District Council. The Government’s Planning Inspectorate concluded the visual impact of Padbury Brook Solar Farm would not be enough to justify refusal. Planning inspector Cullum Parker visited the site and said “The site would be visible to occupiers of motor vehicles as they travel up and down this road… Nonetheless, the primary purpose of drivers is to watch the road.” He agreed there would be “major adverse effects” for walkers on a nearby footpath, but said that hedgerow and tree planting would mitigate this, resulting in a “visually variegated view… rather than a sea of solar panels”. A separate appeal is currently underway for a solar farm at Noke, Otmoor.
  • But wait! There’s more! Another solar farm is proposed for North Oxfordshire. Elgin Energy wants to build a 40MW installation between Hanwell and Shotteswell, just north of Banbury, with a lifespan of 40 years. A “scoping request”, an early part of the planning process, has been lodged with Cherwell District Council. Cherwell’s planning officers are presumably keen not to go anywhere sunny on their holidays.
  • The main construction contract for the A40 Shores Green works at Witney has been signed. Oxfordshire County Council has engaged M Group Highways to carry out the work. The works will see new west-facing sliproads built to relieve congestion in Witney town centre.
  • The Coalition to Keep Campsfield Closed held a small rally in Radcliffe Square on Wednesday. 25 protestors held placards opposing the reopening of Campsfield House immigration detention centre near Kidlington. Oxford City Council passed a motion in October opposing Home Office plans to reopen Campsfield House, which closed in 2019. Detainees had undertaken hunger strikes and died by suicide.
  • Speed limits on the dangerous A4260, the old main road from Oxford to Banbury, could be reduced to 50mph, with 40mph at busy junctions and 30mph within Banbury. The proposal, part of Oxfordshire County Council’s Vision Zero policy, is out for consultation.
  • The Government’s Oxford–Cambridge Growth Corridor Champion, Lord Vallance, was the key speaker at an ‘OxCam Supercluster Conference’ this week. He said he wanted the region to be “an economic engine for the entire country”. The event, which was held in Oxford Cambridge London, included a session on ‘Turbocharging the UK Economy with AI’ and speakers from the Ellison Institute of Technology, Airbus, and Oxford Science Enterprises.

University and research

  • Oxford University could offer part-time undergraduate study for the first time, according to its draft strategic plan shared this week. The university also proposes to digitise 25% of its museum and library collections. Its fundraising target for 2030 is £4bn.
  • Researchers in the University of Oxford’s Department of Biology have been awarded £6.7m to pioneer a new synthetic biology approach which promises to improve yields in potato and wheat. They say that genome science “could allow farmers to grow more food with fewer resources, even under tough conditions such as drought or extreme heat”. Which is timely, because another Oxford researcher, Dr Solomon Gebrechorkos, found this week that droughts are getting more severe – even in places where rainfall has stayed the same. “We need to act now by developing targeted socio-economic and environmental adaptation strategies and improved early warning and risk management systems. Many affected areas are already struggling to cope with severe drought.”
  • The Choir of Worcester College travelled to Bayeux this week for the 81st anniversary of D-Day, singing at a service of remembrance. ITV’s Good Morning Britain broadcast their seaborne rehearsal and interviewed some of the young trebles from Christ Church Cathedral School who sing in the choir.

Anneliese Dodds at the Headington Festival; Freddie van Mierlo and Tim Bearder, together with former Outreach sub-post mistress Judy Kent plus Horspath Villagers signing a petition to re-open the post office; Charlie Maynard with some heavy machinery and a constituent while out on his walk.

Oxfordshire politics

A curated selection of the week's political goings-on.

  • The Conservative/Independent group forming one of the two official oppositions on Oxfordshire County Council has announced its shadow cabinet. Liam Walker is leader and Ian Snowdon deputy leader; Independent David Henwood takes on transport; while Saj Malik is responsible for Community Wellbeing & Safety, a choice that aroused some comment on Bluesky (full list with reaction in the quote-bleats).
  • Meanwhile, the Labour opposition has named Liz Brighouse as its leader; Izzy Creed as shadow Children & Young People; Imade Edosomwan as shadow Adult Social Care; James Fry as both Place & Environment and Transport; Glynis Phillips as Resources; Andrew Crichton as Future Economy; Susanna Pressel as Public Health; Geoff Saul as Community Wellbeing; and Brad Baines (deputy leader) as Finance.
  • Last week, we reported on Oxford Pride banning political parties at the event this weekend, saying that “Allyship is not expressed through logos but through actions”. This week the LibDems put out a statement saying that decision to ban political parties was “regrettable” but pledging to “be there in spirit, on Pride day and every other day, marching beside you”. Oxford Pride has now announced Stagecoach as a sponsor; the bus company was founded by Brian Souter, notorious in Scotland for funding homophobic campaigns. Oxford DIY Pride is on Sunday 15 June.

On to our national representatives...

  • Police & Crime Commissioner Matthew Barber has been at a Waste Crime forum to tackle fly tipping, and met with TVP volunteers for Volunteer Week. Did you know you could volunteer for police dog puppy socialisation? Sign up here, if we don’t beat you to it. He also met with councils, National Highways (or whatever they’re called this week), and the ambulance service at the local Road Safety Partnership.
  • Banbury MP Sean Woodcock has again intervened on behalf of the growing Sikh community in the town who have struggled to find a new location for their place of worship, having outgrown their premises in West Street. The community has sought over several years to find an alternative location, either by building a new property or converting an existing one; they have struggled with planning regulations and been unable to move forward with Cherwell District Council. At the MP's suggestion, the council is now allocating specific, dedicated officer time to to help the Sikh community navigate planning regulations and assist them in identifying a suitable location. The MP commented: “I visited the Gurdwara in April and saw how the space was unsuitable for their growing community. I hope this intervention will lead to a quick resolution, allowing the Sikh community to practice their faith in a space that meets their needs.”
  • Oxford East MP Anneliese Dodds visited the Headington Festival. She met her constituent Neil who kayaked from Oxford to Westminster to raise funds for medical aid for Palestine. In Parliament, she proudly backed the Labour government's Bus Services Bill. She also visited Charlbury. This ‘Greater Oxford’ thing is clearly even more expansive than we thought.
  • Witney MP Charlie Maynard has been on a lot of radio shows speaking about the ongoing saga of Thames Water, whose buyer pulled out this week, and may go into special administration, with potential consequences for bill payers – some clips here. A colleague in the House claimed that Maynard had done more to hold Thames Water to account than Ofwat, the current, or previous government. In non-water related news, last week he finished the latest in a series of walks around his constituency. He also put out his own monthly newsletter, so if you're a constituent, you can read it here.
  • Bicester & Woodstock MP Calum Miller also spoke out on sewage in Parliament. He cited his constituent Bruno in Charlton-on-Otmoor whose garden floods with sewage when it rains, saying it was within sight of a pumping station that fails every single time. And he presented his petition to Parliament for a full underpass under London Road in Bicester, which we reported on last week.
  • Henley & Thame MP Freddie van Mierlo has joined Horspath's fight to save the local post office. The 'outreach' post office, which had operated in the Community Hub for three hours a week, closed in March. Van Mierlo commented: “This is a well-used facility, embedded in the heart of the community. The Post Office’s decision to close it without meaningful engagement is unacceptable.” The MP is writing to the Chairman of the Post Office and the Minister for Postal Affairs, urging them to intervene. The village’s County Councillor Tim Bearder added: “It’s great that we have a local MP who is prepared to champion causes like this. Tremendous work has been done already by the community to raise the alarm, and now Freddie and I will bring their concerns to the doors of those in power.” He too spoke out on sewage in Parliament this week.
  • Didcot & Wantage MP Olly Glover spoke in parliament about the impact of increasing the skilled worker qualifying period from five to ten years on the Government’s wider science and research objectives, citing a constituent Kamala, who is researching drugs for diseases with no current cure. If supporting this kind of work sounds like your bag, he's hiring for a campaign mobilisation and volunteering officers. We don't think he talked about sewage in Parliament this week. Or Thames Water. But it surely won't be long, as Thames Water is due to build a giant reservoir in his constituency, which is... controversial. Much more on this in the Clarion next week.
  • Layla Moran in Oxford West & Abingdon is on parental leave and we hope she's enjoying every minute of it, but she joined the rest of the county’s LibDem MPs in campaigning on Thames Water.

Walking and cycling

  • A new travel planning website for journeys in and around Oxford has launched. Oxford Travel Options is created by Low Carbon Oxford North and the Zero Carbon Oxfordshire Partnership (ZCOP). It shows transport options and tools for transport beyond the private car. The site gives tips for walking, cycling, public transport and shared mobility like scooters or car clubs. It also includes inspiration for journey types like school and work journeys, and case studies.

Dates for your diary

  • Getting Started with Poetry. Mon 9 Jun, Oxford Poetry Library. Free monthly workshop for aspiring poets (16+).
  • From ‘Adolescence’ to non-violence? Male violence and what to do about it. Tue 10 Jun, Caper, Magdalen Road. Book launch for Every Man: Why Violence Against Women is a Men’s Issue, and How You Can Make a Difference by Jackson Katz.
  • Let's Talk About Stigma. Thu 12 Jun, History of Science Museum. Group conversations led by Oxford researchers who work on reducing the stigma around infectious disease.
  • Nature Needs You! Fri 4 July, Oxford University Museum of Natural History. Local campaigner Hannah Bourne-Taylor talks about her campaign for swift bricks in new buildings.
  • Detecting the Gothic: the 32nd Crime Fiction Weekend. 8-10 August, St Hilda's College. Keynote speaker Val McDermid, plus Oxford author Mick Herron.
  • Barbara Pym and the Charm of the Absurd. 29-31 August, St Hilda's College. Barbara Pym's admirers return to Oxford to explore the rediscovered novelist's fascination with surrealism.

Charity begins at home

  • Oxford Mutual Aid has succeeded in crowdfunding £10,000 to continue providing food support across the city. In addition, it will receive £20,000 from the National Lottery, and has registered as a charitable incorporated organisation in order to benefit from Gift Aid on donations.
  • Refugee Week is 16-22 June and the theme is 'Community is a superpower'. Asylum Welcome are looking for volunteers during the week. More details here.
The Pride flag flying over Christ Church this week.

This weekend

It's a busy weekend in Oxford. Oxford Pride on Saturday (have you spotted the repainted crossing outside County Hall?), Jericho Fest all weekend, and Magdalen Road's Summer Festival on Saturday. So let us supplement these big names with a few smaller suggestions.

Oxfordshire’s independent media

Notes from Clarion HQ

As well as the ‘Greater Oxford’ proposal which we examined in our long read, this week also saw a website launched for the districts’ rival Two Councils proposal which would see (you’re ahead of us) two unitary councils created. As we’ve already reported, the southern one would be called Ridgeway Council. The northern council, comprising Oxford, West Oxon and Cherwell, has now been christened Oxford & Shires… which is frankly a bit weak (shires, plural?). Could we suggest Solar County Council instead?

Ok, we jest. We’re still rooting to reclaim the name Isis Council, after the river. (And the sun goddess.) But we were struck by the number of renewable energy stories – solar farms, EV charging, flying electric taxis – not just this week, but increasingly week in, week out. Whatever your thoughts on proposals like Botley West, it’s hard to deny something big is happening here in Oxfordshire.