This afternoon I met with Craig and Vanessa at Squirrel Cottage farm shop on The America to hear about their growing business and their plans for the future.  The weather was cold and blustery but the reception was warm, and it is great to see such a well-stocked store in our village full of produce sourced locally where possible.

I’ve heard only good feedback from local residents about Squirrel Cottage, and I really hope they’ll make a success of it.  I’ve undertaken to find out some information from the council for them.  And I came away having purchased some seeded bread, honey and a butternut squash!

The Joint Parishes HCV Group, set up to address the problem of heavy vehicles in local villages including Sutton, heard recently about this new initiative from Mick George.

The company has unveiled its new Safer Roads scheme, which will see it voluntarily extend no drive zones for its fleet of vehicles to cover more local villages, as well as introducing 20mph speed limits in high risk areas.

This is excellent news for Sutton, and a great first step in showing what can be done with modern technology and the will to address the problems of rat-running through villages like Sutton. Let’s hope other firms follow suit!

Last October, more than 100 Sutton residents came to The Glebe to give their views on which issues facing the village should be included in the village’s Neighbourhood Plan.

Sutton Parish Council’s Neighbourhood Plan working group is now consulting on the next phase of the Plan. Visit the parish council website to find out more, including a questionnaire for residents to complete and return no later than Monday 29 February,

Three of Ely’s six public toilets are set to close, after a council committee voted yesterday to recommend the closures.

The three public toilets facing the axe are Barton Road, Newnham Street, and Sacrists Gate – leaving only Palace Green, Ship Lane, and The Cloisters. Of the three remaining sets of toilets, one (Palace Green) has no disabled facilities, while all three toilets to be closed are accessible to people with disabilities.

A fascinating visit to Anson Packaging on Tuesday, thanks to Trevor Wilkin and Chris Plant.  After hearing about the history and growth of the company, I was given a comprehensive tour of the facilities and an opportunity to see from start to finish the production of the plastic food packaging that the company produces.

The compulsory ‘gear’ of oversized navy blue cover-all, hi-vis jacket, ear plugs, hairnet, and hard hat isn’t the most flattering I’ve ever worn, but is obviously essential for both safety and food hygiene.

I was given an introduction to the different types of plastic, including the polyethylene terephthalate or ‘PET’ plastic which is used for drinks bottles and other food and drink containers.  A visit to the laboratory showed the various testing equipment that is used to analyse samples.

In the factory itself, shredded and cleaned plastic ‘cornflakes’ of previously used plastic are liquified and then extruded into a thin sheet sandwiched between two very thin layers of virgin plastic.  The sheet is cut to width, and the remnants returned to the beginning of the process for chipping and re-entry into the system.

The completed sheets are wound into large rolls and put into the next stage of the process, where they are ‘thermoformed’ into shape – as the familiar triangular cases for ready-made sandwiches, containers for chilled supermarket mixed salads, pots for marinated olives, and so on.  The plastic containers are then stacked, packed, and racked for distribution.  Everything is labelled at every stage of the process to enable strict controls and recording.

A number of changes are in prospect at Anson, including more thermoforming machines, and new silos to ease movement of materials around the site.  It’s clearly a lively and vibrant business, and a large local employer, making productive use of our discarded plastics to create items we rely on almost every day without even realising it.

East Cambridgeshire District Council has received a planning application for a two-storey fire training building, behind the fire station on Mepal Road, Sutton.

Parish councillors were advised at their meeting earlier this week that the building will be set well back behind the existing fire station – and won’t be set alight!  It could be good news in helping secure the future of the fire station here in the village.

Full details of the application are online on the district council’s planning page: the reference number for the application is 15/01600/FUL.  If you would like to respond formally to the council about the application, any comments should be addressed to the district council and not to me.  Comments may be made

• Online using the council’s public access webpage (the link above);
• By email to plservices@eastcambs.gov.uk;
• Or by post to the Planning Department, The Grange, Nutholt Lane, Ely, CB7 4EE.

A lot of seasonal items can be recycled in your blue or green bin: see the council’s website for details.  Real Christmas trees will be collected until 29 January if you cut them into lengths no longer than the height of your green bin and leave the lengths out for collection next to the green bin.

Sutton’s next waste collection – green bins and black bags – is on Tuesday 5 January (not Monday 4 January), but from the following week the service reverts to the usual Monday collection.