Shepperton Matters

Local family support charity, Home-Start Spelthorne was launched in April 1986 and 25 years later is still providing support for young families with children under the age of 5. Over the last 25 years, 36 Volunteer Prepa-ration Courses have been run and 223 volun-teers have been recruited. This has enabled over 2000 families to receive

By Monica Chard  It has been a long time coming, but finally, the Incubator Hub, to support Spelthorne small businesses and entrepreneurs, has been officially opened. The slogan is Dream it. Do it. It opens the opportunity to new business owners to follow their dreams of running their own business, but offers the support of

By Monica Chard  Why was I up at 5.30am? I kept wondering, until the sun came over the horizon and threw a golden glow over Chertsey bridge and the river as I drove towards Laleham. Pure magic and worth getting up to see.  But I was up to meet the Win the Morning Win the

There is a new tea room opened locally which is well worth a visit. Dramatize tea room is in the little square of shops on Hetherington Road and is very special. It has been set up to support adults with learning disabilities who are being trained in the hospitality sector.  Sunbury Matters took a relaxed

Spelthorne Borough Council recently honoured 11 volunteers at the Civic Trust Awards, which honours residents for their voluntary service in the Borough.  Spelthorne Civic Award Trust recognise individuals who have given at least 12 years’ service to volunteering in the Borough. Between them this year’s winners have given more 100 years of service to the

By Inspector Maxine Cilia  Summer is here. Well whilst I am writing this piece for July and August it is absolutely pouring with rain and its Midsum-mers day or Sum-mer Solstice.  It saddens me to say that as we come out of lockdown we have seen an in-crease in violent crime. There has been a

The Holiday Inn, Shepperton, has been taking advantage of lockdown to undergo an extensive modernisation. Not one area of it will be untouched and the plans are definitely exciting.  We visited in June, on a hard hat tour of the premises. There are two defined areas of the building; the hotel, with new reception desk,

Saving Water In spite of the somewhat soggy spring water is an increasingly precious resource in the UK. Over the past few decades, rivers, reservoirs, and ground water supplies have become depleted. It’s important to save water where we can. Most of us have enough space for at least one water butt, and there are

This summer’s Spelthorne in Bloom competi-tion will be launched in June, when the entry forms will be published online and in print, and the posters will appear on Council notice boards. The children’s poster competition attracted more than 100 entries, despite many schools being closed, and we had many entries from children who were studying

Bank Holiday Monday, gale force winds, a garden fire and an island full of wooden craft and flammable materials. What could possibly go wrong?!  It was devastating to see images of the fire on Platts Eyot last month. Two boathouses full of historic boats under restoration, went up in flames which were seen from miles

By Monica Chard  According to the Horticultural Traders Asso-ciation, lockdown spawned an estimated 3 million new gardeners, as many of us started really treasuring outside space that we may previously have taken for granted.  But one local family has been nurturing growers for decades. This year Squire’s celebrate 85 years. The business was started in