The July meeting was to be our first face to face meeting since Covid and although there were only four councillors left, another four people who wanted to join were going to be co-opted. Unfortunately Covid struck and one councillor had to isolate which meant that meeting had to be cancelled.

The same evening one of the remaining four Councillors left and Parish Council became quorate and unable to function.

The City Council had to be informed, who in accordance with the law could put forward a number of City Councillors to join the remaining Parish Councillors to co-opt the new Parish Councillors before it could become functional. Unfortunately this does take time.

Initially the council becoming quorate was seen a major catastrophe but it turned out to be for the best, apart from the problems that it created with the bank.

By the time the Parish Council was allowed to have a meeting there were eleven people ready to join and a number of others in the wings should they be needed.

Because there were only eight vacancies there is a procedure that has to be followed for the election. The two City Councillors joined the remaining three Parish Councillors and a blind vote was used to determine who was elected.

Each of the eight vacant seats were voted upon in turn and if one name received three or more votes they were elected, if no majority, another vote was taken until a majority was achieved. This procedure was repeated until all seats were filled.

The Parish Council is now up to full strength and there are Councillors from Clesketts, Coalfell, Farlam, Forrest Head, HBG and Tindale. With a good range of ages and talents that I am sure they will put to good use.

I would like to thank all the people who came forward and commiserate with those who were not elected, the election process has been designed to make it very impersonal.

The City Council deserves our thanks for nominating three City Councillors, two of whom were able to attend the meeting. Thanks to Councillors Keith Meller and Ray Tinnion for taking part in the voting and thanks also to County Councillor Roger Dodds who was canvassing to join the County Council but still included our predicament in a mail drop to all households in the parish and as a result, seven more prospective Councillors came forward, thank you all.

Green Finger Volunteer’s

Volunteers wanted in Hallbankgate to look after the tubs by the bus shelter, the seat on the other side of the road and the Hosta bed in the middle of the green. It would involve planting and weeding. If someone agreed to take it on and they could present an estimate of the costs involved at the January meeting.

Should no volunteer come forward then the tubs will have to be removed and the Hosta bed filled and grassed over. (Please email your interest to farlampc@hotmail.co.uk or rayhinton1@gmx.com)

Thanks to all who have helped over this period.

Ray Hinton

Chair Farlam Parish Council

On the 14th of July the Parish Council was due to have its first face to face meeting and co-opt four new councillors BUT unfortunately one member had to self isolate and could not attend.

Because we only had three members left we were 'in quorate' so we could not co-opt the new members and at the same meeting another member resigned immediately. This meant that the Council was permanently in-quorate and had to be put in the hands of Carlisle City Council.

The City Council are allowed to select a number of City Councillors to sit in at a meeting to allow the Parish Council to co-opt new members again we had the unfortunate situation that the City Council did not meet in August so we had to wait until the September meeting.

At this meeting three members were selected BUT again we have had to wait until the order was produced and 'SERVED' on the Secretary of State.  We were given the official notification that we could organise a meeting on Thursday 7th October 2021.

The one good thing that has come out of all this is thanks to Roger Dobson who was canvasing the area for the County Council Elections and he very kindly letter dropped the households in Farlam Parish and this produced seven more people, giving us a total of eleven new member, three more than we need to have a full Council. This will be the first time for many years that we will have a full Council.

It is going to be very hard for the three remaining Councillor and the City Councillors to decide which three we have  leave out because they all have so much to offer.

I would like to THANK  ALL OF YOU CAME FORWARD it is greatly apricated  Thank You.

THE NAMES ARE ON THE COUNCILLORS PAGE BUT THE CONTACT DETAILS WILL BE COMPLETED ONCE THEY ARE FORWARDED TO ME 

Ray Hinton

Chair  FPC  

The top picture shows the wall and railings prior to the Parish Council contacting the Highways  in June 2021, after 3 visits the growth on the inside was still in place and we had contact the landowner ourselves to ask him to remove it so that turning at Low Lonning Corner to Naworth could be done safely.

The bottom picture shows the safe corner.

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