A VILLAGE CENTRE

Alan corrects a few typos and re-asserts that the continued use of claims that the Mill stinks is counterproductive!

My article in the August edition of the Village Pump suggested use of the Duke's Head building as Village Centre. The article included some hilarious misprints (my fault). For the Duke's Head I advocated tatting up (instead of tarting up) and I referred to boarded-up widows (instead of boarded-up windows).

On the face of it, I appeared to have been mistaken also in referring to the 'whingers' against Grampian Foods as being a small minority. But according to the draft Village Design Statement most people were unhappy with Grampian.

I still suspect that most people are pro-Grampian rather than anti-Grampian. The anti-Grampians are the sort of people who attend meetings - the posher sort concerned about property values. Others I speak to tend to be pro-Grampian. Perhaps it is a class divide. One would imagine the posher the brighter. But it is not very bright to go on and on about the odour coming from Grampian.

It does property values no good to say that Stoke Ferry stinks.

Anyway, occurrence of odour nuisance is so infrequent as to be negligible. Nearly every day the air in Stoke Ferry is as fresh as the air in the rest of Norfolk - a great place and Grampian are a great firm. With all the bellyaching it is a wonder Grampian are not bloody-minded, rather than the cooperative and responsible operators they are.

Let's be nicer to Grampian and hope they will let us have the Duke's Head.

And, for the sake of common sense, delete from the Village Design Statement all reference to odour.

Alan Whitford