Today’s Dunmow and Stansted Observer reports a row over Sunday car park charges in Bishop’s Stortford. At one time the car parks were only used by church-goers and for leisure on Sundays. Now it is a normal shopping day and car parks are in much greater demand. So why should parking charges be different?

Wicken House, the former children’s centre at Wicken Bonhunt that Lord Hanningfield’s Conservatives sold last year, is to become a private home. The council has not lived up to its promise to replace the activities that children used to enjoy at Wicken House.

MP Alan Haselhurst has another party political rant in his “View from Westminster” column. Once again he demonstrates his qualifications as an opposition politician by ducking responsibility for providing homes for present and future generations and blames everyone else for the hole that his council colleagues have dug for his party. Perhaps the Tory slogan for the forthcoming election will be “Vote Conservative for family values: Live with your parents into middle age”!

A £3 million fund for local rural businesses to reduce their carbon footprints has been announced. One possible project in Uttlesford would produce fuel from local woodlands for local consumption. We are interviewing people next week who could carry out a feasibility study.