Information and Communication

This part of the questionnaire was designed to discover how people find out about people and events in the village, what sort of things they wanted to know about and how they would like to hear about things in the future. Questions were also asked about the use of new technology, the internet, to see how widely it was accessible in the village and how it might be used in the future.

How do you receive information at present?

What about village life would you wish to know more about?

Other sources of information quoted included the W.I Village Guide, Village Voice and Tony Enderby!

Word of mouth was the principal way of passing information to others, one person commenting that this was generally known as gossip!

The fact that so many people wished to hear about Village Hall events, clubs and social events and societies is a clear indication of the villager’s interests and must be reflected in any future magazines or communications

How would you like to get information in future?

Of particular note is that more than one third of residents expressed an interest in a new village diary of events and/or a new monthly magazine.

Only 20% were interested in the development of a village web site, but it is interesting that 153 people, or 50% of respondents, either currently have access to the internet or are planning to do so in the next 12 months.

Other comments in this section included reference to the WI village guide and the existing church magazine, both of which are seen as important by many people.

It was suggested that the Parish Clerk’s list of ‘Next of kin’ for people living alone in the village should be maintained. The action of the Parish Council in installing new notice boards is to be welcomed and as a result, few people saw the need for any additional boards. However, it should be pointed out that one of the village notice boards is in Roecliffe Road and this should not be neglected when notices are being displayed.

Recommendations

- Parish Council to arrange for a village diary to be developed and held in the Post Office, with all village groups being encouraged to participate. Promotion of events by email to those interested could be encouraged.

- Parish Council to arrange with club secretaries for up-to-date information on clubs and societies to be placed on the County Council Infolinx web site (www.leics.gov.uk)

- Parish Council to promote the development of a village web site including a village diary within 2 years subject to clear support for the paper based village diary.

- Parish Council/District Church Council to investigate the enhancement of the existing Parish Magazine, currently produced by the District Church Council, to include a greater content of village information and then to be distributed, free of charge to all households.