THAME Players will be performing a family pantomime based on J M Barrie’s timeless story of the boy who never wanted to grow up, with Peter Pan, Wendy, Tinkertbell, Captain Hook, and all the characters everyone knows and loves.
Will Peter Pan fly? You’ll have to come to the panto to find out! The Panto will run from Friday, December 2, to Sunday, December 4; then Wednesday, December 7, to Sunday December, 11.
Weekday evenings at 7.45pm; Weekend Matinee at 2pm; evening performance at 5.30pm
Tickets cost £9 (concessions £8) and are now on sale. CLICK HERE TO BOOK
SMALL businesses in Thame were able to take advantage of free advice and various on-board Workshops this afternoon when the Small Business Saturday Bus rolled into town, and was welcomed by the Mayor, Linda Emery.
SBS Thame Co-ordinator Helen Johns (left) and Mayor of Thame Linda Emery
Business and financial advisers were on hand as well as experts on sales and marketing, social media, and how to improve your presence on Google, most in one-to-one sessions. Jackie Jarvis of Heart of Business, Wallingford, ran a very popular workshop on Sales and Marketing, focusing on 10 quick tips that any small business could learn from to get more customers. Do it Digital hosted a free workshop with Nikhilesh Haval of niKreations offering advice on how to list businesses on Google and Street View.
Jackie Jarvis of Heart of Business, Wallingford
Visitors to the bus were invited to sample local food and drink from the Egg House, the Deli at No 5, and canapes by Katie Ryder-Richardson Catering. Ben Smith of Concha Y Toro held a Chilean wines-tasting board the bus and XT Brewery offered samples of their craft beers. And after all that food and drink, Racquets Fitness Centre were there with a Gym challenge, encouraging everyone to see how long they could hold their arms out straight horizontally with a weight in each hand. The winner, to be announced, wins a free, one month Gym membership at the club.
The Small Business Saturday bus travelled to Thame as part of its UK tour around the country using the theme ‘Small Business, Big Difference’, aiming to promote Small Business Saturday, on December 3.
This annual campaign puts small, independent businesses across the country in the national spotlight, to both consumers and small business owners and in Thame, a day of activities and workshops is planned for December 3, Small Business Saturday. Visit the Thame Small Business Saturday Thame webpage HERE and sign up for the various workshops on December 3, and follow the facebook page HERE
You can keep up-to-date with Small Business Saturday Thame on Facebook via Thame4Business on twitter: HERE
THE trip to Canterbury was not expected to be easy as the Canterbury team had recovered from a patchy start to the season and were playing and winning against some good opposition.
In a game of high drama, the boot of fly half Tom Best with his two second half penalties and a dropped goal proved too much for Chinnor on the day. It was a competitive contest and Canterbury tackled and defended well as one unit. Playing down the slope and with the wind Chinnor pressured the set scrums but only managed a first half lead of 5 points. This was to prove crucial.
Chinnor scored two well worked tries to lead by 12 points as the half time whistle approached. The scores were both set up by forward power that forced penalties. Driving hard at Canterbury in the right-hand corner a catch and drive sucked in the defenders before a blind side overlap was worked for fly half Bertie Hopkin to score but failed to convert. The second try, after half an hour, was created as Chinnor drove the Canterbury set piece into retreat and No 8 Tom Burns scored off the back, with Bertie Hopkin adding the conversion. Canterbury, after a period of sustained Chinnor pressure, took their chance a minute before half time to go into the break at only 5 points behind. Chinnor lost possession at their lineout and Cameron Townley took the ball on, his forward colleagues piled into to retain possession and it was whipped wide for Martyn Beaumont to score. Tom Best kicked a solid conversion into the wind. This left Chinnor much to do in the second half as the slope and wind were a distinct advantage to Canterbury.
The second half was a hard-fought contest with little give or take on both sides. The decisive period came early in the final quarter as pressure built and Chinnor’s Tom Burns was yellow carded for a technical offence. Tom Best kicked the penalty. A minute later the fly half gave his side the lead as he hit a long, low drop goal which crept over the bar by inches. After a long consultation, the referee said yes. Referee Manley was accidentally knocked out but recovered and Chinnor put in a furious late assault which they hoped would prove decisive. However, in the 78th minute Tom Best was handed the penalty chance which he duly converted to give Canterbury a 16 point to 12 victory.
Although Chinnor dominated the scrums, Canterbury became adept at depriving Chinnor of possession by stealing their lineouts. This became a contributory factor for Chinnor’s first defeat of the season. It hurt and hopefully Chinnor have learned a few lessons that they can take back to fortress Chinnor and get back to winning ways. It was not Chinnor’s day in many ways but Canterbury deserved the win and Tom Best deservedly was man of the match.
Chinnor play Clifton at home next week and hope to get back to their winning ways.
THE Christmas season in Thame begins in earnest on Friday, December 2, when the town stages its annual street festival of crafts, gifts, food and drink stalls in the town centre, and the official turning on of the Christmas lights.
From 3pm there will be live entertainment and music on the High Street and in the Upper Chamber of the town hall and Masonic Hall, a Santa’s Grotto, Go-Karts and Donkey Rides, as well as a Lantern Parade showcasing the beautiful lanterns hand-made by the pupils of Thame’s Primary Schools and Chilworth House School.
As usual there is much speculation about the identity of the celebrity who will be turning on the Christmas lights!
Remember to keep searching high and low around Thame’s shops and town centre buildings for all 24 Go-Kart Santas in the Santa Circuit, to be in with a chance to help the Star guest turn on Thame’s Christmas Lights this year!
DO you know someone who has made an outstanding contribution to your community? Applications are invited for nominations for High Sheriff’s Awards for the year 2016/2017. The purpose of these awards is to recognise people in Oxfordshire who have made outstanding contributions to the communities in which they live and work.
Nominees will usually have had a high impact on the lives of others over a sustained period of time and will be recognised by other people working in the nominee’s area as inspirational and as setting an example for others to follow.
High Sheriff’s Awards will not normally be made to people whose work and commitment has already been recognised by the award of a National Honour or by bodies such as the Police, the Fire and Rescue Service and Oxfordshire Charity and Voluntary Action.
The High Sheriff of Oxfordshire, Sarah Taylor
Nominations can be made by anyone who lives or works in Oxfordshire or who is representing an organisation in the public, voluntary and charitable or private sectors. All nominations will be treated in the strictest confidence and nominees should not be informed that they have been nominated as it can be very disappointing to raise expectations which are then not met.
The Nomination Process
The application form sheriff_nomination-form should include the contact details of the nominee as well as the nominator, together with a brief summary (400 words max) of the reasons why the nominee merits a High Sheriff’s Award.
The deadline for nominations is Wednesday, January 11, 2017. Successful nominees will be contacted in early February and the awards will be conferred at a ceremony in Christ Church, Oxford on Monday, February 28, to which nominators, families and friends will also be invited.
Contributions to Community Life
Nominations will be welcome for people who have made outstanding contributions to any aspect of community life but in the current year nominations in the following areas will be particularly welcome;
* Individuals who have helped carers or organisations which support carers of any age.
* Students from the Oxford Universities or Oxfordshire schools who have made a particular contribution to the outer community;
* Individuals who are, or have been, involved in crime reduction projects, whether in prevention, rehabilitation or support for the vulnerable young.
Nominations should arrive with the High Sheriff BEFORE Wednesday, January 11, and sent via email to: ella@organisationunlimited.uk or by post to High Sheriff of Oxfordshire, c/o Organisation Unlimited, 25 Littleworth Road, Benson OX10 6LY
A ground-breaking deal between five councils, which are nearly 100 miles apart, has been short-listed for a prestigious public sector award.
The Five Councils Partnership is the first time local authorities have looked beyond their immediate neighbours to share services. The councils are South Oxfordshire District Council, Vale of White Horse District Council, Hart District Council, Havant Borough Council and Mendip District Council. East Hampshire District Council is also involved through services already shared with Havant.
The deal, which should save the councils around £40m, has been nominated in the Most Innovative Service Delivery Model category of the LGC’s 2017 awards. The shared services are being provided by Capita, one of the UK’s leading business process and support companies, and VINCI Facilities, with experience across the UK and Europe, and its partners Arcadis and Indigo. The services are already live in South Oxfordshire and the Vale of White Horse.
Cllr John Cotton, leader of South Oxfordshire District Council, said: “I am glad this pioneering partnership has been recognised and shortlisted for an LGC Award. The financial pressures facing the public sector are shared by every council in the country. If we are to carry on delivering the quality of services our residents expect it is vital we find novel solutions to these challenges.
“Councils that share services with neighbouring authorities are becoming more common but we have shown there is no reasoson why any group of councils that share similar values and common goals cannot join forces equally as effectively.
“This complex partnership of councils, ranged across such a large geographical area, is one of national significance.”
The partnership will present its model to a judging panel in January and will find out if it has won at a ceremony on March 8.
BARLEY HILL primary school in Thame, has been congratulated by the Minister for School Standards on achieving a very high standard of achievement its recent 2016 Phonics Screening Test.
Flashback to Barley Hill School’s visit from another famous MP, back in 2013
Nick Gibb MP, in a letter to Mrs Anne Stopforth, the Headteacher at Barley Hill, said: “..I was delighted to see your results. With at least 95% of pupils reaching or exceeding the pass mark in the check, your school is in the top 8% of all primary schools in the country.
“I am pleased to hear that you have ensured your Year One children at Barley Hill Primary School have a firm foundation in reading, from which they can develop further and become increasingly fluent readers. this will help them develop a life-long love of reading.”
FENCERS from Thame Duellists Fencing Club were in action on Sunday, November 6, at the Buckinghamshire, Berkshire and Oxfordshire County Championships in Langley.
L-R-William Nethercleft, Hal-Seed, Isaac-Sallé, Katie Oliver and India George
Thame fielded four fencers including two who were competing for the first time, and all achieved success.
Competing were Hal Seed (12), Isaac Sallé (11), William Nethercleft (8) and Katie Oliver in the adults event. Seed and Sallé both have plenty of competition experience and it showed, with Hal winning the Under 14 boys event and Isaac picking up a bronze medal in the Under 12 Boys event. Katie Oliver, who only started fencing in September, entered the Women’s Championships. The senior and Under 18 events were grouped together this year at the group stage and Katie was faced with the daunting prospect of fencing a number of much more experienced opponents and was beaten in each of her bouts. However she managed to score hits against all of her opponents and managed to collect some silverware of her own, becoming champion by default as the only entrant in the Women’s event this year.
Thame’s youngest competitor this year, William Nethercleft, also fencing in his first competition, also managed to pull off an upset, winning a bronze medal. He won three out of his six bouts in the group stage of the competition and so was seeded in the middle of the draw for the knockout phase of the competition. Nevertheless he managed to reach the semi-final where he came up against an opponent who, at the top of the age range, was over a year older than him. He fenced bravely but couldn’t beat his opponent, the eventual winner of the Under 10s event.
Club coach James Kingston said: “I was really pleased with all our fencers. Even some friends of the club who train with us occasionally, Darcy Herring-Johnson and India George, who were competing in the girls’ Under 12 and Under 14 events, were successful. For me though the best moment of the day was William’s performance in his semi-final. He had to be brave against a bigger and stronger opponent; but, as well as that, he was able to change his tactics in the second half of the fight after we talked through what to do during the one-minute break between rounds. He started to move better and scored an additional hit almost straight away.
“It’s difficult to alter your style but to do that at his age and under pressure was fantastic. His teammates gave him lots of support too, which was great to see. He really earned his medal.”
Thame Duellists fencing club meets on Thursday evenings from 6.45 p.m. in term time at Thame Leisure Centre. For more information, contact club coach James Kingston on 07947 049511
SHOWING this Saturday November 12, 8pm USA, 2016, 97 minutes, 15 certificate – Directed by Rebecca Miller, starring Greta Gerwig, Ethan Hawke, Julianne Moore, Maya Rudolph, Bill Hader.
GRETA Gerwig is Maggie, a slightly batty bookish New Yorker who enjoys a successful career as an arts facilitator but who is unlucky in love. A bit of a control freak, she has decided to become a mother with or without a partner, and has a carefully mapped out plan to conceive using sperm donated by an erstwhile school friend who is now a pickle magnate. Meanwhile, she meets Hawke’s John – “one of the bad boys of ficto-critical anthropology” if you please – unhappily married in mid-life crisis and struggling to complete his first novel. His wife is the terrifyingly glacial Georgette, a formidable intellectual who ‘has tenure at Colombia’ – a superciliously hilarious turn from Julianne Moore who steals every scene she’s in. Maggie becomes John’s confidante and muse and, as they say, one thing leads to another.
When things turn out not quite as Maggie had dreamed, she sets out to re-engineer her life and everyone else’s with the help of her erstwhile adversary, Georgette. What ensues is a story about the messiness of love and fate and our attempts to control them, a contemporary metropolitan configuration of the screwball comedy: witty, very funny, erudite and razor-sharp but also very sweet, which will have you rooting for its flawed heroine and her haphazard attempts to get what she wants. Don’t miss it.
Film tickets are available on the door or online- Click here
Note: The capacity of the theatre is 130 seats. 100 seats are allocated for pre-booking online, and 30 reserved for those who prefer to buy on the door.
Doors open half an hour before films start, admission £5, licensed bar – www.thamecinema.org.uk
THIS month’s business networking The Late Breakfast in Thame will be on Thursday, November 17, at The Spread Eagle Hotel, Cornmarket, Thame.
The Late Breakfast – Monthly networking
The theme this month is Agency-Client Relationships: The (Brutal) Truth, the title of Alex Minchin, of Zest Digital’s presentation.
‘All businesses need to be in front of their customers if they are to thrive, and many achieve this by partnering with agencies. Some partnerships flourish, whilst others break down at cost to both parties. In his short presentation, founder of Zest Digital, Alex Minchin, will referee the argument from both sides and will share his advice on how you can achieve knockout success from your relationships.’
