Colyford makes bid for indpendence

Residents of Colyford have made a bid for the village to become an independent parish, separate from neighbouring Colyton.

Colyford currently falls under the jurisdiction of Colyton Parish Council, but several hundred residents have now signed a petition which could result in the village having its own parish council.

The petition required 187 signatures for East Devon District Council to launch a Community Governance Review, but Ian Priestley, chair of Colyford Residents' Association, said many more had put their name to the campaign.

Accompanied by Colyford Residents Association committee member Annie Thompson, he handed over the petition to East Devon District Council officer Henry Gordon Lennox this week.

There will now be a year-long consultation process to decide whether Colyford should be an independent parish, and if successful its own parish council could be formed in the 2023 election process.

Colyford is the largest settlement in East Devon not to have its own parish council, with a population of 800, and hopes to follow the footsteps of communities such as nearby West Hill, which became independent from Ottery St Mary in 2016.

Some Colyford residents have felt under-represented on Colyton Parish Council for several years – only three of the current 13 councillors live in the village – and this has resulted in some acrimonious feeling between the two communities in recent years, particularly during discussions on the long-running Neighbourhood Plan.

Mr Priestley said there would be many advantages of Colyford becoming in independent parish; it was a village with its own identity and history, and had many different issues and priorities to Colyton, not least that the busy A3052 runs directly through the centre of the village.

He added that Colyford also had an older population than Colyton with different needs.

Mr Priestley said Colyford residents would like to see more regular maintenance of public open spaces and the village often missed out on investment, with the only new facilities provided "in the last 100 years" being a children's play park and two dog waste bins.

"We get nothing for our precept," he added.

Mr Priestley said the split would also ease the workload for Colyton Parish Council and would mean that parish council meetings could be held in Colyford, easing parking issues in Colyton.