October 2025 Update

Community Events. It was good to see the collective spirit of Harleston on display at Heritage Open Days with many groups hosting events and activities. The town again had the most entries in the Norfolk Booklet. Thank you to Harleston Information Plus for designing and printing local fliers and to the many volunteers who delivered them through the town. The opening organised by Harleston’s Future was a great showcase for our town. I was pleased to do my bit by delivering fliers and hosting an exhibition charting the community nature recovery work of Harleston from an aspiration in the Neighbourhood Plan to the proposals for a conservation area at Rushall Road.

Grants and Funding. South Norfolk Council (SNC) awarded Harleston Greenspace CIC £10,000 from the Nature Conservation Fund for their project at Rushall Road. This should provide a much welcome public conservation area for the people of Harleston. It was pleasing to see the local comments of support.

Invasion of the Pylons and Batteries. SNC are concerned at the size and extent of plans for solar farms and launched a lighthearted, but controversial, Grand Theft Auto style video post to raise awareness of a survey to gather views on the projects within the district. Despite some reservation with the current proposals, the Council supports appropriate green energy and has partnered with ‘Solar Together’ to help homeowners and small businesses in South Norfolk install solar panels and battery storage.

Park Hotel in Diss. The Home Office informed SNC that the Park Hotel in Diss will no longer be used to house asylum seekers. Its decision comes after the Council refused to accept the Home Office’s attempt to remove families from the hotel and replace them with single male asylum seekers and the hotel owners’ threat to close the hotel. Unfortunately, it means that the women and children who SNC fought so hard to protect will now be moved elsewhere. South Norfolk has always opened its arms to people in need. A statement from the Leader of the Council read ‘The Home Office thought it could just impose this change and that we would accept it. But there is a right way of doing things and a wrong way and the decision by the Home Office was just plain wrong. The Council had to make a stand to support the women and children and our local community and that’s exactly what we did’.

I will hold my next surgery on 13 October at Harleston Information Plus on Exchange Street in Harleston at 10:00. It would be great to see you there.

Cllr Trevor Graham

South Norfolk Council

Member for Harleston