Shalford Village Hall Committee Update 2026

The Village Hall is a registered charity under the Charities Act 2011. So contrary to many peoples beliefs the hall is not funded by the PC or paid for via your council tax. It is managed by a very small group of people who give their considerable time to ensure that we have a hall and playing field that can be enjoyed by everyone in the Parish

Members of the Management Committee are also Trustees of the charity. As such (and I quote) we must act reasonably and prudently in all matters relating to the Charity and must always pursue the interests of the Charity to the exclusion of personal prejudices and interests. Our first duty is to ensure the ongoing viability of the Village Hall.

A list of things completed since the last Annual Parish Meeting:

Firstly, as is clear for all to see , the car park has been enlarged, the timing of which could not have been better after such a wet winter. The original quote for this work was almost 30k when we first looked to have this done, This project came in considerably lower thanks to the huge generosity of a few. I would like to thank Sanjay and his family for the financial contribution and help, to Martin Gould for his generous donation. To G and B Finch for the preferential prices on the materials. However a special thanks needs to go out to Phil Blumfield from Deersbrook Farm who went above and beyond by supplying a tractor and trailer and with the help of Kipper , Charlie and Darren were able to help me for a few days to get the job done. We worked out that between us we provided over 12k worth of work and muck away for free. Times have been extremely tough for the farming community these last few years ( and continue to look extremely challenging ) so for Phil and his team to be so generous at such a busy time of year is a real credit to him and his team.

Secondly, the fencing around the play area has been completed, phase one of it anyway. This was mostly thanks to section 106 money already allocated for this specific job and released by the PC. It is nice to see the play area a little safer. We are looking to fully enclose the play area with fencing by the end of Summer , if not earlier, but again this cost is in excess of 10k so a series of grants are looking to be obtained to help fund the work

Thirdly, with thanks to Kevin, our play area, at first considered nearing the end of its usable life, has been professionally assessed by a health and safety expert and all issues have been identified and rectified. We hope to get a good few years out of the play area yet.

Fourthly, and unexpectedly, it seemed we had to upgrade our fire alarm system to fulfill our obligations in providing the safest building we can. This came in at an eyewatering 6 thousand pounds. Buildings used by the public are expensive to run , very expensive.

This takes me to a point I made at last years meeting, our expenditure in relation to our income from letting the hall, always runs at a deficit.The costs involved are simply too great A large part of this 4 to 5k deficit is our expenditure on heating oil and electricity, so a small team of us have been looking into the installation of solar panels and the potential of switching to an air source heat pump. I would like to thank Kevin in particular for his work on this and we have made good progress. However these things are never easy, solar panels will also need to include replacing the entire flat roof at the very minimum, again these are huge costs that we will incur but with the geopolitical situation in the Middle East playing out at this very moment, it seems a cost we may have to swallow to ensure the long-term viability of the hall. This will be our major focus for this year, so lets see how we get on by the next APM.

With all this in mind there are two additional points I would like to make. Firstly, it is village hall policy to keep at least one year’s worth of expenses in reserves, at all times. The world is uncertain and volatile, there may be another covid style outbreak but next time there may be no government support, so we have to have a contingency for any eventuality. Secondly, all discounts for hirers have now come to an end, we must priotise the long term future and success of the hall, for generations to come, therefore we cannot hire out the hall to the point we are making a loss and it is grossly unfair that we are expected to do so. The costs involved with simply running and maintaining the hall, to such a high standard, are too great and that’s before we factor in the huge costs of future projects like repairing the flat roof or resurfacing the tennis court etc, tarmacing the car park, replacing the play area, building new machinery sheds

Yet I hear you say, what about the legacy that Lawrence and Pauline Rawlinson left, why can’t that subsidise groups , pay for everything. Well, the will was very clear that and I quote ‘the monies are used on improving the fabric of the building’. This legacy is not to be used to subsidise groups which are well supported and well funded. However, the village hall committee always tries to help where we can and to do the best we can, this asset after all is for the community and we are aware that it was Lawrence’s wish that money was also given to other groups but this was never updated in his will. So, although we weren’t legally obliged it was obvious that we would honour the Rawlinsons wish as best we could, with that in mind we gifted 5k to Bendlowes, enough money to transform their finances and easily enough to hire the hall for many years to come. 5k also went to the History Society and rightly so, preserving the history of this village is vital. We also gave 2k to the Gurkhas and 1k to the Royal British Legion.

So the legacy left by Lawrence and Pauline is to ensure that this hall and grounds are the best they can be, not just for this generation but for many generations to come, for it to be able to function and prosper no matter what happens. It is this committee’s job to put those foundations down on which we can build this hall and playing fields future.