Councillor John Derrick, Chairman of Peasedown St John Parish Council delivering his speech at the opening ceremony. (the speech is detailed below)

May I start with a potted history of the site?

The area was originally labelled a public open space way back in the 80s when the master plan for the new estates was first put to the public.

Once planning permission was given for the 1000 houses, building started in earnest and the by-pass was built and opened in 1996 when the house building was about half done.

During the early 90s the builders had used this site to store excess material and in 1999 when Westbury/Beazer made their first application to finish the site the Parish Council was very excited. Other than the need to install some form of kissing gates and litter bins it seemed to the Parish Council to be the ideal use of the site.

The first plan did not gain favour from the planning officers and very little happened until a further plan came in from Westbury/Beazer which described a much less ambitious scheme, which did not appeal at all to the Parish Council.

Our then Councillor McInnes asked the Council if he could approach Westbury to see if the site could be taken over and developed by the Parish Council. Westbury were very interested and started negotiations on the design and obtained quotations for the work needed to complete the original 1999 design.

The Parish Council was asked to formally agree that a deal should be struck and after protracted legal arguments the land was handed over to the Parish Council on 1^st March 2002. We must thank Westbury Homes and the successor to Beazer, Persimmon Homes for their generous deal. They handed over nearly £54,000 to carry out the work, which was designed by The Landscape Company and eventually carried out by them. We have had a fairly good relationship with David Best from the company and with its sub contractor, David Cradock, who most of you know lives very nearly in the parish.

 Planning permission at the time of hand-over had not been granted. It involved amending the original 1999 Westbury plan and the application had to be re-processed in the name of the Council by the Clerk.

The plan did not get a first time recommendation for approval but after further amendment, a site meeting and help from Cllrs. Les Kew and Cllr. Mrs. Phyllis Gay, eventually the officers recommended the scheme to the committee and the planning certificate was received just before Christmas 2002. We must thank especially Cllr. Mrs. Gay for her all out support for the scheme from the start.

The work is still ongoing as the grass is improved and the dead trees replaced. The new extra planting will give the residents further protection from noise and pollution generated by the by-pass.

Hopefully by next year, when the area is finally handed over to the Parish Council, all work will be controlled by the Environment Committee of this Council currently under the Chairmanship of Cllr. Bob Butt. Bob Butt and Ian McInnes have shared the duties as "Clerks of Works" during the contract and we are indebted to them for the extra work over and above their work as Councillors.

We must congratulate the Clerk of the Council, John Whittock for his painstaking liaison with planning officers, contractors, residents and our own caretakers. He has taken on extra work with his usual wry smile.

A warm welcome goes to the Chairmen of our neighbouring parishes, to the Clergy and the Majorettes who will be entertaining us in a few moments. After the entertainment please enjoy the space, have a good look around and take advantage of the light tea laid on.

Lastly, may I thank the residents of the three cul de sacs for their keen interest in the scheme? After an initial objection to change, which is only natural, the "Friends of the Green" have quietly and democratically lightly policed the vandalism, which did at one time threaten to rubbish the work.

Thank you all for coming to witness the success of this project which is the biggest scheme taken on by the Parish Council for many a year.

I have great pleasure in naming this public open space Ecewiche Green - may the whole village enjoy looking after it and more importantly - using it.