Local News Monday 21st August

    A union leader representing workers at Pittards in Yeovil is asking the government to step in to help rescue the business. Yeovil MP Marcus Fysh is demanding swift action from Royal Mail to resolve long delays in delivering the post in the Yeovil area. Planners have given the go-ahead to convert a listed building in Chard into seven flats...and more.

    A union leader representing workers at Pittards in Yeovil is asking the government to step in to help rescue the business. Administrators have been appointed to run Pittards, who employ around two hundred people at their factory on Sherborne Road, after the company failed to raise one-point-one million pounds needed to stay afloat. Regional Secretary of the Trades Union Congress, Ines Lage, says Pittards has been facing exceptional economic pressures and wants the government to support the business and protect local jobs.

    Yeovil MP Marcus Fysh is demanding swift action to resolve delays in delivering the mail to homes and businesses in the Yeovil area. He’s written to Royal Mail and Ofcom, who oversee postal services, after receiving complaints that letters are arriving up to two weeks late. The Post Office is blaming staff shortages at the Yeovil sorting office for the problem. Mr Fysh says the situation can’t be allowed to continue.

    Somerset Council says the roadworks in the High Street in Bruton should be completed by the end of the month. A sinkhole in the High Street has been blamed for the delay in finishing the work. 

    Better support is being provided to rape and abuse victims in Somerset. It follows a grant of one million pounds given by the government to the charity, Avon and Somerset Sexual Assault and Rape Support. 

    Planners have given the go-ahead to convert a listed building in Chard into seven flats. The addition of a retail unit is also included in the agreed changes to the property at seventeen Fore Street.

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    • Thursday 16th May

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    • Wednesday 15th May

      Somerset Council seeking to save £40 million by cutting one thousand jobs says 201 employees have so far applied to leave the authority based on voluntary redundancy. East Somerset Railway near Shepton Mallet has been used for filming the TV adaptation of Jilly Cooper's novel Rivals. An old-style red phone box in Castle Cary is being turned into Somerset's smallest museum...and more

    • Tuesday 14th May

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    • Monday 13th May

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    • Friday 10th May

      The Ferne Animal Sanctuary near Chard says it needs an immediate injection of £100,000 to keep going. Yeovil’s Marlie Packer has returned to Yeovil Rugby Club where she began her rugby career 20 years ago. Twenty-five Town criers from across the South will be in Ilminster tomorrow competing in the annual Ilminster Town Criers' Competition...and more.

    • Thursday 9th May

      Train services through Somerset are again being disrupted today due to continued strike action by the train driver’s union ALSEF. A campaign has been launched in Somerset aimed at stopping people overdosing on opioids. A Somerset business is raising a smile with its name.‘Top Of The Clops’, a tack shop near Taunton has won a place in the top ten of the UK’s funniest business names...and more.

    • Wednesday 8th May

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    Today's Weather

    • Yeovil

      Sunny intervals

      High: 21°C | Low: 9°C

    • Chard

      Light rain shower

      High: 20°C | Low: 9°C

    • Crewkerne

      Light rain shower

      High: 20°C | Low: 9°C

    • Somerton

      Sunny intervals

      High: 22°C | Low: 9°C

    • Wincanton

      Sunny intervals

      High: 21°C | Low: 8°C

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