The number of crimes recorded in Lincolnshire fell last year, despite a 40 per cent rise in the amount of sexual offences being reported.

This is according to figures published today (Thursday, April 23) by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), based on Home Office data.

Overall, recorded crime fell by two per cent in Lincolnshire in 2014, reaching a total of 35,376.

This included a fall of 11 per cent in shoplifting and nine per cent drop in theft from the person and the combined crime type of criminal damage and arson.

However, there was a rise of 40 per cent in sexual offences and 17 per cent in possession of weapons offences.

The figures in full:

- Total recorded crime (including fraud) - 35,376 (down two per cent)

- Total recorded crime (excluding fraud) - 35,376 (down two per cent)

- Violence against the person - 5,986 (up nine per cent)

- Homicide - 13 (percentage change not provided as number is fewer than 50)

- Violence with injury - 3,178 (up eight per cent)

- Violence without injury - 2,795 (up nine per cent)

- Sexual offences - 853 (up 40 per cent)

- Robbery - 188 (up 12 per cent)

- Theft offences - 19,352 (down five per cent)

- Burglary - 5,298 (up one per cent)

- Domestic burglary - 1,921 (up three per cent)

- Non-domestic burglary - 3,377 (no percentage change)

- Vehicle offences - 3,031 (down one per cent)

- Theft from the person - 343 (down nine per cent)

- Bicycle theft - 1,430 (down one per cent)

- Shoplifting - 4,257 (down 11 per cent)

- All other theft offences - 4,993 (down 10 per cent)

- Criminal damage and arson - 5,149 (down nine per cent)

- Drug offences - 1,647 (no percentage change)

- Possession of weapons offences - 274 (up 17 per cent)

- Public order offences - 1,313 (up five per cent)

- Miscellaneous crimes against society - 614 (up five per cent)

- Fraud - now recorded by Action Fraud

Nationally, there was a two per cent increase in police recorded crime compared on the previous year, with 3.8 million offences recorded in the year ending December 2014.

A spokesman for the ONS said: “The renewed focus on the quality of crime recording is thought to have led to improved compliance with national recording standards, leading to proportionally more crimes reported to the police being recorded by them.”

Improved compliance with recording standards is thought to have particularly affected the police recorded crime categories of violence against the person (up 21 per cent) and public order offences (up 14 per cent), the spokesman continued.

These rises were largely off-set by falls in the number of recorded theft offences (down five per cent), he added.

Total sexual offences rose by 32 per cent with the numbers of rapes (26,703) and other sexual offences (53,559) being at the highest level ever recorded since the introduction of the National Crime Recording Standard (NCRS) in 2002/03.

“As well as improvements in recording, this is also thought to reflect a greater willingness of victims to come forward to report such crimes,” the spokesman said.

He added: “There was an increase in the volume of offences recorded by Action Fraud (nine per cent year-on-year), although it is still difficult to judge to what extent this was affected by the transfer in responsibility of recording fraud offences from individual police forces to Action Fraud.”

Spalding People’s Parade has a new sponsor for May’s event in Taylor Wimpey, one of the UK’s largest builders of homes.

The company’s sponsorship has helped secure the Breaston Highlanders, who will lead the parade through the town on May 24, as well as help build a bigger event.

People’s Parade committee treasurer Bruce Alexander said: “Taylor Wimpey have shown real community spirit and their money has allowed the parade to be that little bit bigger and better this year.”

The parade also has great support from small local businesses, groups and clubs including Spalding Lions, South Holland Rotary, Connect Virtual Assistant, Accountancy Plus, Chain Bridge Forge and Rooke’s Pet Products.

Parade entertainment and stalls will be based at Sir John Gleed School, where there’s free admission from 11am.

Music on site will be organised by Dean Fitchett, of local band The Sound Injectors, and the licensed bar will be provided by a local, family-run business called Coronation Bars.

The People’s Parade will have one of its signature decorated carts in Moulton Chapel’s Tuliptime Parade on Sunday, May 3.

There’s still space for more charity stalls at the People’s Parade and the committee are still looking for volunteer stewards and helpers.

To get involved, call 07437 936684 or email spaldingparade@outlook.com or check out Spalding People’s Parade on Facebook.

Your letter box is most probably brimming with red, green, blue, purple and yellow electioneering leaflets and you can’t turn the telly on without coming across a political debate.

South Holland and the Deepings has an excellent record of voters, with 50,188 residents heading for the polls in the 2010 General Election – a turnout of 65.8 per cent.

But with just 13 days to the General Election, are you champing at the bit to get to make your mark or are you throwing the leaflets into the recycling bags and switching channels?

We asked for families to talk to us about what life is like in South Holland and what they think of the election campaign so far.

Father of three sons under 11 Martin Murphy said he was on the phone to the Labour parliamentary candidate Matthew Mahabadi as soon as his electioneering leaflet dropped through the letter box.

Mr Murphy, of Long Sutton, said: “There was nothing about the man or his involvement in the area. That’s what I needed to know. But I’m a supporter and I’m happy now I’ve spoken to him.

“I’ll be voting because I’m passionate about change and I don’t think there will be a chance of that unless there is a new party in government.

“I was born in Spalding and moved back to the area because it is a nice place. Yes, it has its problems but there are good transport links on trains and buses and you can get to most places from here.

“Unfortunately I lost my businesses because of the extortionate business rates and I’m now a carer.

“I want to vote for a party that will help small businesses and do something about the minimum wage. Carers do not get enough credit for what they do and deserve more.

“There is also a drugs problem in Spalding. I contacted the police when I had a shop and some youths came in waving cannabis about.

“No-one turned up and when I asked the police why they said they had something more important to go to. Something needs to be done to strengthen policing in the area.”

We met mum of two Natasha Bowater in Spalding with her children during the busy market day on Tuesday.

Natasha (32), of Moulton, said she had already decided she would be voting Tory, but said that had not always been so.

She and her husband Graham have lived in Moulton Chapel for six years and believe it is a great place to bring up their children – Grayson, aged four, and Macie, who will be two on Sunday.

Boston born Natasha said: “We are making a nice life there. If we lived in a city there would be a higher crime rate – we like living there.

“I worked in business development for Infotel Solutions in Gosberton until I had the children. My husband is a self-employed wealth manager. We’ve never had a problem getting work here.

“Now I am a mum, education is very important to me. We were delighted to get our first choice of school for Grayson – he starts in September.

“But I don’t think the secondary education here is as good as at our primary schools. It was fine when I went to the Gleed School, but I do worry about the future. That’s why I think it’s important to vote.”

A couple who retired to Spalding 13 years ago are UKIP supporters Peter and Doreen Stoner.

Formerly both on the pharmaceutical register, they said they found the town friendly when they first arrived and immediately got involved in a number of community projects.

However, the sad death of their own daughter, Diana, who had Downs Syndrome, at the age of 32 and extended waiting times to see a doctor at their previous surgery has raised their concerns about health care in the area.

Mr Stoner believes tighter controls should be made on immigration and its impact on health and other public services.

He said: “We used to be able to get an appointment the next day but then it became a month or even two months. Triage nurses are no substitute for seeing a real doctor.

“And if you go to the hospital one-in-three names on any board are foreign – we need more British doctors, but that won’t happen while the tuition fees are so high.

“We should be encouraging more young people to become doctors not driving them away.

“We need to get control of our country again. China doesn’t think it’s necessary to be in Europe or America. Wages haven’t risen in Germany for years.

“My wife and I will both be voting UKIP because the elections are not about getting rid of potholes.

“People need to vote because the things that affect us are the things that are imposed on us.

“It’s the last chance to save this country.”

Market Deeping firm Spanners Mixer Hire can claim to be industry innovators after taking delivery of the first eco-friendly truck mixer in the UK.

The family-run firm, based at Northfields Industrial Estate, has already had enquiries from building firms about its new CIFA Energya plug-in hybrid truck mixer made in Italy.

The mixer, which works by using an electric induction motor powered by a lithium-ion battery, is a coup for Spanners and its directors Peter and Lynne Spooncer.

“We sell concrete mixers all round the UK but this is the first mixer of its type in the country which we have the chance to sell on,” Lynne said.

“The mixer makes less noise, has less carbon emissions, less maintenance costs because wear and tear of the engine is less and more freedom around work sites.”

Staff at Spanners welcomed Conservative parliamentary candidate for South Holland and the Deepings, John Hayes, earlier this month to the site for an official unveiling of the new mixer.

Mr Hayes said: “I was very honoured to have been asked by Spanners to come and see the new mixer.

“It’s great to know that a business in our area is doing such excellent work to bring something as innovative as this into the UK.”

Conservative John Hayes had a comfortable victory in an opinion poll we ran at our South Holland and the Deepings hustings event on Thursday evening.

Everyone in the 200-plus crowd was handed a voting slip on arrival and asked to hand it in as they left.

Mr Hayes took 112 of the 214 votes, meaning he was backed by 52 per cent of the audience, down slightly from the 59 per cent he polled at the last election in 2010.

Second place went to UKIP’s David Parsons, who received 33 votes (15 per cent) - an increase of five per cent for the party from five years ago.

In third place was the Green party’s Dan Wilshire with 28 (13 per cent) - and that was an encouraging 12 per cent up on his party’s showing at the last election.

Matthew Mahabadi of Labour came fourth with 24 votes (11 per cent), which was three per cent down on the general election result. Finally, George Smid of the Liberal Democrats polled 12 votes which equated to six per cent and represented a nine per cent decline from 2010.

There was a lot of praise for Free Press and Guardian reporter Winston Brown, who chaired the event. So much so that he even took five votes (two per cent)!

We asked a neutral reporter from King’s Lynn to assess each candidate’s performance at the Spalding Guardian and Lincolnshire Free Press hustings event on Thursday evening. Here’s what Lynn News chief reporter Allister Webb thought...

Afterwards, however, it could only refer to the man who really did steal the show on the hustings platform.

It isn’t Dan Wilshere’s age alone that makes the Green Party candidate so impressive. It’s the whole package.

He spoke eloquently, argued his points well, knew his policies and, above all else, allowed you to believe him. Not so much believe in him, but believe that this is a man who wasn’t simply presenting some sort of polished version of himself but him as he is.

It was a performance that deserved to attract support and, whatever happens in the next couple of weeks, I suspect we’ll hear a lot more of him in the future.

As for the rest, Conservative John Hayes gave the sort of assured, confident performance one might expect of a man who has represented the area in Westminster for almost as long as his Green rival has been alive.

As an exile, he beautifully summed up the county I still call home, though I was relieved when he stuck to politics rather than poetry.

And he certainly served up the headlines when he vowed to resign from government if his leader reneged on an EU referendum or did a deal with UKIP, the first of which went down very well in the hall.

If Mr Hayes appeared confident and re-assuring, UKIP’s David Parsons was very much the fall guy, the butt of many of the jokes.

Yet, as much as he tried to push his message of “new politics”, and played on the established parties’ note swapping on the panel, he was always going to be the most vulnerable to attack and/or ridicule.

And while his past may have come back to haunt him, not for the first time, he did at least avoid any gaffes. To that extent at least, job done.

Where I suspect he was right, however, was when he suggested that any of the panel would make a good constituency MP, and that is particularly apparent with Labour’s Matthew Mahabadi.

While I await news of the outcome of his plea to the domestic electorate over his absence from wedding planning, he was another impressive young candidate.

It was no surprise to hear Mr Hayes tell him afterwards that he will be an MP one day. I’d be very surprised if he isn’t, though, after hearing him say he was driving through the fields before the debate, I can’t resist saying I’d rather he stuck to the roads.

Which leaves us with the Liberal Democrat George Smid, and just because I’ve mentioned him last doesn’t mean I rated him worst of all. While I heard that he came across well in the hall, he didn’t seem to come over as well on the spin table, so to speak, backstage.

He was solid and unspectacular, though his line about how nobody moved out when he arrived was one of the more memorable.

So, at the end of it all, will blue still be the colour of South Holland on May 8? Even if it is, I suspect there could well be a bigger hint of green there.

GRAMMAR VIEWS: A monthly column written by teachers and students of Spalding Grammar School, this week with student Tom Coley

Six boys from Spalding Grammar School set out on a journey to Norwich for the FA Five-A-Side People’s Cup, which has seen over 1,500 teams enter from all over England, aged 12-35, and these boys had entered the Under 14 category.

Playing for the chance to go to Manchester for the finals, the six boys – Liam Scales, Patrick Campling, Tom Coley, Fenn Storey, Tom Tyler and their captain Luke Cutts – set out to Norwich. They were shocked to see that the other teams had kits to wear and managers. It was quite off putting for the boys, who had turned up in sports clothes with more mix than match.

The boys named their team Purple Dinosaurs and the first match was far from a comfortable start. But luckily with almost half of the eight-minute match gone, talismanic Liam Scales came up with a goal from a seemingly impossible angle. Next a quick-fire double save from keeper Tom Coley kept them ahead. The games are quick, just eight minutes long, so you need to take your chances. As the Purple Dinosaurs went up the other end, they made it 2-0 after some great feet and a superb finish from Pat Campling.

The next game looked like a top of the group clash because Old Catton had a 100 per cent record. After a slow start, Fenn Storey danced around two of the Old Catton players and onto the edge of the box before firing in a rabona shot that was saved brilliantly by the keeper. But that miss would come back to haunt them as Old Catton found a way through the defence and scored.

When Liam hit a free kick into another player the opposition player used some foul language and got himself a blue card, meaning a one-minute sin bin, so Luke Cutts and his team had their chance but they went two down. By this time the clock was against them and even with the one-man advantage they couldn’t get back into the game and sadly lost 2-0.

Next they played the youngest side there and another goal from Pat and a brace from Liam gave them a comfortable 3-0 win.

So finally they were onto the final group stage match and they were already through. After captain Luke bagged his first goal of the tournament, all was looking good. But a mistake in the defence allowed an opposition player through to equalize before a penalty gave Dinosaurs a 2-1 lead.

There was no holding back after this and Luke and Fenn both went on to add to the score sheet, making the final score 4-1 and also seeing the boys finish second in the group and through to the quarter-finals.

On to the quarters and their opponents were Downham. They got off to a fast start in this match when Fenn Storey banged the ball home to give them a 1-0 lead. And Downham just didn’t recover from it. They rarely troubled Tom in the Purple Dinosaurs goal and this was down to an excellent display from Tom Tyler. Goals from Liam (2) and Tom gave them a 3-0 win.

In the semi-finals they would have to play Downham’s second team and were soon 1-0 down.

A good sub from Luke led to Pat levelling the score. The match went into two extra minutes and Fenn set up Luke to give the Dinosaurs a passage way into the final.

The opponents were Lakefield and Dinosaurs started well, Fenn Storey scoring. Then, after a one-on-one save from Tom Coley, the defence moved up and Pat Campling found himself in on goal and it was 2-0 to the Dinosaurs in no time. But Lakefield scored just seconds after the restart and set up a nervy end. Lakefield were desperate and a shot was put past Tom at his near post. It was the first individual error and what a big one it could have been. It came as a massive relief when Liam held onto the ball in the corner of the pitch, saw the run of Fenn and he slotted it into the net with just 20 seconds left on the clock! Lakefield were left shocked after the comeback and when the defence got the ball, it was into the corner to run down time. The full-time whistle went and nobody could have been more surprised than the players themselves. It was a momentous occasion for the six boys, who at the beginning of the tournament had already ruled themselves out! They had no doubt in their ability but confidence was their main enemy. After not having a kit or manager they came out on top –you can never write them off!

Sincere pledges, political and personal side-swipes, and flashes of humour were all present as five candidates battled on stage for the honour of representing South Holland and The Deepings in the next Parliament.

This was the Lincolnshire Free Press and Spalding Guardian hustings at the South Holland Centre on Thursday night when John Hayes (Conservative), Matthew Mahabadi (Labour), David Parsons (UKIP), George Smid (Liberal Democrat) and Dan Wilshire (Green Party) answered questions from a 200-plus audience.

The Question Time-style debate was flawlessly chaired by one of our journalists, the unflappable and “politically neutral” Winston Brown, who kept order on stage and off as the occasional heckler intervened.

Government minister John Hayes, who has held the seat for 18 years, twice promised to resign if – as a member of a future Government – David Cameron didn’t carry out his pledge of an in-out referendum on the EU and if the Tories formed a ruling partnership with UKIP.

There were questions on topics as diverse as education, pride in South Holland, street drinking, immigration, hospital parking charges and energy.

An audience question – “Is there anything from your political career that we ought to know about?” – saw an 
elephant tip-toe into the room.

John Hayes wished he had voted for the minimum wage and “got that wrong”; Dan Wilshire, the youngest candidate at 19 years, hadn’t had time in his brief political life to have regrets; George Smid had no skeletons in his cupboard; Matthew Mahabadi pointed out he’s only 26 but wished he’d come higher than fourth in Spalding South Ward in 2013 and David Parsons replied: “I have too many regrets to recount to you now sir, but if you want to have a drink afterwards I will tell you about them.”

Then the elephant charged towards Mr Parsons, a former Conservative leader of Leicestershire County Council, when a member of the audience raised the issue of him being censured in 2012 by that council’s standards sub-committee, which accused him of disregarding four key principles of public life – honesty, integrity, accountability and leadership.

Mr Parsons replied: “I have been cleared of any wrongdoing.”

He said the speaker “quoted selectively” from a report and he’d made no secret of that episode in his life when selected to represent UKIP in this constituency.

“We actually issued a press release from UKIP so that people in South Holland and The Deepings knew what was going on,” said Mr Parsons. “I regard that episode as being finished.”

Asked if he was sorry about what had happened, Mr Parsons replied: “Yes, I am.”

At the outset – and at the conclusion – candidates had uninterrupted time to persuade the audience to vote for them.

Matthew Mahabadi is promising among other things to fight for the “Lincolnshire living wage”. He’s the son of an Iranian father and a British mum, who was a nurse.

Mr Mahabadi said: “My mum taught me the caring, colour blind values of her profession.”

George Smid told the audience that everyone is a liberal without suggesting it should have a capital ‘L’.

He said: “All of us don’t like to be told what to do but, at the same time, we don’t want to slip into anarchy and these are our Liberal values.”

John Hayes said the election was about the quality of representation in Parliament and the person chosen should be someone who is rooted in the community, using exactly the same services as their constituents, as he himself has done for 18 years.

Over that time, Mr Hayes estimated he had personally helped 25,000 constituents.

He said: “You deserve a first-class MP committed to this area.”

Dan Wilshire seized the moment as he was “made in South Holland”.

He said: “I have just celebrated my 19th birthday – that makes me out of all of these people (the candidates) present the person who has lived the longest in this constituency.”

David Parsons said: “Can I just say that UKIP stands for a new kind of politics.

“Politicians will promise you the earth and you have heard it all before and, no doubt, this lot here who are all the established parties – not Dan, I actually rather like you Dan – the established parties have not a lot to offer.”

Hospital parking charges was an issue that saw candidates virtually speaking as one.

George Smid said: “I can understand for people who are on a low income parking charges of £2, £3 or £4 are a lot of money, especially if you have to visit the hospital very often.”

David Parsons said UKIP would scrap parking charges, adding: “It’s a ludicrous way to run hospitals to charge for parking.”

Matthew Mahabadi told the audience: “I fully support scrapping hospital car parking charges especially in cases where you have long term illnesses.”

John Hayes said the issue had rarely been raised with him, but he fully understood that it was important for families, particularly in cases of chronic illness. He promised: “I will tomorrow contact the health authority in exactly that spirit.”

Dan Wilshire said NHS funding was the real problem.

He said: “If we resolve the funding problem, then parking charges won’t have to be as high.”

I had been enjoying a lovely evening and as I was pulling out of my drive I chose to pause to look at the two beautiful ducks sitting on my path, instead of edging my way out of the drive trying to avoid cars taking a short cut down an access road.

I thought I would get out of my car and see the two lovely birds back across the road but, to my horror, though they were in full view, some mindless idiot did not think to stop and ran over them, which killed the female. But not instantly... she died about two minutes after, the male injured and pining for his mate. I hope he/she felt great as they drove off whilst my neighbour and I cleared up. Such mindless acts are cruel and unnecessary.

The common pit area is well known for the ducks crossing over the road, so please be more considerate as most drivers are when taking a few seconds to let them cross

The elections are almost upon us but I hear nothing but rhetoric and manifesto promises from all major parties that amount to little more than wishful thinking; hints of what their party has to offer and provide no indication how those offering will be funded.

Cameron goes as far as to suggest we should trust his judgement – quite remarkable given his support of fellow Conservative MP’s that have proven to be corrupt.

Farage witters on about all our troubles and woes are due to immigration and EU membership but fails to quantify the financial impact of EU extraction and the tax contributions if immigrants – oh so naïve.

Miliband fairs little better.

As for the LibDems – for goodness sake elect someone that is more statesmanlike.

Cameron, Miliband and Clegg are independently wealthy, were educated in public schools and have never held meaningful jobs – how on earth can they relate to the plight of everyday people?

Farage is a hypocrite – screams “British jobs should be for British people” but employed his German wife.

For the first time in more than 40 years, I don’t intend to vote.

We are faced with a selection of party leaders that are either hypocrites, have no understanding of what real life is all about or cannot substantiate how their election promises will be funded.

ote or don’t vote, entirely up to you. But please study party manifestoes before deciding – in my opinion, none are worthy.

Further to your recent reports concerning the parish precept (council tax) required by Holbeach Parish Council, the reason for this increase is as described in your report.

Following a decision by central government to remove council tax benefit and replace it with a local scheme along with 
reduced funding, while protecting certain claimants, South Holland District Council implemented a grant scheme to dampen the effect by a reducing amount over time. All parish councils were made aware of the scheme when it was introduced and they were informed of the 2015/16 grant in January. The effect on Holbeach Parish Council was that, although their net budget was increased this year by 1.9 per cent, the effect of the damping arrangement required a further increase in their precept.

In response to the letter about the community survey currently under way in Wygate Park, Spalding.

Clearly, the writer has allowed emotion to cloud his ‘view’ and has failed to read the covering flyer, or even the survey form itself.

Both of these documents refer to ‘a community facility’ not a building, although that is indeed an option. The documents were drafted and approved by Community Lincs and South Holland District Council respectively, not by me.

As a courtesy, I was supplied with a draft copy of these documents, but I had no involvement in their drafting. I also supplied maps of the area and lists of roads within a 10-minute walk time of the potential site for any facility. On behalf of the highly professional officers from both organisations, I believe the writer owes them a public apology, for questioning their integrity, impartiality and professionalism.

Despite his previous profession, the writer continues to ignore the legal framework that made both the land and the financial contribution available in the first place. A legal agreement, a section 106, was signed between South Holland DC and Allison Homes, the original developer.

Allison Homes agreed to build a community centre, on part of the public open space, adjacent to what is now the Wygate Academy School – nothing else. A new legal agreement would be needed to use the actual money for anything else; something that Kier, the new developer, can choose not to do.

The steering group was formed in the hope that the community would either agree to seeing the proposed building managed by South Holland Community Church, for and on behalf of the community, or decide to form their own community group, to take on the task.

For various reasons, the first option is now off the table.

The second option is still available to anybody, including the writer, wishing to take up the challenge. The results of the community survey will become valuable evidence for any group when bidding for the additional grant funding, essential to making the project a success.

Finally, if you live in Wygate Park and are one of the 1,435 households to receive a survey, please take the time to read it carefully and make up your own mind as to whether or not a building is the only choice available.

Once you’ve seen for yourself that it isn’t – so there’s no need to spoil your ballot paper on May 7 as he suggests – please do complete the survey and leave it outside your front door for collection on May 9. There are also details about how to complete the survey online.

A mum of two is taking on the London Marathon on Sunday in memory of her dad who died from heart problems when she was just 23.

Shara Jones (29) will be raising money for Heart Research UK after her father, Les Cook, died aged 63 in 2008 from heart failure after undergoing a heart transplant operation in 2000.

Shara, from Whaplode, said: “I really want to raise awareness about heart disease and what happened to my dad. It’s important to share the importance of health, whether it’s through fitness or healthy diets. Running the marathon is both great for my health and a way to support Heart Research UK.”

This will be Shara’s first -ever marathon, although she completed Peterborough’s half-marathon in 1hr 41min last October and a half-marathon in Milton Keynes last month in 1hr 45min.

“Milton Keynes was a very hilly course and it was a very windy day,” said Shara. “For the London Marathon I want to sneak in under four hours – that’s my target – and hopefully the weather will be kind to me and my feet will be kind to me and won’t give me too many blisters.”

Les Cook, who lived in Algarkirk, had his heart transplant at Papworth Hospital after being diagnosed with such severe heart disease that a transplant was the only possible option.

He managed to live a near normal life until he became ill again in September 2008 and sadly died the following month.

It was a tough time for Shara as 24 days before her dad died she had given birth to her daughter Rhian – although, fortunately, Les got to hold his first grandchild.

Shara has been running all of her life and kept on through her pregnancies with Rhian, now six, and Roman, who is now two.

With Roman, Shara kept on running past her due date – and he was 12 days overdue.

“They advise you not to stop running if you are used to running and I was back running again when he was two-weeks-old,” said Shara.

She’s been running 40 hours a week to prepare for the marathon, but is resting this week and says: “I don’t know what to do with myself.”

Although London is a first for Shara, her sister Keelie has run the race twice before.

Shara is married to Gareth and she works as an avocado technical manager with Greencell.

• People can donate to Shara’s fundraising page for Heart Research UK by visiting http://uk.virginmoneygiving.com/sharajones

More than two million people in the UK are living with heart disease.

We invite candidates for the Spalding wards in the District Council elections to let readers know their views on the following:

• Spalding has 44 per cent less public green leisure space than it ought to have for a town of its size. If elected to the council, what steps would you take to protect the space we already have and to make up the shortfall?

• What should the new council do about the various long-derelict sites in the town - such as the Bull and Monkie, whose planning permission will run out later this year? What would you like to see this site used for?

• What in your view would most improve the appearance of the town centre? Short term? Long term?

• Where in the town would you like to see trees planted to improve the street scene or hide an eyesore?

• Spalding has no town council. What do you feel should be done to put us on the same footing as Sleaford or Stamford, which do have town councils to look after their particular concerns?

Voters might also like to put some of these questions directly to candidates canvassing on the doorstep.

They’ve been used to make clocks, coffee tables, butterfly wall art and mobiles, but the launch of a new vinyl record chart is set to change all that.

Vinyl records are back in the groove – and a new outlet is hoped to send collectors in a spin and heading for Spalding.

Uptown Vinyl Records Music Shop has opened at Spalding Lifestyle and Garden Centre – just in time for the eighth Record Store Day – the annual celebration which champions a reason to dust off collections that for many have been resigned to the attic.

A selection of more than 40,000 vinyl records, many selling for around £3 to £5, can be found decked in memorabilia in a specialist area of the lifestyle centre in Pinchbeck Road, which is becoming even more of a retro paradise with its vintage wines and shabby chic furniture.

Alan Barnsdale, the owner of the collection, couldn’t be more excited.

The former record shop owner in Spalding, who gave it all up for his career as a company director, said: “I’m retired now and have been selling vinyl from home, I’ve 40,000 records and I’ve just outgrown home.

“Coming here is perfect for me because I have the space to display them properly. I want people 
to enjoy the experience 
of browsing the records 
and enjoying the memories and they can do that here. 
I don’t mind them bringing a coffee over from the cafe and having a chat about it all – that’s what it’s all about.”

Already a group of “ladies who dine” have been very excited about the collection. Alan said: “They came out of the cafe and spotted the records and got really excited. They were probably from the era when they had David Cassidy or Donny Osmond posters on the wall.”

But even while he was still setting up the serious collectors had found him. Alan said: “It’s taking off really well. One guy said I had one of the best collections he had seen.”

But it isn’t just the generation which remembers an era when buying and selling discs were labours of love who are excited.

Alan said: “Downloads and the CD market are in decline. With films like Northern Soul, events like Record Store Day and duets like Lady Gaga with Tony Bennett, vinyl is reaching a new young generation. Teenagers are learning how good the crooners were, buying record players and learning the physical joy of holding a record. It’s very exciting.”

I feel I have to reply to the misleading letter from Margaret Wilson printed in your paper on April 21.

She states in her letter that the financial crisis was the fault of the last Labour Government. Doesn’t she realise it was an 
international crisis, and 
resulted from policies that Margaret Thatcher implemented when she was Prime Minister.

Thatcher created a culture of paying bonuses to workers instead of inflation-led pay rises. This resulted in wages lagging behind inflation, and so employers developed ways to pay larger and larger bonuses to keep their workers contented. The major banks adopted Thatcher’s policy of paying bonuses on individual results against objectives, which led to the excessive bonuses that we see today, and was one of the components of the banking crisis.

Thatcher also deregulated the banking industry during her time in office, allowing building societies and others to enter the market, believing that competition would make loans cheaper. On this occasion she was very wrong. Instead of making mortgages and loans cheaper, the new banks invented new innovative ways of lending money to the public, inflating house prices, and it was obvious from the outset that as house prices 
increased and wages didn’t, that at some point it would become unsustainable and it would all come crashing down. What led to it becoming an international crisis, was Ronald Reagan’s obsession with Thatcherism. He followed similar politicise, which created the sub-prime mortgage crisis in the US.

Thatcher also sold off council houses at a discount, which fuelled the housing market, and the property price explosion. All the banks responded to this new increase in demand by bringing in new types of mortgages, and again Thatcher refused to interfere and introduce regulation to curb the market. Not only did this policy fuel the banking crisis, but it also led to a shortage of affordable social housing, and forced the youngsters of today into the private rental market. These private rents have also increased, resulting in financial problems for the tenants, and the growth of food banks in this country.

Margaret Wilson is keen to have a referendum on the EU but this would be a costly distraction for the country. Both Ed Miliband and David Cameron have stated that they do not want to leave the EU, and to have a referendum would mean that the PM would have to concentrate his energy into fighting to stay in the EU, instead of dealing with more important issues.

Ms Wilson also refers to the tax cuts in the latest budget. Has she forgotten the VAT rise from 17.5 per cent to 20 per cent imposed by George Osborne in 2010/11, whilst giving tax cuts to the top earners. History shows that the only party to raise VAT, and to enlarge the scope of VAT is the Conservatives, and the only party to cut VAT is Labour.

Finally, is spending £100 billion on replacing Trident a good use of tax payers’ money, as Margaret Wilson believes, especially when it will never be fired in anger? Surely that money would be better spent on the NHS, building affordable housing, reducing the national debt, and an efficient police and fire service or protecting the environment.

THOUGHT FOR THE WEEK: By Roger Seal, Spalding Quaker Meeting

“Smoke gets in your eyes” – one of the all time great songs, by any reckoning. Yet a bit strange; just think about the words: “when a lovely flame dies, smoke gets in your eyes”.

There’s no getting away from the fact that it is about the end, maybe of a love affair, maybe life itself, and the tears that follow. So it seems we are ready to sing about dying.

But talking about it – well, we have tended to avoid it, calling death the last taboo, like sex and politics used to be.

Yet I have a hunch that many of us would really like to bring the matter up. This is partly because there is actually no escaping it, sooner or later, so the sooner we can come to terms with it the better, before it bites us.

And partly we would do well to sort out the practicalities while we have still got our wits about us, rather than leave them to our next of kin.

In some places people are starting up ‘Death Cafés’, where anyone can come and share their thoughts and ideas about dying and death.

No-one touts for business or tries to push their beliefs, as religious figures, undertakers, medical people, etc, and there is no ‘party line’.

There is just a welcome, a willingness to listen and share – and tea and cakes!

I wonder whether Spalding folk would be interested in somewhere like that?

Regarding the letter from Margaret Wilson, constituency cChairman South Holland and the Deepings Conservative Association, ‘Why take the risk of voting for Labour?’

If there are any risks involved, then yes I agree the stakes could not be higher on May 7.

The votes cast will decide whether we all have an NHS we can count on, whether people will be able to be better off in secure jobs, and I do not mean more zero hours contracts, or whether our country becomes fairer or more unfair, we all have a choice to make.

Labour offers a new and better course, the scrapping of wasteful tax cuts for millionaires and put the 
money into the building blocks of a stronger economy and good paying jobs.

The deficit will be reduced responsibly, cutting where we can and investing where we must. No more free rein for the banks, energy companies and landlords. Labour will support those who pay the bills by putting a freeze on energy bills until 2017-and improve energy efficiency of at least five million homes over the next ten years.

There will be no risk in saving our health service, by stopping the wholesale privatisation of the NHS, repeal the disastrous Tories’ Health and Social Care Act and recruit 20,000 more nurses and 8,000 more GPs.

The Tories claim unemployment is falling fast, tax receipts have fallen, but you don’t need to be an economist to know the reason why. This so called ‘job creation’ is based on low pay, on zero hours working and bogus self-employment in a precarious jobs market that is the ultimate in ‘flexible labour’.

We need an economy for all of us – a stronger minimum wage, a ban on exploitative zero hours, create thousands more apprenticeships and 
ensure justice in the workplace is affordable.

The Bedroom Tax is so unfair and will be abolished under a Labour government, more houses will be built, 200,000 a year by 2020, prioritise capital investment in affordable housing, stop private landlords and agents ripping us all off.

Tackle crime – protect frontline police numbers and bring in Britain’s first Victims’ Law to put victims at the heart of the justice system.

Extend free childcare to 25 hours for working parents with three and four year olds and reinvigorate Sure Start.

Devolve regional transport decisions, bringing together trains, buses, ferries and trams into a single network, have a strict cap on annual rail fares and legislate so public sector operator can take on lines.

Reform the European Union – guarantee no powers will be transferred to Brussels without an in/out referendum.

So despite the scaremongering and some totally unfair national character assassinations of Ed Milliband, I will be voting for change, voting for hope and voting for Labour.

Your readership will have received a leaflet from me in the post last week, stating my five pledges and plans for the area.

I have listened to feedback from the electorate and wanted to respond. Additionally, I recently engaged with Mr Hayes and other candidates in a debate on BBC Radio Lincolnshire and I want to set the record straight on a few points.

Firstly, with regards the leaflet, the overwhelming response was extremely positive.

For instance, proposals for a Lincolnshire Living Wage have resonated very well with your readers. However, I wanted to apologise to those who were disappointed with the content – specifically, that nothing about me as a person was mentioned.

It is very important that voters realise that my party only had resources for one of these leaflets. The type of content was therefore a carefully considered decision with such a wide variety of people to reach out to and stand out from the other candidates.

Our funds come entirely from our members in the constituency, who are ordinary people. The Conservatives and UKIP, as your readers can guess, have very wealthy backers (some of whom are outside the area) and are able to afford many leaflets and adverts as a result.

We are a member-funded, passionate, local, grass-roots organisation and so I wanted to ensure for our one leaflet that the policies were shared first and foremost, rather than talk about me and my personality (so not an ego-trip!).

This is not an excuse, but rather hopefully an explanation of the practicalities of my position.

Secondly, I wanted to respond to a specific misconception raised by Mr Hayes at the radio debate.

I lived in Spalding until November last year and had lived in the area for around three years as well as standing in a previous council election in Spalding. I only had to move due to the utter uselessness of our rail connection to and from Peterborough, which meant that when I changed jobs I could not get home from work at a decent time. I am sorry if that is unacceptable to some, but I have to earn a full-time wage like everyone else and do not have the luxury of being a full-time politician.

I 100 per cent guarantee to voters I will move back to the constituency if elected.

Finally, as a bit of personal background. I am 26 and my life experiences mean that I understand the pressures that local people are under from the cost of living.

I went to a state school. I graduated into the worst recession in living memory, I have been unemployed and on minimum wage. I have had to fight to succeed, as have many others in my generation, due to the financial sector’s blundering and greed.

I also feel I am entitled to claim ‘borrowed roots’ insofar as my fiancée is locally born and bred. She has been educated, lived and worked in around Spalding all her life, as has her family.

This means that unlike some other candidates I am always in and around the area. Just last night, for instance, we went for a birthday meal at The Moorings in Spalding – another great local pub and phoenix from the ashes!

We love this area – as I have said many times before, ours is a beautiful constituency. It just needs some TLC and investment, someone who will go to Westminster and fight our corner. This is what I intend to do.

Has Roger Gambba-Jones reconsidered his anti-UKIP rant? (see Spalding Guardian of April 19). Defections from the Independent Group to form a coalition with the minority Conservative Group shifted the balance of power?

The excellent refuse service we receive is wholly due to the hard work and diligence of the labour force involved. Our district douncil makes huge savings by not supplying and servicing the wheelie bins that virtually all others do. Regarding the recycling facility opposite the power station – bin your ideas of district versus county council, just prove that you’re up to the job and have it fully open all year round.

This ‘opening’ business applies to our libraries. Is it a sell-off ploy in much the same way that Hayley Stewart and the Castle Sports complex have been drooled over for so long?

This is the biggest issue facing democracy today. My correspondence with the (now) Leader of the Conservative Party regarding the Localism Act, together with smug claims of parish councillors who admit they conduct affairs the way they do “because they can” appear to show that he and they think that nothing in public ownership is off limits, but theirs by right.

If this occurs in all our shires, are we not (under the present Conservatives) living in a dictatorship wherein the bottom layer of ‘Government’ (largely self-elected) supports the upper branches unchecked.

Their claims that the Labour Party is funded by the Unions are sour grapes.

I anticipate the very best in people, but when my trust is ill-founded, try to demonstrate better solutions.

I cannot tolerate being lied to and, as a genuinely elected parish councillor, again thank my supporters for their confidence in me to protect their interests. Having no political affiliation enables me to do this.