Last week I presented sports equipment to four local primary schools as part of the Tesco for Schools and Clubs voucher scheme.

The four schools were All Saints in Winfarthing, Burston, Bressingham and Harleston. This new scheme combines the best of Tesco’s Computers for Schools and Sports for Schools and Clubs both of which ran successfully for a number of years. As with the previous schemes, parents, friends and relations save vouchers from Tesco stores which are then used by schools and clubs to apply for computer or sports equipment.

Richard Bacon MP and Amanda Bushall from Tesco with pupils from All Saints, Winfarthing and Bressingham, Burston and Harleston Primary Schools.

This is a great way for parents, family and friends to help local schools obtain new computer and sports equipment.

I am pleased that Tesco is continuing to help the local community in this way.  .

Shimpling Church

This year is the 40th anniversary of the Churches Conservation Trust and I visited the St George’s Church, Shimpling, one of the Trust’s 341 historic churches, to meet with Trust staff and local volunteers. Set back from the road among the fields of the Shimpling Hall Estate (to find it, you follow the sign saying Free Range Eggs!), Shimpling Church is one of the most serene and unspoilt small parish churches I have seen.

Richard Bacon MP (centre back) with (from left) Owen Thompson, Churches Conservation Trust, volunteers David Cooper and Maurice Philpot, Rebecca Rees, Churches Conservation Trust and volunteer Sheila Cooper at St George, Shimpling

The church is 12th or 13th Century and the fabric has hardly been altered from the original form. The Nave retains its full complement of 15th Century bench ends.

Although the church is technically ‘redundant’ it remains a consecrated building and is still used for occasional services, including weddings. There will be Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols by Candlelight on Thursday December 17th, which should be a wonderful event.

It’s the usual nightmare: the computer system doesn’t work properly, the cost of processing each claim has risen to £1,743, even though under the simpler Scottish system they do it for only £285 per claim.

The agency is now spending millions correcting earlier mistakes and paying millions more to the European Union in penalties. 

Meanwhile our farmers still suffer from huge bureaucracy and delays. Quite honestly, if this is the best the agency can do, it would be better to ban computers and bring back the quill pen!