Parish 1000 Fruit Tree Project - Shepley - 50 more trees go in.

Green Party Shepley Councillor Ian Lumb puts the finishing touches to fruit trees at Shepley Playing Fields

Yet another blogpost about Kirkburton Parish Council's 1000 fruit tree project because we have planted yet more trees. This planting season so far we have planted trees in a Thurstonland, Kirkheaton and now Shepley. We do not pay for the trees to be planted, nor do the Parish Councillors go out and plant them on their own. All fruit tree installations have to have community buy in. In this instance the whole of Year 5 at Shepley First School had a hand in planting the trees and the great thing is that as they grow so will the trees. In every sense of the word they have planted a community orchard.

The real strenghth of the project is having knowledgeable, practical and committed Parish Councillors such as Ben Wightman, Ian Lumb and Robert Barraclough driving the project. We are succeeding in making the Parish Council very outward facing with high levels of engagement with the people we represent. This is the good stuff. We've had a few sneers from Conservatives from the sidelines about wasting money on fruit trees but I believe this is one of the best schemes the Parish has ever run making us relevant, visible and Green.

One of the legacies of these 'Green Years' on Kirkburton Parish Council will be the several hundred local people who will literally benefit from the fruits of their labours from the trees that they planted with their neighbours.

Cllr Ian Lumb with Cllr Ben Wightman cataloguing yet more fruit trees planted under the groundbreaking Parish project