This week's in my view comes from... Conservative councillor John Halsall, Wokingham Borough Council leader

“The Times recently named Wokingham as one of Britain’s most thriving communities. Wokingham is one of the most attractive places to live in Britain; our Borough can only improve. The Town Centre is coming together. We are filling the retail units with lots of great shops such as Oliver Bonas and Neon Sheep. Elms Field children’s play park and the new Aldi are proving to be very popular. Wokingham now has and in the future will offer a greater range of shops for everyone. We have opened the new unisex toilets and provided free water fountains in the town centre, which is something visitors and residents have been telling us to provide in the town centre for many years. We are sorry it took so long, but we did listen and we have delivered.

I am working closely with the Superintendent, Bracknell and Wokingham Local Police area, and the Safer Wokingham Partnership to tackle the recent spike in anti-social behaviour. We have lots of officers with good ideas who are passionate about tackling anti-social behaviour; I hope to be able to share these ideas with you as soon as possible. We are recruiting a dedicated Anti-Social Behaviour Manager to help deliver everyone’s right to feel safe in Wokingham. What makes Wokingham a great place to live is the people. Within one week of the fire at Ashridge Nursery we were able to provide temporary accommodation to the nursery in the Brambles Children Centre. The amazing community in Wokingham started online fundraising pages, toy donations and messages of support. This is fine example of how we can really come together, support one another and look for a solution to tackle our problems.

One of our biggest issues is to protect Wokingham for the future. So far our residents have done a fantastic job recycling their household waste and food. Our recycling rates have increased 10% from 45% in 2018 to 55% in June 2019. This is a fantastic result and means we are ahead of the EU target of 50% recycling rate for UK households by 2020. Let’s keep it up and improve it! If you have any ideas on how we can reduce our carbon footprint and save the world then I urge you to take part in our Climate Emergency Survey by 31 December. You can find out more by visiting www.wokingham.gov.uk/consultation or by calling 0118 974 6000 to request a hard copy.”