Latest news with #Salisbury
Yahoo
10 hours ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Burger and loaded fries takeaway will open late to serve Chapel clubbers
A NEW burger takeaway is coming to Salisbury – and it plans to open late on Friday and Saturday nights to feed hungry clubbers. Smashing Stack will open at 37 Milford Street, directly opposite The Chapel Nightclub, at the end of June. The building used to be Lee's Fish Bar, which closed suddenly at the start of this year. It is understood that the owners have retired. Paper signs in the window say the new venture will offer smash burgers and loaded fries, and the 'best deals' will be available online. The new business is 'opening soon' (Image: Newsquest) The signs say Smashing Stack will open until 3.30am at weekends, allowing it to serve Chapel-goers when they leave the club. A website, does not have any more information about the venture. Companies House says it will be run by Salisbury local Kai White. When Lee's closed, one customer said: 'I heard he shut and is not re-opening; just going to enjoy retirement. Such a shame. Fantastic food and such a lovely couple.' Read more City restaurant 'goes out with a bang' with full house on last day Italian restaurant to be replaced by sports bar and nightclub this summer Another wrote: 'I asked the 'boss man' in [neighbouring takeaway] Dominic, and he said he thinks Mr Lee has retired.' Another nearby takeaway, Chick-o-Land on New Canal, closed for three weeks in March to undergo a full refurbishment. The fried chicken outlet normally opens between 2pm and 11pm from Thursday to Sunday, and between 2pm and 4am at weekends.
BBC News
20 hours ago
- Health
- BBC News
'Fragile' girl's life transformed after rare condition caused her to stop eating
A 'fragile' girl's life has been transformed thanks to "caring and loving" staff at a 12, from Salisbury, Wiltshire, has a rare life-limiting muscle wasting condition called Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA), which prevents her from House children's hospice came to the family's aid in 2023 after Ellie took to her bed, dropped out of school and expressed suicidal mother Beth said: "They just came in and gave us a chance to heal a bit. Cope a bit. Relax a bit. We were given this 360 care and love from people that were so gentle with us when we were so damaged." The family are sharing their story during Children's Hospice Week, which runs until Sunday, to raise awareness and funds for local parents first noticed their daughter might be unwell when she stopped crawling at nine months testing showed that Ellie had SMA Type 2. The condition is life-limiting, affecting her muscles, swallowing and period after the diagnosis was "absolutely awful", Beth said."I was searching for a cure anywhere I could. We were just desperate – we were like frightened children," she can still use her lower arms and hands to write, but is unable to stand independently or walk as her upper thigh muscles have weakened. "While she does physically struggle, it's Ellie's confidence and sense of identity that's damaged the most," said Beth. "She still very much cries because she can't go on a climbing frame and do things like other children. Her mental health is massively affected." 'Very fragile' In 2023, Ellie took to her bed on and off for about six months. She stopped eating, dropped out of school and told her parents she did not want to live. "It was an incredibly scary time for us and for her."But that was luckily the year that we discovered Julia's House, and things changed massively."Being around other children who are in wheelchairs or know what it's like to have a complex condition has also been phenomenal for Ellie. She has developed some really special friendships because of Julia's House."She added that all of Julia's House nurses, play worker and counsellor helped Ellie through her "very fragile mental health condition". 'Enormous strain on parents' Mike Bartlett, the charity's chief executive, said that Ellie's case proved how important it was to support parents, as well as children."Looking after a very poorly child puts an enormous strain on parenting. Research shows that many parents looking after seriously ill children suffer ill health themselves," he it is becoming more difficult for the charity to provide its services, due to the economic climate, he added."The problem is the costs have gone up, the cost of providing care, staffing, energy bills, inflation all have a pressure on our bottom line and it's getting harder and harder to fundraise," he said.
BBC News
a day ago
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Headlines: Giant peace sign and a tech amnesty
Here's our daily pick of stories from across local websites in the West of England, and interesting content from social media. Our pick of local website stories The Swindon Advertiser reported on Wednesday that £70,000 worth of illegal cigarettes, tobacco and alcohol had been seized from two Manchester Road shops and a flat, leading to the shops being shut down. A repair café in Burnham-on-Sea has launched a tech amnesty to help unwanted items find new homes with owners who really need them. A letter to the editor of the Salisbury Journal focusing on the scrapped tunnel scheme under the ancient site of Stonehenge also generated a lively conversation online. Our top three from yesterday What to watch on social media Excitement for Glastonbury Festival is reaching fever pitch - proven by more than 20,000 likes on this Instagram video of an enormous peace sign on the grass in front of the iconic pyramid stage. A plumber from Salisbury shared his beautiful copper creations, including hedgehogs, hearts and bunches of flowers, to widespread acclaim on Facebook. This week is Learning Disability Week and Wiltshire Council's star of the show on Wednesday was garden volunteer Jeremy, who for the past couple of years has also worked as a cinema host.
Spectator
2 days ago
- Politics
- Spectator
Why the Tories should oppose regime change
As a minister I lived by mantras: simple principles that summed up how I believed you got things done. Faced with a PowerPoint presentation as means of influencing policy, I'd sling it back in the box with the injunction 'Think in ink' – in other words, make a proper sustained argument on paper instead of trying to advance shonky argument with a series of unevidenced assertions, a dodgy graph and the words 'levelling up' on every page in bold. Told that the prospect of a judicial review should mean shelving a policy, I'd write on the submission: 'If the legal advice says no, get a better lawyer.' Informed by officials that 'the Treasury are opposed', I'd invariably respond: 'The building may have a view, but I'd prefer to hear from a person, and unless that person is the Chancellor, we're going ahead.' My most frequent observation, repeated almost every hour, was: 'Don't make the perfect the enemy of the good.' It's the golden rule of politics, and the advice I'd give now to those of my former colleagues who've been indulging in that favourite Tory pastime – grumbling about the leadership. The truth is there has never been a perfect Tory leader (although Lord Salisbury comes close). But Kemi Badenoch is good and getting better. Monday's announcement that the government would, after all, commission a national inquiry into the rape gang scandal was many things. Long overdue. An indictment of the moral cowardice of ministers. The very least the victims deserve. It was also a vindication of Badenoch. She had fought for it, forced vote after vote to try to secure it and been denounced for opportunism and dog-whistle racism as she sought only to give a voice to the women and girls betrayed for years. Finally, perhaps, a measure of justice may be coming – although, as John Power points out in his article, there are still ample grounds for fearing that the government will try even now to dodge the most difficult and important questions. Labour's U-turn on the inquiry is only their most recent surrender to arguments Badenoch has been making. The retreat on winter fuel payments followed sustained Conservative campaigning. The belated acceptance that men cannot become women by filling in a form meant acknowledging that Badenoch had indeed been right and not the bigot they had claimed her to be. Now, it appears, they may be on the verge of accepting she was correct about the long-term damage to tax revenues their Budget inflicted. Badenoch's leadership has been far from faultless. Spending Christmas quibbling with Nigel Farage over Reform's membership figures was beneath her. A commitment to restore tax privileges for independent schools is a gift not to disadvantaged pupils but to Labour campaigners determined to depict the Tories as the party of the privileged. The Conservatives foolishly chose last week to side with nimbys in a vote on necessary planning liberalisation, putting the interests of the asset-rich ahead of those of the aspirational. But these missteps are minor set against the government's sins, and they are all either forgettable or correctable. Would that the same could be said of Badenoch's internal critics – the incorrigible in pursuit of the impossible. The agitation for a change of course, in many conversations quickly succeeded by the contemplation of a change of leader, is uncomfortable evidence of the persistent political immaturity of too many Tories. They display the impatience of a toddler allied to the stroppiness of a teenager without either the charm of the first or the promise of the second. The party's desperate position in the polls is not of Badenoch's making. If there's any female Tory leader who should take responsibility for the unpopularity it's Liz Truss. There are attempts by some to revise the verdict on that brief period. And it is worth re-examining, because it was worse than many Tories are still prepared to admit. The party inflicted on the country a PM manifestly unfit for office who, whatever virtues any part of her programme may have had, implemented policy so ineptly that it toxified Tory ideas and tarnished Tory achievements. Far from being an icebreaker for another Thatcherite revolution, Truss was an ideologically-intoxicated joyrider who wrote off the country's best vehicle for necessary reform. That is why the process of restoring confidence both in Conservative ideas, and the Tory party as the means of delivering them, will take time and care. Credibility must be restored by demonstrating intellectual seriousness and the sort of detailed plan for implementation that John Hoskyns developed for Margaret Thatcher in the 1970s. And just as he helped ensure that the economic errors of the Heath premiership could be corrected, so the party now requires a similarly comprehensive account of how to control the migration which ran out of control in the Tories' final years in office. This will, undoubtedly, mean extricating ourselves from the European Convention on Human Rights as it stands. But that will not be enough on its own. Simply leaving the ECHR without addressing how it's become intertwined with other legal and judicial constraints on necessary executive action would be to promise transformation while being destined to disappoint – the approach of both Truss and Starmer, which has corroded faith in democracy and failed to deliver the change the country needs. Badenoch's decision to commission David Wolfson KC, the finest legal mind in the Lords, to review our entire judicial architecture is a sign of seriousness. It is a demonstration of responsibility, not an abdication of action. Some of the same critics who chide Badenoch for not being bolder or faster are also those who, with admirable inconsistency, complain about her combative character. Her ferocity in argument is undoubted, and it may make those Tories whose own arguments are weak uncomfortable to have them incinerated, Targaryen-style. But it hasn't put off donors, as a recent increase in financial support for the party indicates. In any case, successful political warfare requires not just courage in the heat of battle but care in the preparation of the campaign. To invoke another mantra – the right policy is the right politics. By being consistently right on policy Badenoch is, at last, providing the politics conservatism needs.
Yahoo
2 days ago
- General
- Yahoo
Public servant who dedicated career to families and safeguarding awarded MBE
A DEDICATED public servant who devoted her career to families and safeguarding children has been awarded an MBE. Pier Pritchard, 62, was named in the King's Birthday Honours list on Friday, June 13 for services to children and family care. She grew up in Jersey but moved to Salisbury as a teenager in 1982 to pursue voluntary opportunities in the field and has stayed ever since. Read more Charity CEO inspired by son's rare kidney condition to help others awarded MBE Grand Wiltshire home of former Prime Minister gets top award Pier was nominated for the award by Wiltshire Council's senior leadership team and received the good news around a month ago. She said: 'It was a real surprise. I'm absolutely delighted and touched. One of the hardest things was not being able to tell anyone. 'I have been absolutely overwhelmed since then by kind messages from friends, family and colleagues. I'm very thankful to those people.' Pier received a Lifetime Achievement Award at the National Children and Young People Awards in October 2024 (Image: Wiltshire Council) Pier had not planned to have a career in social work but became 'hooked' when she started volunteering with children. She later moved into safeguarding and spent most of her 40-year career working for Wiltshire Council, leading innovating work that supported families and protected children facing challenges in their lives. Pier also supported colleagues through significant change after Ofsted judged Wiltshire's Children's Service as 'inadequate' in 2012. The service was rated 'outstanding' in 2023. 'I'm very steadfast and determined,' Pier said. 'I really want to support families. The satisfaction of that work comes through supporting families through tough experiences. 'You need to have passion and want to see families and their children do well. The most important thing is them staying together as families. 'It's important to be open and honest with people. Social work can have a bad press, but I've really enjoyed it. 'I've valued the support that I've had within the council and multi-agency groups, and friendships have developed from that. 'I've worked for Wiltshire Council for almost all those 40 years. They're such a good employer. 'It's important to work within an organisation that supports their staff.' Pier retired from her senior management position in April 2025 and hopes to spend more time with her family, reading and enjoying nice weather, but she plans to stay involved in safeguarding through fostering and adoption panels. Read more Former chair of Salisbury NHS trust recognised in King's birthday honours Decision on plans to open second Lidl supermarket in Salisbury hit with delays Wiltshire Council chief executive Lucy Townsend said: 'This honour is a fitting way to celebrate Pier's extraordinary work in children's social care. 'With over 40 years of dedicated service, Pier has been a tireless advocate for safeguarding and family support in Wiltshire. 'Her leadership in pioneering initiatives like Family Group Conferences, PAUSE and the Family Drug and Alcohol Court has been vital in the success of our services and, on behalf of everyone at the council, I would like to congratulate Pier on receiving her well-deserved MBE.'
