Archive

  • Rat-run will take a life, fears resident

    FAMILIES on a Didcot estate fear someone will be killed along their road which has become a rat-run. Widow Gillian Keats, 54, whose late husband Cllr John Keats pressed for traffic calming, said the 30mph speed limit on Brasenose Road was ignored by motorists

  • House fire death 'not suspicious'

    A FIRE chief said today no evidence has been discovered to suggest the death of blaze victim Ann Llewellyn was suspicious. Mrs Llewellyn, 55, died in her burning three-bed- roomed home in Blackbird Leys, Oxford, on Monday. She had two sons and a daughter

  • Landfill tax rapped

    THE jump in landfill tax from £7 to £10 a tonne announced in the Budget has been condemned by Oxfordshire county councillors. It is feared the increase could cost the county council as much as £800,000 a year - money which will have to come from an already

  • Cats hurt by oil pollution

    ENVIRONMENT Agency staff are still trying to trace the source of oil pollution in a stream which nearly claimed the lives of two cats. Leigh Dyer, acting manager of a children's nursery, said her tabbie cat Millie had to spend nearly a week at the vets

  • Soccer yobs wreak havoc at hospital

    HOSPITAL staff have handed over footage from closed circuit cameras to police investigating crowd trouble which flared up after Oxford United's match with Reading. Up to 100 football thugs went on the rampage, damaging cars parked in the grounds of the

  • Mayor calls for crisis centre bar to stay

    VOLUNTEERS at a troubled community centre say they will not be able to pay off their £70,000 debt if they are forced to close the bar. Oxford City Council, which owns Donnington Community Centre, wants its social club committee wound up and has withdrawn

  • Joyriders raise hell for residents

    IT is not only the opera singers who have been shattering the tranquillity in sleepy Garsington. Joyriders have also been disturbing the peace in the perfect rural setting, less than a mile away from Oxford's Blackbird Leys estate, where young car criminals

  • Sacked kart boss 'not team player'

    THE man behind the launch of a new go-karting venture at Grove, near Wantage, has been suddenly sacked. Guy Meisl, 33, who helped set up the Kartex Grand Prix circuit at the Grove Technology Park just three months ago, said he was "utterly gobsmacked"

  • Snack mix-up could have cost girl's life

    A MISTAKE in packaging could have had lethal results for a teenager with a deadly nut allergy. If 15-year-old Carly Buckingham, of East End, North Leigh, had eaten a chocolate bar, which was almost included in her lunchbox, her throat would have swelled

  • Pc shows dogged determination

    BICESTER traffic policeman Mark Howard has mushed into the record books as one of the first people to dog-trek across the north American continent from coast to coast. Against all the odds the five-strong team, led by former cancer patient Wendy Smith

  • Cultural centre idea welcomed

    A COUPLE'S plans to rescue the Museum of Oxford by turning it into an 'open college' and European cultural centre were welcomed by Oxfordshire County Council. Jonathan Ungar, 30, and Eleanor Malaurie, 30, of Cowley Road, Oxford, want to use the museum's

  • £500,000 revamp for Bicester station

    A RUNDOWN railway station is in line for a £500,000 facelift. Tatty Bicester Town station can expect new shelters, closed circuit television cameras and hi-tech information displays in a partnership between Thames Trains and Bicester Village retail park

  • Choker for ref as son misses cup final

    A YOUNG boy's dream of playing a cup final at the Manor has been dashed because his dad was the man in the middle in the semi-final. Class 3 referee Leigh Thompson was appointed by the B-Line Oxford Boys League to officiate in an under 12 cup semi-final

  • International call-up for United's Francis

    OXFORD United centre forward Kevin Francis got an international call-up today - from the tiny Caribbean island of St Kitts-Nevis. He has been asked to play in three Shell Caribbean Cup Zone 3 matches on April 1, 3 and 5. The 6ft 7in striker will miss

  • Hands up who's got henna!

    THE art of henna body painting has become fashionable - thanks to Madonna who had her hands elaborately decorated for her latest pop video Frozen. Mehndi, the ancient Indian custom of henna body painting, is a filigree design used on the feet and hands

  • Crem 'fiasco' shocks family

    A FAMILY has been left heartbroken after blunders by Oxford Crematorium turned a burial ceremony into a fiasco. Widow Ivy Ganter and her sister Doris Butler were horrified to find the ashes of relatives had been put in plastic bags instead of bronze urns