Dear Editor

I would like through your pages to offer my heartiest congratulations to Lea Parish Council for organising the Easter Monday walk for villagers and to applaud councillor and footpaths officer Mike Williams, in particular, for all his efforts.

Around two dozen intrepid parishioners explored public footpaths that some of them had never encountered before and arrived in places that some of them never knew existed. It was a hugely-entertaining experience and thanks to the maps that Mike provided no-one got lost; and the tea and cakes at the village church at the finish were more than welcome.

The entire exercise - and I do mean exercise! - brought home to everybody what a beautiful place the Lea is. Beautiful, yet at the same time vulnerable.

Gazing across the village, parishioners saw some of the loveliest countryside Herefordshire has to offer. A developer however would doubtless see fields ripe for concreting.

That is why it is so vitally important that villagers get involved in the Lea’s Neighbourhood Development Plan and help bring it to fruition. If you want to shape the Lea’s future and have a chance of warding off some of the more-undesirable schemes developers may have up their well-tailored sleeves, then it’s the only game in town.

Steve Banner

Lea