Overnight between Monday 1 April and Tuesday the second of Sunflowers of Grafton’s minibuses was taken from their property on The Green in East Grafton and driven to East Kennet where it was discovered, on fire on a road just to the South of the village.
Police are appealing for information – from anyone seeing a ‘Sunflowers of Grafton’ logo’d minibus driving along a road between East Grafton and East Kennet overnight on Monday, or anyone on that road who was able to pick up DashCam footage of the minibus – and possible ‘support vehicle'(?) – on the way between the locations.
If you can help, please contact Wiltshire Police on 101 quoting reference 54240037240.
The same (almost) happened just over six months ago but that burnt out minibus was found near to Basingstoke. After that anti-theft security measures were increased significantly – CCTV, steering wheel locks, new and robust gates and reducing front hedge height – but a couple of days ago the other minibus was taken in spite of these new protective additions.
“Devastated – terrible blow for us all on Tuesday. Hard to believe that we have had two vehicles stolen in seven months” stated Sue England, Business Manger of Sunflowers at Grafton.
Sue explained that both buses run by Sunflowers are fundamental to provision of essential childcare options – school transport, wraparound care (breakfast and after school clubs) at Great Bedwyn and Burbage Primary Schools – and to the Holiday Club provision. But it’s not just the schools and children who make use of this valuable resource, the buses are also made available for hire to community groups in the area.
Sue and the team at Sunflowers are now working on a plan to minimise impact on families when term starts in a week’s time so that school transport and wraparound care provision can be maintained. “We have had a bus from Swindon Dial-A Ride (shout out to community transport organisations – they provide amazing support to communities)” added Sue.
What next? “We have some serious thinking and planning to do on how we recover and move forward positively.
“We will work out how we are going to replace our vehicles. The conversation to date has been based on replacing one minibus and now we are faced with the challenge of replacing two. The cost of replacing like-for-like is prohibitive – costs for both purchase and lease of minibuses have risen enormously so we need to find a solution that works operationally and financially.
“We look at further security precautions – add additional layers to the measures put in place last year.”
Marlborough.news will update regarding any plans or appeals, so that Sunflowers at Grafton can keep doing what they have, for the children in the nursery, the surrounding schools, and also for the local community as their role goes far further than just providing nursery facilities. And these minibuses are fundamental to what they can do.
Hocktide in Hungerford – traditional festival, once to give the right to fish in the Kennet
