MAY I, as chair of St David's Neighbourhood Partnership, send a message of welcome to the university students who have come to live and party in our city.
I recently attended a community engagement meeting at the university where we, local residents (or 'turnips', as we are affectionately known by the students) were encouraged to invite students into our perhaps rather humble homes for tea and buns in a lovely 'getting-to-know-you' way. After all, away from home for the first time, probably nervous and a little inhibited, students can rely on local people to help ease the pain of separation, the cutting of the umbilical tie, as these young people put their huge intellect to the test, learning to do their own laundry and put out their rubbish on the right day.
Local people are reminded, too, of the very, very high importance the council places on having lots and lots of students living in the city because of the large, well, 'huge' contribution they make to the night-time economy when they arrive, tanked up on masses of wonderful A levels, in the South West's new Magaluf.
So it is with absolute delight that the residents of St David's welcome the students who had such a wonderful, cheerful, vomiting time on Saturday night in and around the Clock Tower, St David's Hill, Lower North Street and, in particular, Exe Street, running along the length of St Bartholomew's cemetery. What fun.
By the time the revellers reached Exe Street they could contain their intellectual enthusiasm no longer and quite brilliantly kicked the wing-mirror from a small family car parked in the residents' spaces along the road.
The surge of testosterone released by this brilliance could not be contained: engorged on intellectual rigour, the revellers kicked off another wing-mirror from a small family car. And, yes, it was just too delicious to resist so two more cars had their wing-mirrors torn off.
Unbeknown to the revellers, this is not a one-off activity and they cannot claim it as a 'first'. No, it has happened in our neighbourhood every year at the start of the university year and so it is something of a tradition. In fact, the revellers may have photographed this great intellectual feat on Saturday and posted them on Facebook, so proud they must be of this tradition.
Happily, university students are encouraged to get to know their neighbours and their host neighbourhoods, so our Saturday night revellers may be interested to know that victims of the car damage are, in the main, families on very low incomes.
Our neighbourhood is high on the index of deprivation and it is particularly health-deprived. So finding the £100-plus to get their car repaired will be a real struggle.
So as chair of the Neighbourhood Partnership, I invite our jolly revellers to contact me via our website (stdavidsneighbourhood.org.uk) with their apology and they can leave either cash or a cheque for a total of £400 at the reception of Exeter Community Centre at St David's Hill, EX4 3RG. Together with the police (the Crime Log No. is 335 of 20/09/2014) I will ensure that the money reaches the victim of this 'victimless' crime. Thank you very much.
Christine Fraser
Chair of St David's Neighbourhood Partnership
St David's Hill, Exeter
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