Stu

I wrote the original post some years ago. Russell has come back a few times since and always been great - the last one was when that crazy downpour knocked out our downpipe (not Russell's work). He called me ad-hoc on the way back from another job and said he could come round now to sort it out. As a simple quick job (but I wasn't getting up on the roof!), he tried to insist on doing it for free so I had to give one of his boys some cash while he was up the ladder. I think the fact that people here get defensive of criticism of him shows how highly people regard him - he did tell me he is very busy though and can't get back to everyone. If you can get hold of him, he's usually been great for us - sounds like you got a bit unlucky.

My wife and I just wanted to share our recent very positive experience of Heber School. We personally found relatively little to choose between Heber, the new Harris and Goodrich schools but put Goodrich as our number 1 for a few reasons but namely as it is our closest, living at the Rye end of Upland Road. Heber has always been traditionally very hard to get into so we were surprised when we ended up getting Heber as our school and by the start of term we were number one on the waiting list for Goodrich. Our daughter started at Heber and has had a brilliant time there - we have been amazed at what she has learned in that time and enjoyed all of the class and school events such as the nativity performance. Her teacher was Mrs Piddington and we can?t speak highly enough about her from our experience. Our waiting list place at Goodrich just came up and we deliberated intensely and finally made the stressful decision to move over to our local school having had a trial visit and joined in with another very nice class. We don?t know whether we?ve made the right or wrong choice and obviously there is strong rationale for leaving her where she is happy and thriving but we wanted to put this post up to share our positive experience of Heber in case it helped other parents with their decisions. The headteacher is now established and has exciting plans for the school. Both the headteacher and our daughter?s class teacher agreed to meet us to discuss our position whilst we were making our decision and made a very persuasive case to stay. The plans for the near future of the school also sound very positive and exciting. We made our decision on a knife edge which was very stressful but we are obviously so lucky to have had the choice of these schools. We don?t need or want responses on our personal choice to move our daughter but did want to point out that Heber has a catchment area which has expanded in recent years and could be a great option for anyone in the area. We know of people who would have loved to have had Heber as a choice but thought they were too far away ? which is why we wanted to put this out there.

Another one for Russell. He just did our front and back roofs. Having just done the side return extension last year with some difficult and uncommunicative builders who liked to try and charge extras where possible, was really good to work again with someone honest considerate and good at what they do.

Suggest at this stage that those of us with children at the nursery try and talk separately and productively rather than have it mixed in with people who wish to speculate/opinionate. I was going to tell others to 'butt out' but then again it is within our capabilities not to read this thread which is probably the most appropriate option. Hopefully you've been contacted by one of the others but if you need details let me . Know.

If I was at work and ITV came to the door asking me for comments on my company I wouldn't speak to the camera men either. Grow up and give the girl a break. Yes the nursery needs to give a comment at some point and yes they should (by the sounds of it) been much better at following up with the mother but you cannot moan about a general member of staff refusing to give a tinpot journatlist an ad-hoc interview on a national tv. Focus on the issues. Non-interview to ITV is not one so move on to more important considerations.

Just to say our 18 month old daughter is also there and I agree with loz76. Terrible incident that should never have happened but involving the media and shutting down the nursery rather than working with it benefits noone. I believe there have been some transitional problems with the new manager but they seem to be getting back on track and there are some lovely caring men and women on the staff there.

Hi guys - just a big recommendation from us for RJP roofing. We bought a new house in Upland Rd where they had had builders do a hatchet job on the roof. RJP quoted for the remedial work but made it clear that they would only charge for what they had to do once they pulled it back and found out what was underneath. Number is below: 07852 972052 Russell was very helpful and communicative throughout and seems to have done a great job and ended up coming in under the original quote which was much appreciated especially with all the new house costs we have been racking up. He even helped me free up our chimney and got one of his guys to come back and install a chimney cowl for us at a later date free of charge. Get in early - he keeps his team to a moderate size so that he can ensure the quality stays top notch so book him up with a bit of notice.