Members of the public for their feedback on the trial parking machines—touch screen and keypad—located in Civic Car Park (Abingdon), Cattle Market (Wallingford), Goldsmith Lane (Wallingford) and West St Helen’s Street (Abingdon) from Wednesday 9 April until 11:59pm Monday 26 May 2025. The survey was promoted via posters located alongside the car park machines.

We received 36 completed responses. 44% of them used the Civic Car park machine in Abingdon followed by Goldsmiths Lane in Wallingford and West St Helen Street which both had 19% each and Cattle Street in Wallingford with 17%.

Touch screen machines

• Of the 61% (22 respondents) that used the touch screen machines, 50% agree that the instructions were easy to follow.
• 82% agree that the machine was easy to input vehicle registration details
• 45% felt the machine processed their payment quickly, 23% did not.
• 50% are happy to have an electronic ticket rather than a ticket to go on their dashboard, whilst 40% are not.

Keypad machines

• Of the 28% (10 respondents) that used the keypad machines, 60% agree that the instructions were easy to follow.
• 80% said it was easy to input their vehicle registration details
• 40% of respondents disagree that the machine processed their payment quickly, whilst 30% agreed.
• 50% disagree with having electronic ticket rather than a ticket to go on their dashboard, whilst 30% are.

The results have been reviewed and will be presented to council members at a full council meeting in Autumn 2025. If approved, the most appropriate car parking machine will be purchased and installed across all council-owned car parks in South Oxfordshire and Vale of White Horse. You can read the full Parking Machines Trial Report here.

Owners of, and people responsible for empty properties in South Oxfordshire and the Vale of White Horse to provide information to understand why their property is empty and how we can help to bring it back into use. 

200 completed responses were received, of which 123 were submitted online and 77 via email and post. Most respondents were owners of one or more empty property/ies (59 per cent), whilst 28 per cent were responsible for them. With respect to the type and state of the empty property, the reason for buying it and for it being empty, and the length of time it has been empty, the most common responses provided were: 

• 22 per cent declared a detached property and 33 per cent said their property had five or more rooms
• 36 per cent of properties were in need of major renovation
• 33 per cent of properties were bought as primary residence
• 37 per cent of properties have been empty for 1-2 years
• In 26 per cent of cases the relevant proprietor of the property had died 

Respondents to the survey have been offered help and advice to bring their properties back into use, or they have been considered for further monitoring. Empty property owners who did not respond to the survey will be contacted again on a regular basis. Click on this link to read more about the findings of this survey. 

Members of the public, registered charities and charity collectors, businesses/organisations, and district, county and town/parish councils for their views on our new joint policy on charity collections. The proposed policy is aimed at safeguarding donors and beneficiaries, ensuring fair access to collection opportunities and preventing unlicensed fundraising. You can read the full proposed Charity Collection Policy here. 

We received 95 completed responses for this consultation. Most respondents agreed with all the proposals made in the Charity Collection Policy, in relation to both house-to-house collections and street collections. 

More specifically, with regards to house-to-house-collections: 

• 89% agree with the proposed amends for applicants to provide detailed supporting material about their charity. 
• 69% agree with the proposed amends to restrict where collections can take place to prevent blanket district-wide collections.  
• 86% agree with the proposal that a minimum of 80 per cent of money donated during house-to-house collections should go to the charitable cause. 
• 86% agree with the proposed amends to set grounds for which an application may be refused.  

With regards to street collections: 

• 75% agree with the proposed amends for any one charity/group be allocated a maximum of four collections per year, to provide equal access to all who wish to collect. 
• 87% agree with the proposed amendments to set the grounds on which an application may be refused. 

A report with the results of the consultation was presented to the council’s General Licensing Committees in July 2025. The committee reports included details of changes made to the proposed policy as a result of feedback from the consultation. The Committees discussed the results of the consultation, and a number of the comments received and approved the proposed policy to take effect from 1 August 2025. You can read the comments received in our consultation summary report. Click here to view the Appendix to the report.