Roadside spotchecks have revealed one in four vehicles are overloaded in Oxfordshire -- creating a danger and damaging road surfaces. Police and Oxfordshire County Council's trading standards officers found 26 per cent of 239 vehicles randomly stopped
A casual game of football produced an unexpected result when two of the players decided to team up again -- after becoming successful actors. From left, Jason Watkins, Toby Jones and Douglas Hodge Jason Watkins, who recently finished filming for the new
Author and broadcaster Lynne Truss is as amazed as the rest of us at the phenomenal success of her book -- the rank outsider in the pre-Christmas rush which romped home as a bestseller, selling half a million copies to date. And what is its subject? Punctuation
Shopkeepers and residents are being urged to have their say on the use of surveillance cameras to deter trouble in a village square. Posters and leaflets are going out around Grove inviting views and opinions to be e-mailed or posted to the parish council
A memorial is being planned by children and staff for a caretaker at an Oxford primary school who died from Legionnaire's disease. Jim Perry, 61, who had worked at St Andrew's School, Headington, right, for eight years, died from the deadly pneumonia
Hook Norton's Andy Martin is set for a busy time at the Farmers Bloodhounds meeting at Dunthrop, near Chipping Norton, on Sunday. The trainer-rider has several horses entered under his own name as well as a number of rides booked for other trainers. He
Promising front row forward Simon Chadbone plays his last game of the season for Oxford Harlequins when they travel to face Truro in South West 1 tomorrow (2.30). Chadbone departs next week for a two-month trip to Australia and New Zealand, where he hopes
New signing Ryan Fisher's first ride for Oxford Silver Machine will be against his former Coventry teammates. Oxford open their campaign with an attractive challenge match at home to the Bees on March 12. One of the criticisms of recent years has been
Gangs of youths will be thrown out of Banbury's Castle Quay shopping centre if they wear hoods. The centre's commercial director Paul Jackson said that in the past few months there had been complaints that groups of teenagers -- some wearing hoods --
The chances of Oxfordshire's top five non-league clubs - Oxford City, Thame United, Banbury United, Didcot Town and AFC Wallingford meeting in a newly-formed Southern League next season have moved a step nearer. An arbitration tribunal yesterday unanimously
Marty Wilde is more than a musical legend. The man is a pop icon. Back in the fifties, when a dour and drab Britain was still picking itself up off its post-war feet, Wilde and his fellow rock 'n' rollers were laying down the soundtrack to this country's
A lapdance bar owner has failed again in his bid to turn a disused Oxford shop into a hotel. Residents are delighted that Bar Baby owner Martin Forde's plans for a 19-room hotel, with bar and terrace, opposite his Cowley Road bar were turned down again
A lapdance bar owner has failed again in his bid to turn a disused Oxford shop into a hotel. Residents are delighted that Bar Baby owner Martin Forde's plans for a 19-room hotel, with bar and terrace, opposite his Cowley Road bar were turned down again
This is another of Paul Auster's complex, compulsive books -- part detective story, part ghost story; a tale within a tale within a manuscript. Sidney Orr (appropriately named) is recovering from a serious illness. One day he wanders into a new small
Green is supposed to be a soothing colour, which is why theatres traditionally have a green room where luvvies attempt to lift the tension before treading the boards. Maybe whoever was responsible for the partly green decor of the St Giles Cafe also had
THE teenage girlfriend of a man who died in police custody has given birth to his baby son -- and named him after his father. Kim McGrath with Robin Jr Robin Goodenough, 26, died after he was arrested in Alma Place, east Oxford, on suspicion of driving
A new beat officer assigned to a troubled estate at Abingdon said that police intelligence had identified a gang of troublemakers. PC Ian Leese, a former RAF officer involved in military intelligence, is the new officer for the Peachcroft estate in north
Here's something that will give hope to all budding musicians -- and anyone who has ever dreamed of getting a band together and taking on the world. Just over three years ago a couple of lads from Eynsham, near Oxford, got some instruments and put together
Terry Morrisey has dismissed claims that he was sacked by Premier Division leaders Didcot Town. Morrisey, 29, left his home-town club under a cloud three weeks ago, with boss Pete Foley saying he had been booted out for "continued breaches of club discipline
Oxfordshire 2nd beat Jersey 10-5 in Division 2D of the Inter County Championships at Radley College. Sarah Torgersen, Chris Burden, Ian Ross and Daryl Coombes were all unbeaten. Oxfordshire 4th went down 10-5 to Buckinghamshire 3rd, with teenager Hannah
Oxford City boss Andy Sinnott says his side face the biggest test of his managerial reign when they take on Ryman League Division 1 high- fliers Leyton at Court Place Farm tomorrow. But they will have to do it without defender Andy Ballard, who has been
Didcot Town manager Pete Foley has warned his team not to become a bunch of 'chokers' as his outfit continue their push for the Premier Division title. Foley spoke out after Didcot slipped to a 2-1 defeat at Carterton last week. He said: "It's frustrating
Shadow Home Secretary David Davies pledged to abandon the Government's controversial asylum seeker accommodation centre policy if the Conservatives won the next General Election. David Davies with Tony Baldry The MP was in Bicester last night for a Question
SATURDAY FOOTBALL NATIONWIDE LEAGUE Div 3: Bristol Rov v Oxford Utd. RYMAN LEAGUE Div 1 North: Barking v Thame Utd, Oxford C v Leyton. Div 2: Abingdon Tn v Dorking. UMBRO ISOTONIC YOUTH ALLIANCE Merit Div 2: Oxford Utd 19 v Gillingham. UMBRO ISOTONIC
Nikki Chapman, the 'nice' Pop Idol judge, memorably told hopeful Suzanne Carley at her audition last year that she was "a ray of sunshine". Suzanne didn't make it through to the final, but her sunny rays are shining onstage in Grease, the musical. The
The hopes of Oxfordshire scientists and engineers were dashed when Europe's space mission to chase and land on a comet was postponed again on February 27. UK science teams, including staff at Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, near Didcot, designed and developed
St John's College is facing a fresh controversy over the future of the old St Philip and St James school site. The wealthy Oxford college has been challenged by a city councillor and residents to reveal its plans for the site, amid new fears that the
War veterans are rethinking their £3m clubhouse and flats scheme after householders complained it would ruin their view of Oxford's dreaming spires. The Marston Royal British Legion Club is redrawing its plans to build the state-of-the-art new clubhouse
Matt Bound, who could return for Oxford United at Bristol Rovers tomorrow, says he has been mystified and angered by his recent omission. The former Swansea captain, one of the team's most consistent players in the first half of the season, has not featured
Organisations across Oxfordshire have joined forces to launch a campaign aimed at persuading people to take up new careers as carers. The move, led by social and health care staff at Oxfordshire County Council, has been set up to work in tandem with a
Oxford has long been one of Europe's most recognisable movie locations. Thanks to the likes of Iris Murdoch, CS Lewis and -- of course -- Harry Potter, in recent years it has also become one of the busiest. Many of us have become almost blas about stumbling
Joanna Trollope's new novel takes up where she left off at the end of her last novel, Girl From the South, which raised the question of how our personality is influenced by family, and where we come from. Brother and Sister takes that issue and explores
