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Our trading standards officers are backing a campaign urging you to look out for fraud this Christmas, and there's lots of advice to help prevent you becoming a victim.
 The 12 frauds of Christmas campaign from Action Fraud, the national fraud and cybercrime reporting service, is highlighting some of the fraud types to be alert for during the festive season.
Stay extra vigilant online, and in person, as criminals will be seeking to take advantage of the time of year while people celebrate Christmas.
The 12 frauds of Christmas being highlighted in a social media campaign are phishing, pet fraud, online shopping fraud, social media and email account hacking, courier fraud, romance fraud, gift card fraud, charity fraud, investment fraud, QR code fraud, holiday fraud and ticket fraud.
New figures from Action Fraud show that these 12 types of fraud resulted in victims losing a combined total of £224 million during the 2023 festive period.
There are lots of ways you can protect yourself from becoming a victim of fraud or cybercrime this Christmas, including:
- Protecting your online accounts by making sure the password you use for your email accounts is different from all your other passwords for online accounts
- Using three random words to create a strong and memorable password
- Enabling two-step verification.
Did you take part in an online survey earlier this year about your relationship to nature and your priorities for helping nature thrive in Derbyshire in the future?
The survey, which attracted more than 1,000 responses from the public, was carried out as part of our work with the University of Derby and other partners, to develop the first Local Nature Recovery Strategy (LNRS) for Derbyshire and the city of Derby.
When published by summer 2025, the strategy will set out where and how nature can be improved and enhanced across the county and city.
The survey results confirm a strong relationship between the county and city population and nature. Some 99% of the survey respondents stated that nature makes them feel happy, and 98% stated nature is important for their health and wellbeing. Local nature is particularly important to 97% of the respondents, and 87% said they had noticed loss or damage to local nature.
In the survey, our own Elvaston Castle and Shipley Country Park, pictured, both made it into the top five of our favourite green or natural spaces in Derbyshire.
You can sign up to receive regular email updates on the project.
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If you live in or drive around the Derbyshire Dales you'll be pleased to hear Oker Road, near Matlock, has reopened to traffic following extensive work to fix a landslip.
The road slipped in January 2021, meaning a diversion of around four miles for local people and the closure of an important route which was often used during flooding in the lower valley area.
Following detailed investigatory work on the slip and possible solutions, as well as work with local landowners, work started to fix the landslip in June 2024. It's taken around six weeks longer to complete due to challenging and particularly wet weather.
Since the landslip in January 2021 the ground has continued to move, and this posed extra challenges to repair works on site, with movement only stopping recently now that work is substantially complete.
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Could you change a child’s life this Christmas?
We’re part of the Foster for East Midlands partnership and together we’re urgently appealing for more foster carers in 2025.
There are more than 3,300 children in care across Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire but only enough carers to provide foster family homes for half of them.
You don’t need any special qualifications to foster – whether you’re single, in a couple, have children or not, rent or own your home, are working or not, of any sexuality or religion, if you have a disability or whatever your background you can be considered.
You just need to be aged 21 or over and go through some checks to make sure fostering is right for you before you’re assessed – and there are all kinds of fostering including full and part-time to fit around your lifestyle, family and hobbies.
Foster for East Midlands – made up of ourselves in partnership with Nottinghamshire County Council and Derby City and Nottingham City Councils – gives carers full training, support and allowances.
Change a child’s life and change yours too. For more information or to arrange a chat with the friendly team visit www.derbyshire.gov.uk/fostering
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Our Deputy Leader Councillor Simon Spencer has set the record straight on our current budget position and says hard work is going on to ensure our books continue to balance.
Councillor Spencer, who is Cabinet Member for Corporate Services and Budget, said he was ‘extremely disappointed’ by recent news coverage suggesting that we were 'edging towards effective bankruptcy' which he said was based on a misunderstanding of our current financial position.
He said: "It is extremely frustrating to read headlines about bankruptcy which quote figures that are simply wrong. These misunderstandings paint a very misleading picture about where we are and I am very keen to set the record straight.”
A report on our financial position for the month up to the end of September, referred to as quarter 2, showed that we were forecast to overspend our £741 million revenue budget for 2024-2025 by just over £28 million, increasing from the £20 million forecast overspend in the first quarter of the year.
The report, which was discussed by Cabinet on 5 December 2024, explains that measures are being put in place to tackle the overspend.
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Would you like to have your say about our proposals for closer working between health and social care, designed to help more Derbyshire residents stay living independently at home?
We already work closely with Derbyshire Community Health Services NHS Foundation Trust (DCHS) to help people retain their independence by helping get people home from hospital and supporting people to remain at home.
We’re now proposing to formalise the arrangement by creating a single service across both organisations, which would involve combining the budgets for assessment and reablement activities. The proposals include potential for the teams to join together under a single employer.
The joint six-week consultation runs until Thursday 16 January 2025, and we’d like to hear your views.
Are you a smoker who'd like to quit? It can feel like a lot of pressure to make the ‘perfect Christmas’ happen, and with the stress it brings, you might feel the urge to reach for the cigarettes.
But you don’t have to give into the cravings.
Christmas can be a great opportunity to prioritise your health and wellbeing, as well as that of your friends and family.
Making the decision to quit for good is one of the most important choices you can make, and every day that you spend without smoking is a triumph.
It’s not always easy, but it is always worthwhile. Support is available in a number of places:
- call Live Life Better Derbyshire on 0800 085 2299
- the free NHS Quit Smoking app which can be downloaded for Android and Apple phone users
- talk to others who are trying to quit smoking too. We offer a private stop smoking Facebook group for anyone who joins our stop smoking service. It’s a place to share tips, advice and support throughout your quit journeys.
It’s never too late to stop smoking… Live Life Better Derbyshire offers 12 weeks of FREE accessible support from qualified stop smoking advisors, as well as nicotine replacement therapy, vapes and medication to suit your needs.
To find out more, fill out our online Health & Wellbeing MOT, or contact the team on 0800 085 2299.
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Here's a reminder that we're asking you to have your say on how our care services could be run in the future.
Find out more and help us by filling in an online questionnaire or attend one of three consultation drop-in sessions taking place next week to give your views or get help filling in the questionnaire.
Last month our Cabinet agreed to a range of measures which will support changes in the way we provide in-house care services for older people. They also agreed to a further public consultation around the future use of some of our remaining residential care homes which is running until Sunday 12 January 2025.
The drop-in sessions are: .
- Tuesday 17 December. Staveley Library Hall Lane, Staveley, Chesterfield S43 3TP. 9.30am to 11.30am.
- Tuesday 17 December. Buxton Library, Kents Bank Rd, Buxton SK17 9HW. 10am to midday.
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