The new Brewery field has not long been opened for the public to use as a town centre park with a water feature and a stone crossing (known locally as Tarr Steps), childrens play areas, benches and crucially numerous trees. Today residents woke up to find two of the trees had been vandalised. Mindlessly. And if not mindlessly then in a premeditated way that would have had the intention of killing the trees. Bark had been blatantly stripped from 2 trees in the centre of the park by a youth “looking to be about 11” in full view of residents and of CCTV cameras. Ward councillors immediately launched an investigation. Councillor Brian Smedley (Westover) visited the scene and took pictures submitting them to new Town Council amenities boss Scott Mason who immediately undertook an inspection by tree experts to see if the trees could survive. Cllr Smedley said “These days we’re all of us tree huggers as they’re so important and we don’t have enough of them. But some of us it seems are tree muggers. I guess it’s education. It’s your own world your destroying.”

Fellow ward councillor Tim Mander  said “Hugely disappointed to hear of and see the damage to two recently planted trees which are an important part of the redesigned Brewery Field. Trees are an essential part of the ecosystem and stripping them of bark can be devastating to a tree’s chance of survival. I hope the culprit is identified and is forced to face the consequences of their actions. Such wanton vandalism is unacceptable and totally unwarranted”

Cllr Jacqui Solomon  (Eastover, Labour) will be Mayor of Bridgwater from this Thursday. A keen environmentalist she adds “Very sad to see the damage done to these well established trees. I’m sure that it was only done out of curiosity not malice but unfortunately removing bark in this manner is likely to be the death of these trees. This act that probably only entertained for a few minutes will have sad consequences and funds will need to be found to replace the trees.”