Janet Bearman, Green councillor for Town Close ward, has put forward a motion to tomorrow's full council meeting at City Hall calling for more to be done to open up allotments to more groups of people.

She said: “I am hoping to raise the profile of allotments because they seem to come very much in second place compared to the city's parks in the work of the green spaces officers.

“I know there are schools which do use sites but I thought it would be good to encourage more of that. Schools these days are keen to teach children where food comes from and using allotments is a perfect way to do that. It also shows the children they can grow their own food and don't always have to head for Tesco to get their food.

“I have been looking at the sites around the city and one of the problems is that when people first get their plots they are all enthusiastic, but then realise it can be quite tough.

“The officers only have so much time to give support, so it would be good if other allotment holders could maybe act as mentors by offering help to those people, so they stick with their plots.”

Kerry Annison, 43, started up her allotment four years ago and has won numerous awards, including the Gold Innovative Award at Norwich In Bloom.

The former model, who got into gardening when she was diagnosed with epilepsy and was unable to continue working, has a 90ft by 60ft plot in the Mousehold North allotment, complete with a pond, solar panels, chickens and all sorts of herbs and vegetables.

She said: “It is absolutely vital that children get into gardening. There's nothing better than growing some seeds and watching us they germinate and grow.

“Some of my fondest memories from being a kid was in my garden and running around with chickens and yet there are children today that just don't know what that is like.

“My allotment would always be open to any children who wanted to come to see what I do here.”

The Greens will ask for the council's scrutiny committee to investigate the level of resources which would be needed to make their aims possible.

Other authorities across the country have started to offer gardeners a quarter of the normal size plot because a rash of TV gardening programmes led to a surge in popularity for allotments.

But Norwich City Council last year said it had no plans to change the standard size of allotment plots, although it does offer split plots if people think a full-sized allotment is too big for them.

The Evening News reported earlier this month how a spate of vandalism on allotments in Sprowston and Thorpe St Andrew had prompted the setting up of an Allotment Watch scheme to help catch the yobs.

Source: Norwich Evening News