There was a touch of Spring in the air last Friday with the weather behaving favourably and the sun shining down on the official launch of the building work in Ongar which will bring the National Centre for Arts Access and Inclusion to the town.

I was honoured to be invited to take up a golden shovel and ceremonially mark the start of the works which will make the marvellous Theatre Resource a nationally known centre offering a programme of day and residential arts courses for people with disabilities and other socially excluded communities.

I have long been a supporter of Theatre Resource, and will watch the progress of this building work with interest. In a couple of years time this disabled-led arts organisation will have improved teaching and learning spaces and a 25 bedroom fully-accessible residential education facility for short weekend or week-long courses.

The building project has the enthusiastic backing of the Town Council and Epping Forest District Council which both passed the plans for development unanimously. It is obviously a project which is going to be vastly beneficial to Ongar and I could sense an air of excitement in the attitude of the guests gathered in the Spring sunshine for the launch of the building works.

Theatre Resource is already one of the largest arts organisations in the UK specialising in this area of work and is the only ‘disabled-led arts’ organisation in the UK to own and operate its own arts education centre.

I believe, in years to come, Theatre Resource’s work will win Ongar an international reputation for its care and assistance to disabled and disadvantaged young people and adults.