Support the Oxford Christmas Market

Dear Supporter,

The Oxford Christmas Market is a German-style Christmas Market that was established in 2009 by NiRa Events, a small local business.

The market has been located at Oxford Castle since 2009, however discussions have been held each year with Oxford City Council to host it in Broad Street – our preferred location. Various issues and regulations have always stood in the way of the application being successful.

Unfortunately, despite different marketing approaches and great supporters such as Jack FM, First Great Western, Oxford City Guide, Oxford Times and Oxford Mail the footfall during the weekdays at Oxford Castle remained too low to make the market a viable option for 2012.

We therefore contacted the Oxfordshire County Council and Oxford City Council in early 2012 and handed in a new application to move to Broad Street.

After a considerable amount of work by ourselves and Council officers we were given to understand that our plans had met with approval.

But on 27th September we received an email from the Council stating that our "application has been turned down on the basis that there are no strong grounds to support a move away from the Oxford Castle site."

We appealed against the decision, but were told that it "is the Council's intention to re-open discussions with stakeholders about the use of Broad St for market events and to seek to draw up a fresh agreement with them. But that will not happen until next year (2013)."

After many emails supporting the Oxford Christmas Market, we have set-up this petition to support our final application for next year.

Please support the Oxford Christmas Market by signing this petition if

- you have been to the Oxford Christmas Market in the past 3 years or

- you intended to visit the Christmas Market this year

and would like the Oxford Christmas Market to return in 2013 on Broad Street.

Many thanks!