06/11/2017 Inside Out South West

Hello and welcome to

Inside Out Southwest.

Stories and investigations

from where you live.

This is where we found

Kate back in 1997.

On the trail of his sister's killer,

searching for new clues 20 years

after Kate Bushell's murder.

It's probably the last decent chance

of getting that trigger or that bit

of motivation where people might

have remembered something or some

detail that they could use

to help the investigation.

She was sitting...

Also tonight, it's never too late,

learning to read at 88.

I do really want to read

to the children and I've been

practising very, very hard.

And we all love a Jersey potato

but who ordered the salad?

A carpet of slimy,

stinking sea lettuce.

We investigate the impact

of the island's multi-million

pound potato industry.

I'm Jemma Woodman and this

is Inside Out Southwest.

It's one of the Southwest's most

notorious unsolved crimes.

Kate Bushell was just 14 years

old when she was brutally murdered

near her home on the edge of Exeter.

The case was never closed and,

as Simon Hall reports,

20 years on her family and friends

still hope that someone or something

can lead them to the killer.

For 20 years, Tim Bushell has had

to live with not knowing

who murdered his sister.

My parents obviously shielded me

quite a bit and actually,

looking back, I'm quite glad

that they did.

But at the same time,

whoever did it is still out there.

Today Tim is going to meet

the detective leading

the investigation.

It's probably the last decent chance

of getting that trigger or that bit

of motivation where people might

have remembered something or some

detail that they could use

to help the investigation.

It's difficult in some ways

because you kind of find out

about the brutality of it

and the horrible circumstances

in which it happened.

Nicky Johns was Kate's

best friend at school.

I look at 14-year-olds now

and I try and imagine them

going through what I went

through at 14.

And at 14 I felt like I was really

grown up and I felt

like I was quite mature.

But really you're still

only 14 years old.

At 4:30pm on the 15th of November

1997, Kate took her neighbour's

Jack Russell dog for a walk.

She was seen in Exwick Lane later

but did not return home.

Me and my dad went out and drove

around Exwick to try to find her.

And we came home and

we hadn't found her.

And the phone downstairs

was constantly ringing.

The first time I realised that

something was wrong,

one of my friends' mum,

she had brought us back and I just

went, have they found Kate yet?

And she was just really silent.

I don't even think I remember crying

at the time because,

I kind of couldn't believe

what I was being told.

I think it was my mum who told me

and it was just like, you won't be

seeing your sister any more.

And it was just like,

oh, OK, and like, there

was just so much going on,

I didn't really know how

to process it really.

I think I kind of asked

to be excused and went

up to my room and...

And started crying.

Today we are taking Tim to visit

the police incident room.

Paul Burgan is a detective

superintendent who's

come out of retirement

to lead the investigation.

What we've got, we've got

a dedicated room to Kate's case.

So what we'll do, I'll

take you in there.

Just be warned that it's absolutely

full of material relating to that

incident so I'll pre-warn

you with regards to it because I

know you haven't seen it before.

OK?

Yeah.

Come on through.

Inside are more than 40,000

documents and exhibits.

Paul's got something to show Tim.

Material left by the killer

which hasn't been made public before

and which could be crucial.

On Kate, on her clothing

there were in excess of 100 fibres.

And what we've done is we've managed

to identify that it comes from that

type of orange garment.

And that was predominantly used

in workmen's clothing,

boiler suits, gloves and aprons,

that type of thing.

Because it may well have been

that the offender was wearing it

at the time or he could have been

wearing it before and those

fibres have transferred

onto Kate's clothing.

Paul Burgan worked

on the investigation

right from the start.

Now he has to give it a new impetus.

You basically start

at the beginning.

Did we miss anything

in those first seven days?

Some of the issues that were present

in 1997 are still present now.

The knife used to kill Kate has

never been found but the police have

been able to work out the size

of the blade.

The injuries to Kate were horrific.

Probably the worst single injury

I have seen in 30 years of policing.

This is an example of the type

of knife we would be looking at.

You can see from the blade,

it is at least six inches long,

it is four centimetres deep.

I don't want people to concentrate

on the handle but it's just

the size of the knife.

The focus of the inquiry remains

the lane where Kate was walking

the dog and the path

where her father found her body.

It's going to be difficult but Tim

has agreed to go there with Paul.

It is revisiting kind

of a very dark past.

You've kind of got to sometimes lay

some of your past ghosts to rest.

This is one of the last points

of interest, Tim, really.

This was the lay-by that we know

Kate was last seen in.

She would have been stood

around about this spot.

The police think Kate now walked

down the lane towards Exwick.

A few yards further up

witnesses say they saw a man

standing behind a blue car.

Kate probably saw him too.

That male has never been identified,

he's never come forward.

There an important

unanswered question -

why did Kate leave Exwick Lane

and go down the path?

Was it voluntary?

Did she see something

in the lane that worried her?

Did an incident take place?

Was she forcibly taken down there?

A 14-year-old child, would she have

gone down there voluntarily?

That's the thing we always thought

about in terms of the investigation.

Yeah, she was always confident

and she was tall for her age

which maybe would have

given her false confidence,

but at the same time

it was getting dark so...

You can see our concern

in terms of, you know,

why she would have gone down there.

Definitely.

This will be the worst bit I expect.

Very close to where Kate's body

was found used to be a style.

It has now been

replaced by this gate.

The police found an orange fibre

on the style which matches

the fibres found on her clothes.

We're saying it's been

deposited by the offender.

Really relevant to the case

for obvious reasons so this

was a style and literally Kate's

body was found just inside here

to the left-hand side

in the overgrown copse.

And there's a further important

piece of evidence here at the scene.

A man who was seen running

away towards the houses

at the bottom of the hill.

I know this is really difficult,

Tim, this is probably

the worst part of it for you.

This is where, you know,

we found Kate back in 1997.

We've got the witnesses

from the estate, two individual

witnesses who see an individual

running back down towards the estate

between 5.10pm and 5.40pm.

Again, really relevant

to the investigation and it's

something we still haven't been able

to bottom out after all these years.

She was just my annoying kid sister.

Despite towering over me

for quite a few years.

She would be the one who would often

antagonise me, take something,

pinch me and I would react

and she would just scream

and go straight to mum

and dad and it would be,

like, you annoying little...!

But then the last couple of years,

as we were starting to grow older,

she was actually, instead

of being my annoying kid

sister, she was actually

a pretty cool person.

You could have conversations

with her and we were starting

to like some of the same things.

Yeah, a cool little sister.

Tim hopes confronting his dark

memories of this place will help

produce the lead that police

are looking for.

It's difficult.

It's helping me piece together a bit

of what happened on that day.

They've obviously got a lot

of information there,

a hell of a lot from just that

entire room covered in files.

But they need that kind of,

that clue, that thing that

will point them in the right

direction so they can

use that information

in the best way possible.

20 years since Kate left her

bedroom for the last time,

and her family and friends

are still fighting for her.

It's really important and it's

been really important

for Tim as well as a sort

of cathartic exercise.

Him sharing his thoughts

on Kate as a little sister,

it's been really helpful

for the investigation and I think

it's been helpful for him.

But it shows how much

he misses his sister.

She was never a miserable person.

She always would find

the fun in everything.

I can imagine she would have done

something with her life.

Hello.

Having children and getting

married would have been

amazing to share with her,

and to see her as a mum.

It would have been lovely.

It's difficult in some kinds of ways

because you kind of find out

about the brutality of it

and at the end of this you've just

got to be really thankful of having

had a really good 14 years.

We're lucky to have enjoyed the good

times and I just wish

there could have been a lot more.

And if you have any information that

you think may be helpful then

you can call the police incident

number on 0800 096 1233.

Still to come tonight,

we investigate the environmental

backlash from that most celebrated

potato, the Jersey Royal.

The more chemicals you put

on the land, the more money Jersey

has to spend clearing them up.

Learning a new skill

is always a challenge but how

about learning to read 70 years

after you have left school?

Meet Ursula Shepherd now,

whose lifelong ambition

is to enjoy a good book.

At her home in Exmouth,

Lesley Waller looks

after Ursula Shepherd and Marjorie

McMasters.

We all seem to get on so well

together, you know.

It's just like one

big family really.

Ursula has found care and compassion

here but also the courage

to fulfil a burning ambition.

Ursula told me that she couldn't

read and she desperately

wanted to learn.

Ursula wants to put a lifetime

of illiteracy behind her.

When I was young I was

very, very nervous.

I'm more confident now.

She was obviously I think

in the back row of the class

and Ursula found it very difficult

to learn to read.

She was just missed

in the class really.

Ursula's journey starts here.

She has enrolled in lessons

at the local adult education centre.

When Ursula first came she didn't

know any letter sounds

and she couldn't read any words.

So we have taught her not just

the names of letters but the sounds,

because you only learn to read

if you know the sounds.

Pat.

Fantastic.

H...

It...

Hit.

Good, that was good.

Even mastering basic words

is going to be tough.

W...

Children get reading lessons

every day at school.

They get a lot of input so they can

progress quite quickly.

With Ursula, I only see her once

a week so it's really up

to her to do the work at home.

Can...

Yes, fantastic.

Kit.

As an adult, you need to be much

more self-motivated than a child.

So in that respect I think

it is much more challenging.

H...

E...

N, hen.

Good, brilliant.

Hard it might be but

Ursula has a goal.

L...

E...

Let.

Fantastic, that's really good,

that one gets a tick.

I want to read like,

like a library book.

You know, you go to the library and

get a book and anything like that.

Read the big letters.

Ursula grew up in

Somerset in the 1930s.

At the outbreak of war,

she left school, and that was

the end of her education.

She worked in local factories

and then as a carer for her father.

An individual who can't read

and write is restricted in the kind

of employment they can take up

and these are people who have

often got many things

they could have offered to society.

They often feel that they are not

as good as everybody else,

that they have failed,

and that is a very difficult thing

to carry through your life.

It's Janet Kipling with you and I'm

really looking forward

to meeting our next guest...

Word about Ursula's

story is spreading.

Was school hard?

Yes, it was so hard,

I couldn't read one word.

I was sitting, sitting at the back,

with another person,

and they had a book that they opened

out and I had to turn the pages.

They could read...

But you couldn't read.

I couldn't read any

of the words there.

Education in the 1930s would have

been very traditional,

focused almost exclusively around

reading, writing and arithmetic.

There would have been almost no

recognition even that if you've got

a class of 30-40 children,

that within that class some

of them were not coping.

I watched the people just turn

the pages over and that's all I did.

If you weren't keeping up,

you were the problem as the child,

not the system, and no help

was provided at all.

I think it's inevitable

that there will be older people

who did just slip through that net.

Some of them will have caught up

later but some of them

would probably just have been hiding

it throughout their lives.

What do you think this is here?

What does that look like?

Back home, Ursula's

new skills are helping

with her favourite hobby.

I'm knitting a jumper.

Knit one and knit two last...

One stitch and pass the stitch over.

Is it nice to be able to read that?

Yes!

Yes.

Yes, I'm coming on with this a bit.

Sam is at home.

Well done, that's really good.

In the classroom, Ursula's

doing well and has joined

other adult learners.

She's gone from learning

the individual sounds of letters

to reading words and sentences

and now she's starting

to read simple stories.

The M 5 motor way...

Yes.

And things are getting trickier.

We're doing some simple reading

comprehensions at the moment

and Ursula is finding

those quite challenging.

That is when you have a short piece,

a short text to read,

and then answer some questions

about it and write the answers down.

In...

In August.

Did you like reading this book?

Yeah, I do, yeah.

A few weeks later and Fiona takes

Ursula to the local library.

That one.

Fantastic, well done.

I love it here.

You know, to look at all

the children's books.

But Ursula's not here to browse.

A very special audience

is turning up.

I do really want to

read to the children.

I'm afraid I might make,

you know, sort of mistakes

and I've been practising

very, very hard.

I will...

Not ever...

Never.

Never eat a tomato.

OK.

I have this little sister, Lola.

She hates to...

Tomatoes.

Tomatoes.

That was very good.

What did you think

about Ursula's reading?

Really clever.

Thank you.

What do you think?

Infinity clever.

Infinity clever!

That's a really good one.

What would you say to Ursula

if you were going to give some

advice about learning to read?

Read every day.

Read every day.

Do you do that, Ursula?

Yes.

She does it every day.

I thought it went really well.

Ursula read really confidently.

Really clearly.

And I think the children obviously

enjoyed it which was fantastic.

We had a great time,

it was really, really good.

I enjoyed the children,

the way they crossed their legs

and sat down and listened to me.

She was sitting at the table.

Ursula can really go as far

as she wants with her reading,

it's really up to her.

But if she carries on the way

she is, you know, who knows?

Here's to a wonderful first chapter

in Ursula's very own story.

It will change her life.

It's amazing.

Jersey has plenty of things

to shout about, one of them

being of course that famous spud,

the Jersey Royal.

As an export crop, its value is no

small potato but after 130 years

of farming, what has been

the environmental cost?

Robert Hall investigates.

It's a lovely summer's day,

a bit breezy but just the sort

of weather to attract much-needed

visitors to Jersey's sandy beaches

but this weather also brings

an unwelcome visitor.

This is it, a carpet of slimy,

stinking sea lettuce.

Sea lettuce is a type of seaweed.

It is common on beaches

across the south-west but now,

every summer, it chokes

Jersey's St Aubin's Bay.

Sea lettuce needs chemicals called

nitrates to survive and to thrive

and one source of those

on the island is

artificial fertilisers.

They are used in agriculture

and in particular in the cultivation

of the Jersey Royal.

There are plenty more sources

of nitrates but there is no

disputing that at least some

of the fertiliser used on this

popular spud eventually

makes its way to those unpopular

layers of sea lettuce.

Ironically, a different kind

of seaweed used to be

the farmer's friend.

What the islanders called wrack.

Here it is, tonnes of it.

They used it to fertilise

their fields and help

feed their families.

But these days it's all

a bit more high-tech.

This time of year in

the mornings, first thing,

I'm looking at the weather.

Paul Carre is one of the island's

biggest potato growers.

The chemicals he uses don't

just come with a cost

to the local environment,

they make a severe

dent in his profits.

23 units of nitrogen,

four units of phosphate

and 13 units of potassium.

And how much is this costing

you to put this out?

That is about, I think

it's £150, £160...

Per bag?

Per bag.

And how many bags would

you use in a season?

300.

Right.

So it's a big investment.

Yes.

Paul says he has no option

but to use chemicals if he's

going to stay competitive.

That's the only way we can make

the business profitable, is by using

these artificial fertilisers.

The supermarkets won't pay,

if we go totally organic you get

half the crop and they won't pay any

extra for it.

But all that fertiliser has

to end up somewhere.

And a big problem for Jersey is that

some of it finds its way

into the water supply.

The nitrate problem stems

largely from agricultural

activity in the island.

There is a very intensive growing,

potato-growing season

which is generally between January

and May where we see large

spikes of nitrates coming

into the watercourses in the island

and then into the reservoirs.

It's pretty easy to see instantly

what the nitrate levels

are in Jersey's water supply.

Jersey Water and the government

here produce this online map

and the red areas and the yellow

areas show where nitrate levels

are at their highest.

So if I was to zoom the map

in and we look at an area feeding

into a reservoir here in the east

of the island, we can look

at a particular stream.

So I'm going to choose the Queens

Valley side stream down here.

We can see that the nitrate reading

in that stream is more than double

the recommended maximum.

And that recommended

maximum is 50 mg per litre.

Above this, say experts,

nitrates can be harmful to health.

It is possible, by putting

in a very expensive plant,

to remove the nitrates

from the drinking water,

but then we would have a stream

of high nitrate to be disposed

of from the water treatment

plant which presumably

would go out into the ocean.

It's always better not

to have the problem to deal with.

A recent review carried out

by Jersey's government suggests

that the amount of nitrates leaking

into the water supply needs

to be cut by around 30%.

Since then they have said

they will offer financial incentives

to farmers to comply.

Happily, nitrate levels have come

down in the past year

after farmers trialed

applying their fertilisers

more precisely.

They are very open to ideas

and they would be delighted

if they had to spend less money

on fertiliser, less money

on nitrates, less money

on phosphates, and were still able

to grow the crop.

And could there be a solution that

not only saves money

but is 100% natural?

Glyn Mitchell certainly thinks so.

Once we've taken the soil sample

from a farmer's field,

we will then take a bit and put it

on to the slide which then goes

under the microscope

and we are literally

counting the biology.

Glyn believes the answer lies

in protecting tiny soil organisms

which recycle vital nutrients.

That's a protozoa and what it's

doing is it's gobbling up

all these tiny little things

which are bacteria.

The more we have of these

in the soil, obviously the better

nutrients are recycled,

the more nutrients are available

to the plant, the less we have

to apply synthetic foods

to the plant because mother

nature is doing it for us.

And to provide a natural

boost to mother nature,

Glyn is using tea bag techniques

to make his own home-made compost.

So the compost is full of microbes.

All we're doing here

is we are blowing air

through the net and extracting those

microbes into liquid,

which then can be applied

into the soil or as a foliar feed

to protect it from disease.

Glyn has convinced Paul Carre

to help him prove his theory.

We've got a field right next door

to his farmer's house and his farmer

was growing some of his potatoes

with this compost tea

in his greenhouse and I went

to have a look at them

and I was quite surprised

at how they looked.

So I thought, we'll

have an experiment with this field,

to see if we can make a go

of it like that.

It's March and the early warm spring

days mean it's time to go to work.

Glyn sprays his compost tea

onto the seed potatoes.

You might say I'm mad but you've

got to try something!

And in they go.

Three months later and the compost

tea crop is ready for harvesting.

Paul checks the plants for disease.

At the moment I don't see any

so they're pretty clean.

For the first time, Paul has

produced a crop without the help

of man-made fertiliser.

So the microbes are doing

the job for us which saves

So the microbes are doing the job

for us which saves the farmer

obviously quite a lot of expense.

As you can see, the potatoes

are pretty good.

No complaints there.

The test field is packed with spuds

and they are looking pretty good.

I'm very impressed,

the crop we're getting out

of here and the quality

of potato, it's impressive.

I didn't expect to get half the crop

that we are getting.

Getting farmers like Paul

on board is just one step

in a long journey to sort out

Jersey's nitrate problem.

The message you get here

is really very clear -

islanders are finally working

together to try to find a new

solution to a very old problem.

But the clock is ticking.

The more chemicals you put

on the land, the more money Jersey

has to spend clearing them up,

and unless that solution is agreed,

everyone is a loser.

And that's all from me for now.

We are taking a break

until after the New Year

but we will be back in 2018

with plenty more stories

and investigations.

But from all of us here

at Inside Out, bye bye for now

and we will see you soon.