Thames Valley Police have released a statement of tribute on behalf of the family of a woman from Milton Keynes who died earlier this month.

The statement was a tribute to Carol Georgiou, who died following an incident on Saturday 2 November in Holywell Place in the Springfield area of the city.

The family said, “On November 2nd 2024, we tragically lost our beloved Carol Georgiou; a wonderful daughter, sister, aunt, and mother. Carol was known for her kind heart, infectious smile, and willingness to help others. She cherished her role as a mother to her sons and brought joy and laughter wherever she went.

“Her passing has left a deep void in our family, and we are struggling to imagine life without her. We will always treasure her warm smile, loving embraces, and witty sense of humour. Our main focus now is on supporting Carol’s sons and each other during this challenging time.

“We appreciate the assistance of the authorities, the public, and our extensive network of family and friends for their outpouring of love and comfort as we mourn Carol’s loss privately. A celebration of Carol’s life will be held in the coming months for close family and friends.

“We kindly ask for privacy as we process our grief and come to terms with the sudden departure of our beloved Carol.”

Thames Valley Police confirmed that a murder investigation is continuing around the circumstances of her death.

MK Dons defender Laurence Maguire was happy to grab his first goal for the club and be the matchwinner as the Dons beat Cheltenham.

Maguire’s goal in the 86th minute saw the Dons complete a comeback to go from 2-0 down to beat Cheltenham at Stadium MK, which in the process confirmed a fifth straight League Two win for Scott Lindsey’s side.

Speaking after, Maguire said he felt an MJ Williams strike that hit him on the way in against Swindon last week could’ve been his, but that he was delighted to now have his outright first goal of the season and looked to push on and score more.

He said, “Obviously, last week’s, I did feel it was mine but obviously it hasn’t gone down as mine and MJ has claimed that one. But today’s definitely mine and I’m off the mark for the season. It’s something I’ve been disappointed with in terms of I haven’t got on the end of enough in the opposition box and I know I can score goals. I pride myself on keeping clean sheets and defending, but I also feel like I’ve got attributes to score goals in the opposition box. To get my first today, I’m buzzing and hopefully I’ll push on and get a few more for this football club.”

MK Dons fell 2-0 down in the opening 14 minutes at Stadium MK and Maguire said that the team knew where it had gone wrong early on, but that they showed good qualities to recover.

He said, “We know obviously the performance wasn’t good enough in terms of the first half especially, but we just needed to add more urgency to the game and make it a bit more scrappy. Sometimes you can’t always play the way we want to play, but massive credit to the boys. The character we showed to turn it around is massive for us and this football club.”

Victory meant that MK Dons also had to come from behind for the third league game in a row, but Maguire gave credit to Cheltenham for testing them while also feeling a fifth straight League Two win showed the progress that the team are making.

He said, “It’s something we probably need to have a look at. I just feel like we lacked a little bit of urgency in the first 20-30 minutes of the game. We probably turned up thinking that we could play our own game but credit to Cheltenham. They came and pressed us really well, went man-for-man and that’s when we need to realise that we needed to make it more scrappy and play quicker. I felt like we played really slow in the first half, as you can see second half, we won a lot of first contacts and went on to win. It’s something we’ll work out, but obviously the main is this club’s won five games on the bounce and we’re heading in the right direction.”

Milton Keynes City Council have announced plans to change the parking charges for council-operated car parks in the city.

The City Council announced that parking charges are due to change in March 2025, which will be the first time they have been changed in nearly a decade.

In a decision next week, the city council is set to change parking tariffs to new fees as follows:

• Two-hour minimum stay period in standard (purple) bays becomes £2.00 (currently £1.00) with the hourly rate after the first two hours remaining at 50p per hour.
• One-hour minimum stay period in premium (red) bays becomes £2.50 (currently £2.00) with the hourly rate after the first hour remaining at £2.00 per hour.
• E1 employee permit daily charge becomes £3.00 for a whole day (currently £2.80) or £2.00 for five hours (currently £1.40). 
• Removal of car share permit and hotel permits due to their limited use. MK City Council will be removing this as they have cited that car share permit applications have fallen by nearly 90% in the last five years.

Drivers will remain able to switch off an optional 20p convenience fee for text notifications from provider RingGo.

MK City Council have defended the move by stating, “The proposed tariffs remain comparable to commercial parking in the city centre, and to nearby places such as Northamptonshire or Bedford, where it’s £2.00 per hour to park.”

In a separate decision next week, MK City Council stated they also plan to recommission its demand-responsive public transport service MK Connect.

This move is because the current contract for this service is due to end in March 2025. MK Connect ensures residents have a public transport option, even if they are not located near a bus stop. It transports riders who are heading in the same direction and connects them to existing bus routes where available. 

Around 500,000 MK Connect trips will be made this financial year, which is around 6% of all public transport journeys in MK; double since the service was introduced four years ago. 

Last year the city council introduced longer minimum stays for both premium and standard car parking but did not increase the hourly tariff for parking in the city centre.

MK Dons boss Scott Lindsey felt his side’s initial performance against Cheltenham wasn’t great but was pleased with impact of changes in a comeback victory.

The Dons fell 2-0 down after 13 minutes against the Robins at Stadium MK, but goals by Alex Gilbey, Ellis Harrison and Laurence Maguire turned the game on it’s head, handing MK Dons a fifth straight league win.

Speaking after the game, Lindsey said he felt there was a lack of quality and speed in their first half work when they fell behind.

He said, “We didn’t play great and showed a real lack of quality at times. I thought first half, we showed a lack of urgency and were so slow in play where goal-kicks and throw-ins took an age. We gave too many free-kicks away then can’t defend the free-kicks properly, which I’ll be putting a lot of detail and work in moving forward because I’m not happy with that.

“I thought we were negative with our play. We had a free-kick in the first half in their half of the pitch, make four backwards passes in it and I just thought we were negative and slow. I didn’t like it in the first half at all.”

This lead to tweaks at the break, with Lindsey making a double substitution at half-time to go with an enforced change after MJ Williams was forced off injured, and Lindsey was happier that the tweaks had an effect.

He said, “I had to make changes. I felt we needed to put players on the pitch with a little more urgency and control. I thought Liam Kelly would give us that and Callum Hendry would give us more of an attacking threat. Joe Tomlinson was struggling a little bit – he has a problem with his heel at the moment and looked like he was struggling so I thought it was only right to make that change. We had runners on the pitch with Alex Gilbey playing wider in the second half and then I had to work really hard to change things, swap things about and use different shapes to get a foothold in the game.”

Victory over Cheltenham was the Dons’ third win in a row in a game where they conceded the first goal, and Lindsey said that the character showed was good but that the team now had to work to tighten up and play more positively.

He said, “We can’t keep doing that because teams at this level of football will punish you. You saw that today. The game could’ve got away from us but it didn’t. But we have to play with a little bit more urgency and a little more forward thinking. I just felt we were negative with our play and I apologise to the fans for kind of watching that as it weren’t a great watch.

“But I do think the character the players showed was brilliant. The dressing room’s really buzzing in there and I’ve just said teams who win titles and promotions win games when not playing well so we’ll take that.”

Lindsey also said he felt confident in his team’s abilities to score during the game, even despite the slow start.

He said, “I think that we kind of looked at them and felt there would be goalscoring opportunities to be presented if we did the right things. In the first half, we were just too slow with the action. I remember there were a couple of times where Scott Hogan ran offside but if we’d been quicker with our decision making to play the ball through, we’d probably have got him in. So we always felt there would be spaces to score and we just kept chipping away.

“We knew we would score today. Even at 2-0 down, I felt there were times we would score. We obviously didn’t want to be 2-0 down, we just found ourself in that position because we didn’t do our jobs on set pieces.”