Author Archives: Hugh Sullivan - Page 3
Covid Winter Plan
For East Sussex: Vax and vax again Figures announced last week by the county’s Director of Public Health Darrell Gale confirmed that East Sussex is recording its highest levels of Covid-19…
Newts Way: “A beautiful building but it belongs elsewhere”
Two alternative designs for new housing in Hollington, one for a single three-storey house, the other for a terrace of four houses, have been rejected by majority decisions of the…
Plan B or not Plan B?
Local council and Public Health chief call for cautionary action In September the national government revealed its ‘Plan A’ to combat the further spread of Covid-19 infections. It involved no…
FOOTBALL
Agutter Quits – a retrospective The comings and goings of football managers are everyday news on national sports pages. But the sudden, apparently unilateral, departure of Hastings United manager and…
Tongue Tide
The flow and ebb of English Language teaching in Hastings The national accreditation system operated by the British Council to maintain quality assured teaching standards for English language teaching currently…
What’s going on at West Marina?
Council signs development contract but terms still not revealed After four or more years of negotiation Hastings Borough Council (HBC) has entered into a contract with a company styled West…
How Green are our Councils?
In October 2019 East Sussex County Council (ESCC) declared a climate emergency. It set a target of achieving carbon neutrality from its activities as soon as possible and in any…
FOOTBALL
The 1,000 Mile Cup Trail Hastings United players and travelling fans go to Maidenhead tomorrow (Saturday) on their renewed quest for FA Cup glory. It’s the fifth successive tie in which…
WANTED: Policy to Create Homes
A newly formed campaign group, the Hastings Rental Health Group (‘Rental Health’), is seeking to promote cross-party discussions between the Labour-controlled Hastings Borough Council and local Conservative MP Sally-Ann Hart…
FOOTBALL
United Form Stokes Cup Hopes Both the Hastings United team and their loyal travelling supporters will face the toughest test of their season so far when they journey to Chippenham…
Walking the Old Town:
A Battle of Blue, Red and Green The tarmac yard of the Roebuck Industrial Estate adjoining Old Brewery Yard in Hastings Old Town is the venue for a current legal…
Who cares?
Foreign Recruits Sought As Unvaccinated Carers Leave “Exhausted” Workforce Multiple staffing problems in adult social care in East Sussex were laid bare in a recent meeting of the County Council’s…
Private Housing Boom, Public Dissent
Detailed plans for the building of 151 new homes plus a community centre and major supermarket on the former Department of Work & Pensions (DWP) office-block at Ashdown House were…
Boat People
Political Clashes over Peril at Sea Well over a thousand people – men, women, children and babies – have crossed the English Channel from France on small boats during the…
FOOTBALL
Hastings Notch First League Win 28th August:Ramsgate 3,Hastings United 2; 30th August:Hastings United 2,Whitehawk 0 Hastings United experienced mixed fortunes in Isthmian League encounters over the Bank Holiday weekend, going…
Pride and Prejudice
Why Town Mayor was barred from LGBT+ event Last Sunday’s Hastings Pride festival was billed as a major event in the town’s calendar – the more so because of cancellation…
Let Us Build If You Won’t
Local Labour Party goes national over land banking ‘scandal’ The Hastings & Rye Constituency Labour Party (CLP) aims to table a motion at the national party conference in Brighton next…
County Council Claims Credit For Carbon Drop
East Sussex County Council (ESCC) issued a press release last week headed “Emissions drop as climate efforts continue”. It declared that its own carbon emissions have fallen by over 60…
GP Appointments in Hastings: A Survey
Major discrepancies in patients’ experience of access to GP appointments in Hastings and St Leonards are revealed by an independent survey undertaken by Ipsos Mori on behalf of NHS England.…
No Jabs Please, We’re a Control Group
More than a hundred residents of Hastings who have not been vaccinated in the Covid-19 mass vaccination roll-out have signed up to a digital study programme which will treat them…
Energy Partner Slams Seachange
Sustainable energy co-op company Energise Sussex Coast, which partners Hastings Borough Council (HBC) in pursuing the latter’s net zero carbon target, has filed a formal letter of objection to the…
Body Count
HUGH SULLIVAN reviews The Duke’s Theatre Company production of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet at Fairlight Hall. Down at the Capulet family crypt in Verona which doubles as Friar Laurence’s cell,…
Councillors Clash over Harrow Lane Housing plans: “Ghetto”, “Nimbyism” & “Panama accounts”
Labour and Conservative councillors traded insults at a full (and live) meeting of Hastings Borough Council last week as they debated the council’s plans to build 200 new homes on…
That Penalty Shoot-Out
Roy Keane, never too concerned in his playing career if he took his opponent out along with the ball, opened hostilities amongst ITV’s post-match pundits. Discussing the decision to give…
Guardians of the Night
Council, Police debate conditions for reopening town nightlife As national government prepares to relax Covid regulations to allow the resumption of indoor hospitality without social distancing from 19th July, two…
Landlord Licence Scheme Discarded
In what lead housing councillor Andy Batsford describes as “a massive dark and backwards step in the protection of our local families”, the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and…
“Fuller Must Fall”
Anti-racist campaigners seek biography ‘rewrite’ 1066 Country’s official website for tourism and travel information describes Fuller’s Follies, bizarre brick and stone structures erected in and around the village of Brightling…
Targeting The Unvaccinated
Council Urges “More Personalised Approach” According to figures supplied by the Sussex Health and Care Partnership, the percentage of over 50s in the county who had been jabbed at least…
72 flats proposed for Ocean House
The freehold owners of Ocean House, the 13-floor office block which towers over Warrior Square railway station, have submitted plans to Hastings Borough Council to convert all but the bottom…
Indoors versus Outdoors: the Cultural Impact
Last Monday 21st June was supposed to be the day that all coronavirus restrictions were lifted in England – dubbed “Freedom Day” by mainstream media ; The extension for another…
CRICKET
The Finch Factor 12th June:Hastings & St Leonards Priory 250-8; Haywards Heath 224-9 19th June:Brighton & Hove 181; Hastings & St Leonards Priory 104 The Hastings side remains with only one…
To Spray Or Not To Spray?
Councils clash on streets of Hastings East Sussex County Council’s continued use of the weedkiller glyphosate on the streets of Hastings has come under fire from Hastings Borough Council. The…
Fear of Democracy?
Dissident Voices But No Council Debate On 6th May, 23,067 residents of Hastings voted in borough council elections, advised by each of the competing parties on the importance of their…
TENNIS: Mission Accomplished
Doug Keen, the charismatic American who doubles as Calvary Chapel minister in Silverhill and Amherst club tennis coach, will be returning to his native country next month after 21 years…
Julia Hilton: Green Shoots
“I would vote Green, but you don’t stand a chance”. Green party canvassers have heard this response on doorsteps so many times in past elections, both national and local. Those…
Harrow Lane Building Plans Rejected
On 28th April Hastings Borough Council planning committee narrowly rejected, by five votes to four, an application for permission to build 67 housing units on land at the corner of…
Labour Wounded
Tories & Greens Advance The Conservatives have renewed their overall majority on East Sussex County Council and Labour retained control of Hastings Borough Council: those are the headline outcomes from…
CRICKET
Old and New at Horntye Grassroots sport was effectively halted in the first months of this year, wiping out the season’s schedules for football, rugby and other winter games. But…
Ore Library Restoration Day
Tomorrow (Saturday 1st May) at 10am, Ore Library will reopen its doors to the public, almost three years since their closure by East Sussex County Council (ESCC) in May 2018.…
The Faceless Election
Next Thursday 6th May will witness the widest-ranging local election ballot in Hastings in modern ; All 50 seats on East Sussex County Council, including eight wards of the borough…