What’s it like to be a newcomer in Hastings?
This year has seen another influx of home movers to Hastings, many of them arriving in the summer, in between lockdowns. One of them, travel writer Martin Dickie, arrived in August. Here are his reflections on being new in Hastings,…
Sea Dreams
By David E P Dennis When I was much younger, I wouldn’t return to Hastings Grammar School on time after lunch. When I did finally arrive around , the class would call out, “Here comes King Neptune!” I’d been standing…
Lifting the Ban
The view from Hastings Community of Sanctuary Campaigns Team: Felicity Laurence, Lead for HCoS Campaigns Team, and Jay Kramer, Campaign Lead, Lift the Ban People seeking asylum have been part of our Hastings community for over twenty years, when the…
Tories on Hastings Borough Council vote against Equality
Jay Kramer, Vice Chair of Hastings & Rye Constituency Labour Party and former Deputy Leader of Hastings Borough Council with responsibility for Equality, tells us about a recent HBC meeting at which Conservative councillors refused to agree to a clause…
As we pass through the portal of the pandemic into another world…
People are understandably sick of the ways the pandemic has infected our lives, far beyond the simple impact of worries about health. But rather than turning away, Ben Bruges argues that we need to look at this new world full…
Divining the future
By David E P Dennis In these uncertain times we seem buffeted by events. Covid regulations vary almost from day-to-day. World politics, terrorism, Brexit, chaos in travel and the aircraft industry, working from home, information technology, global warming, sea level…
Hastings Live Music… an introspective
Is it as vibrant and as creative as we think it is? Gareth Stevens and Mike Willis assemble a small group of musicians and promoters to discuss this and other questions. I remember the first ‘pinch me’ moment about my…
Lockdown Blues? Go Easy on the Booze…
By Helen Drake, Co-editor, Features Several weeks ago, whilst relaxing on the beach enjoying the beautiful sunshine in what, at the time, seemed like a never-ending summer, I overheard a man walking by saying to his companion, “It’s usually two…
The Last Gypsy blacksmith The end of an era?
The symbol for the Sussex Weald is an anvil. Many of our woods survive because they were used to create charcoal for blacksmithing, an ancient craft that lives on in artworks and gates and fences. So why is Hastings Borough…
Desperate homes for desperate people
By David E P Dennis People need homes. The Prime Minister says we must “build, build, build” and Conservative Housing Minister Jenrick proposes massive changes to planning law, creating an inexorable juggernaut that will crush the hopes of objectors, as…