Archives for News - Page 22
County council calls for extension of bus subsidies
Since April 2020, the Department for Transport (DfT) has paid out more than £ in subsidy schemes to maintain bus services across the country, first under the Covid-19 Bus Service…
XR demos target Council budget
Cllr Evans answers back The Hastings and St Leonards branch of Extinction Rebellion (XRHSL) has been out in force on the streets of Hastings to press anew its demand for…
Affordable housing: council cabinet sets First Homes criteria
Under a government scheme introduced last year, First Homes, at least 25% of all future new-built ‘affordable’ housing units are set to be offered at discounted prices to local first-time…
Green Lights for Brownfield Housing
Total of 361 homes get planning approval at Ashdown and Darwell Close A meeting of Hastings Borough Council’s planning committee last week resolved to grant planning permission for the plans…
Channel crossings: Government and Royal Navy at odds?
According to Border Force statistics, nearly a thousand people crossed the Channel into England on small boats during the first three weeks of January – that’s around three times the…
Pothole Repairs
New contractors from May 2023 East Sussex County Council has announced a short list of three bidders to provide highway maintenance and infrastructure services for county roads from May 2023…
A saga of Norman Road: Kino Teatr loses court battle to Arigato
A claim made by Yuka Yoshii-Viellefon, owner of Japanese restaurant Arigato, for a little under £5,000 owed by the Kino Teatr was upheld last week in Hastings County Court after…
Love Hastings seeks fresh term with reduced budget
Love Hastings, the not-for-profit company which represents town centre businesses through a BID (Business Improvement District) programme, is seeking a second five-year term to continue its promotional and safeguarding role…
Union Council Pushes For Pay Rises
Hastings & District Trades Union Council, which represents around 2,000 members spread over 11 union branches within the local economy, is calling on all workers to put in substantial pay…
Stables Theatre Rides the Storm
By contrast with the travails of the Electric Palace cinema, the Stables Theatre in The Bourne – less than 400 yards up the road – seems to be surviving the…
Electric Palace Seeks Funding After Closure
The Electric Palace cinema announced immediate suspension of screenings last week and launched a crowdfunder appeal on the GoFundMe portal to save it from permanent ; Within 48 hours over…
Gaming to replace retail at former Debenhams store?
Planning permission is being sought from Hastings Borough Council to develop part of the first floor of the former Debenhams retail store in Robertson Street as a games arcade. The…
Making homes more energy efficient
Local cash-strapped home-owners are set to benefit from grant funding from the government’s Sustainable Warmth Fund to make their homes more energy efficient. A group bid by East Sussex County…
Covid update – No visitors, please
In line with national trends, the Omicron variant of the coronavirus led to a sharp rise in positive tests over the Christmas and New Year period in the East Sussex…
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…
Buckshole reservoir works postponed
By Ben Cornwell Major maintenance and safety work at Buckshole Reservoir, which started back in September, has been put on hold until next spring. A Hastings Borough Council (HBC) spokeswoman…
OPINION
A Land Value Tax for Hastings! By Robin Holtom A Land Value Tax (LVT) is a levy on the ownership of land. The amount should depend upon the ‘rental value’…
Claire Carr Defects to Greens
Cllr Claire Carr, who was newly elected as Labour councillor for Castle ward at the borough council election in May, announced last week that she had left the party and…
Channel Crossings: 1,000 arrivals on a single day
Border Force statistics show that, despite the rhetoric of politicians on both sides of the English Channel, passages of small boats carrying migrants/refugees from Europe to the Kent and Sussex…
Sea Change Stripped of North Queensway Funding
The promise of £ of public funds for development of a commercial “innovation park” on a site off the northern stretch of the Queensway link road has been withdrawn. SELEP…
Graffiti and Tagging: Art or Vandalism?
By Suzanne Kelly Public areas of Hastings are being ‘tagged’ – graffitied illegally with spray paint or permanent marker with stylised initials and other markings. Bottle Alley was a recent…
OPINION
Losing our green spaces By Peter Bailey How many more publicly owned green spaces are to be lost to housing in Hastings? Hastings Borough Council (HBC) wants to build 500…
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…
Horntye Park: Housing to pay for sports relocations
Hastings & St Leonards Priory Cricket Club and South Saxons Hockey Club have issued a joint statement in support of the proposed sale of land at Horntye Park for housing…
City of Sanctuary
In 2017 Hastings Borough Council resolved to become a City of Sanctuary in response to an initiative launched by a local community group Hastings Supports Refugees (HSR), which had been…
A Heart-warming Welcome
By Jane Grimshaw Today, 11 November, was a day we were hoping wouldn’t happen. It’s cold here in Hastings but it’s even colder at sea. At around we received 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…
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…
Does HEART “research” breach patient confidentiality?
HEART (Hastings Emergency Action Response Team) has been commissioned by the Sussex Covid-19 Vaccination Programme to contact unvaccinated people in the town to find out why they haven’t received a…
Buses on demand in East Sussex?
East Sussex County Council (ESCC) approved a new transport initiative last week which is set to overhaul the provision of bus services across the county. The council’s Bus Services Improvement…
The Role of Entertainments Manager
By Jason Norman I was born and bred in Hastings (William Parker school). I started working as a disco co-ordinator for parties of language schools kids, became a coach co-ordinator,…
Being a host
By Ben Randall-Smith My wife Andrea and I hosted language school kids in Hastings for 15 years (2003 to 2018). We were renting a six-bedroom house with, during the latter…
This government spouts lies on a life-threatening crisis
Richard Price, HIP health & environment co-editor and writer, specialising in climate change with an MSc in Biological Recording: Collection and Management with The University of Birmingham, explores the current…
Historic churches at risk
Eight churches and chapels in Hastings and St Leonards are among 12 historic buildings and other sites in the borough which appear in the latest “at risk” register published nationally…
Strike threat
Bus services in Hastings face severe disruption over the next month as drivers employed by Stagecoach threaten strike action over low ; According to Unite union, drivers’ pay ranges from…
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…
Lounging in Harold Place
The identity of the restaurant chain which has contracted to take new premises being built by Hastings Borough Council (HBC), on the site of the former toilet block at Harold…
Council plans for affordable homes
At a Cabinet meeting next Monday (1st November) Hastings Borough Councillors will review a plan put forward by its Housing Department to set a target for the the delivery of…
Raining Cats and Dogs
By Ben Cornwell Hastings resident Rosie Brocklehurst contacted the Silverhill Surgery of Sussex Coast Vets (SCV) last month to book an appointment for her cat Pepper, to receive his annual…