Archives for Top Stories
Town Centre to Lose Yates Pub
Yates pub and sports bar, which straddles Robertson Street and Havelock Road in Hastings Town Centre will close permanently from this Sunday 13 September. The lease of the premises is…
East Sussex Highways Robbery
The Independent Hastings Borough Councillor, Andy Batsford, has launched a campaign calling for East Sussex County Council (ESCC) to disclose how it allocates the nearly £1 million in lane rental…
A Very Special Moment
PAUL MCLAUGHLIN Royalty and world leaders may have topped the guest list, but it was the schoolchildren from Hastings who stole the spotlight at last Wednesday’s historic unveiling of the…
Ronnie Scott’s Story comes to Hastings
Direct from London’s world-famous Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club, The Ronnie Scott’s All Stars – led by the club’s artistic director - take audiences behind the scenes of one of the …
BASEBALL: Pirates Play-off Bound
JAMES YOUNG Next Saturday the players and coaches of Hastings Pirates baseball club will wake up to some unfamiliar feelings. Nerves. Adrenalin. Excitement not just at playing a game, but…
Tom Hunter: From Squat to Saatchi
VICTORIA KINGHAM Hackney in East London (nowadays a boho-arty des-res area, affordable only to higher-paid professionals) had a bad reputation in 1997. A number of its 1960s-built tower blocks were…
FOOTBALL: Top of the League
15 August: Hastings Utd 2; AFC Croydon 1 18 August: Eastbourne Town 0; Hastings Utd 2 22 August: Ashford Utd 1; Hastings Utd 3 HUGH SULLIVAN Hastings United have made…
Twins, Cancer, and Comedy
People are often quite curious about what it’s like to be an identical twin. Local sisters Anna and Georgina Lewis have been asked this question many, many times, and decided…
‘Best Seaside Town in England’, Says National Survey
The citizens of Hastings and St Leonards are accustomed to claim extreme highs and lows for their town – most sunshine hours, most creative activity and, at the same time, ‘most deprivation’.…
Shrek The Musical
SARAH MILNE AND OUR ROVING REPORTERS The Summer Youth Project at White Rock has become one of the highlights of my theatrical year. I am always amazed by what can be…
Exam Results: Pluses & Minuses
Figures published by exams regulator Ofqual show that school pupils in Hastings have scored the least number of Grade 7 or above GCSE results this summer of anywhere in the…
Crime Rise, or Better Reporting?
HUGH SULLIVAN A survey of police records has revealed the borough of Hastings has the highest crime rate out of 64 local authority districts in the South East of England.…
Skinny Sunday Youth Fest
HANNAH DEEBLE A fresh wave of emerging talent will take over Studio 27 at Hastings White Rock Theatre on 23 August, as Skinny Sunday – the one‑day festival curated, produced and…
Contemporary up for Award?
NICK PELLING Something extraordinary has happened. Hastings Old Town has reached the last six of a European competition. To be more precise, Hastings Contemporary is the only UK gallery selected…
Dutch toTake the VOC Amsterdam Home?
DAVID EP DENNIS An ever-present reminder of the power of storm and tide for the last 277 years, something sits at St Leonards. At the lowest tides of the year, when the…
Local Pensioners Face 14-Year Prison Sentences
FERDUSARA ALI Two local pensioners, Nina Heaton from Hastings and Mary Law from Rother were arrested outside Westminster Magistrates Court on Thursday (30 July), under Section 12 of the Terrorism…
Reform in Reverse
PAUL MCLAUGHLIN Reform UK has withdrawn its threat to report Barry Ashley, the owner of the Grumpy Cook café in Robertson Street, to the police, along with local Labour MP…
The Pub That’s Bringing People Together
TESSA BOASE Ed Nash and Robbie Ormrod dreamed of creating a pub with community at its heart. Just five months in, the revamped Prince of Wales is proving that their…
World Upside Down
In the space of just over a week, thousands of struggling families across Hastings and St Leonards have learned that the automatic allocation of supermarket food vouchers issued to them…
Protecting our Heritage
JULIA HILTON is Deputy Leader of Hastings Borough Council and the Portfolio Holder for Shaping Places and Regeneration. Here she replies to the recent article in HIP issue 304 headlined…
Shock Closure of Source Park
PAUL MCLAUGHLIN The Source Park, one of the world's largest underground skateparks, has been forced to close its doors with immediate effect due to urgent health and safety concerns. The…
Trunks & Hunks in Hastings
MEL STEEL Cold-water men’s swimming group Trunks and Hunks will be taking their first Hastings dip this Sunday 2 August, meeting at 7am on Rock‑ A‑Nore beach. Trunks and Hunks…
Uproar as Council Scraps Food Vouchers for Kids
PAUL MCLAUGHLIN Reform UK-led East Sussex County Council (ESCC) has scrapped the automatic allocation of supermarket food vouchers for struggling families over the summer holidays. The decision has provoked outrage…
FOOTBALL: Chalmers and Black Return to the Pilot Field
IAN GRANT With preparations for the new season underway, Hastings United will be hoping to banish memories of the previous two, one of which ended in relegation and the other…
Cafes, Castles and Community: How Bunka transformed Hastings’ high-up spaces
ELLA LOWDEN In 2024 the Hastings Independent met with Josh Levy, Tad MacDonald and Celia Farrar to discuss the beginning of Bunka, a collaboration delivering restaurant pop-ups across Hastings and St Leonards.…
Paul Joy: A Boxer Who Went to Sea
JOHN COLE The name Paul Joy is well known in Hastings, especially in the Old Town. Paul has been a fisherman here for most of his adult life and he…
Octopus Rescue: A Sign of Things to Come
PAUL MCLAUGHLIN The Pett Level Rescue Boat team, usually tasked with helping distressed swimmers and vessels, found themselves in uncharted waters on Saturday 4 July when they responded to an…
My Antisocial Town Centre
In this special investigative report, new HIP writer JAMES ARNOLD-HO presents a detailed picture of the acute problems facing businesses and their employees in Hastings’ busy town centre throughfare, Wellington…
Convent Arson
KENT BARKER The future of the former Convent of Holy Child Jesus in St Leonards is in serious doubt following a fire which destroyed a large area of buildings. Photos: Chris Ostwald…
1066 Country Rides Again
KENT BARKER Hastings is expected to rejoin the 1066 Country marketing partnership in the near future. Deputy Council leader Julia Hilton told HIP that they had been in discussions with…
St Leonards Festival Returns
TOBY BULA-EDGE Warrior Square Gardens will come alive on 11 July from with the annual St Leonards Festival and Community Parade along the seafront at It promises to be an energetic and…
Old Town Boating Lake Makeover
PAUL MCLAUGHLIN The Old Town Boating Lake has been a popular feature of Hastings seafront for almost a hundred years. Opened in 1933 to plans drawn up by Borough Engineer…
Convent for the Community
The SAVE THE CONVENT pressure group who want the St Leonards site turned into a Community Village give voice to their vision AI Projection of what the Convent could look like The…
Could a Norman Horse Leap from a Longboat?
Hastings Borough council have declared that this is the Year of the Normans (1,000 years since the birth of William the Conqueror) for which there will be events across Hastings…
Enforcement Threat over Convent Vandalism
KENT BARKER Following repeated incursions and vandalism in recent weeks at the former Convent of the Holy Child Jesus in St Leonards, lead member for heritage issues at Hastings Borough Council (HBC)…
Taken for a Ride
Will Some School Children Miss Out? HUGH SULLIVAN Ever since the British Museum, backed by the national Government, persuaded authorities in France to loan the original Bayeux Tapestry for exhibition…
Hastings Heritage in Peril
KENT BARKER Conservation campaigners have castigated Hastings Borough Council (HBC) for failing to protect the numerous heritage sites in the town. One said Hastings had a “sorry record of failing…
Year of the Normans
FIONA MCGARRY To commemorate the 1,000th anniversary of the birth of William the Conqueror, there will be events across Hastings and the rest of the country from this summer into…
A Taste of Hope
ELLA LOWDEN To celebrate this year’s Refugee Week, venues across Hastings and St Leonards are taking part in a food festival, organised by The Refugee Buddy Project. Recipes of Courage is…
Amici Studio Summer Celebration
Over the past six months, Amici Studio has quietly established itself as a new community-focused arts organisation in the town, delivering free exhibitions, artist talks, workshops, school visits, peer learning…