Julia at count
PICTURE: Hastings Green Party

It has taken a little time. Ms Hilton has lived in the town for 14 years, running her own business as landscape architect. She had no previous political affiliation, but became co-ordinator for the Green party in 2015 and stood as a candidate in 2016 without considering that she had a realistic chance of being elected (she hadn’t). 

What boosted the party profile was the proposal floated by a development company the following year to build a multi-million pound marina complex off Rock-a-Nore. This hare-brained scheme, commercially improbable and a potential environmental disaster, attracted initially favourable comments from mainstream politicians of the time – both local Labour leader Peter Chowney and Tory MP/government minister Amber Rudd. It was Ms Hilton and the Greens who led a sustained campaign to oppose it.

A team effort which involved almost every candidate across the borough and many other volunteers

By the 2018 borough council election the marina idea was more or less dead and buried, but the Greens were able to remind local voters of their active role in its demise, and Ms Hilton came within 29 votes of claiming one of the two Old Hastings seats at issue. Last Thursday, three years on and buoyed by a team effort which involved almost every candidate across the borough and many other volunteers putting in time to canvass in this ward, she won her thumping victories.

She is keen to emphasise, however, that in this campaign she and her party were making a positive pitch. “I was not at all negative about Labour,” she says. “On the contrary I put it to voters in the ward that they already had a Labour member (James Bacon) with whom I would work in harmony. This was their chance, though, to get a second voice who would engage with them on key issues when the council did not.”

She points out that some broad ideas which originated in the Green party, such as a green economic deal and the introduction of universal basic income, have gained traction with many in the Labour movement. Whether the current Starmer leadership is continuing in that direction is not clear, but she feels it important to work in a co-operative spirit, and believes that the broad cross-party alliance which exercises power in neighbouring Rother District is working well. 

After the count
PICTURE: Hastings Green Party

At County Hall in Lewes Ms Hilton will be joining up with her fellow Greens to form a party bloc. Although the Conservatives have retained their overall control, she expects that Greens will be invited onto committee posts where some influence can be exerted. At Muriel Matters House in Hastings she will be on her own, facing a Labour majority that has shown itself inclined to maintain disciplined unity against any opposition. How can she affect any change there?

Ms Hilton says that she has already learnt ways of getting things done as an activist outsider. Now she believes she can get herself better informed on the inside. She will have greater access to council officers.  She can share experience with Greens elected onto other councils across the country. 

“All the other councillors, both Labour and Tory, are ‘whipped’,” she declares. “I can make a fuss.”

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 the local elections last Thursday. Neither is at all surprising. However, the ward-by-ward results in Hastings and St Leonards show a shift in allegiances that should warn local as well as national Labour party supporters that their brand is under increasing threat from both Tories and Greens.

Four borough council wards, in three of which incumbent Labour councillors were standing for re-election, were captured by Conservatives. A fifth, Old Hastings, formerly represented by Cllr Dany Louise who had abandoned Labour in 2019, voted overwhelmingly in favour of Greens leader Julia Hilton – the first candidate of her party ever elected in the town. 

After the count
PICTURE: Hastings Green Party

Ms Hilton repeated her triumph by a narrower margin in the county council ward of Old Hastings & Tressell, defeating Labour incumbent Cllr Ruby Cox. Another Labour incumbent Margi O’Callaghan was toppled by Conservative Cllr Marlow-Eastwood in the ward of St Helens & Silverhill. The consequence is that of eight county council seats in the borough, the Tories now hold four, Labour three and the Greens one.

Liberal Democrats enjoyed mixed fortunes elsewhere in East Sussex, retaining their main opposition status on the county council with 11 seats out of 50. However it was a sorry day for them within the borough of Hastings. The party which less than 25 years ago held a majority on the borough council came a poor fourth and last in 15 out of 16 borough polls and seven out of eight at county level.   

The Greens, on the other hand, emerged with four new seats on East Sussex County Council, and within Hastings borough, despite overtly putting their main efforts into getting Ms Hilton elected, made solid advances in other wards too. Marie Jones in Central St Leonards, Andrea Needham in Castle and Ken Davis in Gensing each came second to Labour, polling higher than their respective Conservative opponents. Next time round, which is only a year away for those borough seats that weren’t up for election this time, they will expect to remain as principal challengers with more organisational effort put their way.

The Labour party issued a statement on Monday referring to “the national swing [which] clearly made these elections less about local issues than usual, and this has been a significant factor in the wards where hard-working Labour councillors lost their seats”. 

Council leader Kim Forward said: “We are sad to lose three colleagues but proud to welcome three new councillors, all of whom are women. We are committed to continuing the regeneration of Hastings and to boosting the local economy and welcoming visitors to this most special coastal destination. We will work to attract investment and improve services to the poorest areas of our town.

“Our climate change plan is central to our work across the Council, and we will continue to work with our partners who also deliver key services in Hastings to strive for a carbon neutral town by 2030.”

Meanwhile, the longer term significance of the election results remains open to wide interpretation and speculation. The extraordinary preceding year-plus of 2020/21, dominated by pandemic fears and casualties, social lockdowns and economic meltdown, has been notable politically only for its democratic deficit – a shackled parliament, cancelled council meetings, decisions by fiat at both national and local level. The turn-out of approximately 35% of registered voters in Hastings was only a few percentage points lower than local elections in the recent past, though this one was fought with a minimum of canvassing, no possibility of public gatherings, and very little show of enthusiasm in the electorate. Will some normality be resumed next time round, or is this something like a new normal?

STOP PRESS

Katy Bourne (Conservative) has secured her position as Sussex Police and Crime Commissioner for a third term.

Labour Cabinet Reshuffle

Following the annual meeting of the Labour group in Hastings in the aftermath of the election, two changes have been made in the Borough Council cabinet led by Cllr Kim Forward. Cllr Colin Fitzgerald did not stand for re-election in Gensing ward and has been replaced as deputy leader by Cllr Paul Barnett. Cllr Margi O’Callaghan was defeated in Silverhill by the Conservative candidate Lucian Fernando. Other pre-existing members of the cabinet – Cllrs Peter Chowney, Judy Rogers, Cllr Maya Evans, Cllr Andy Batsford – will be joined by Cllr Trevor Webb, re-elected in Central St Leonards.