Tag archives for Hastings Pier
WHAT’S ON YOUR MIND?
Letter Hastings Pier Madness Dear HIP Why can’t our local council step in and save Hastings Pier? It seems unwise that this important community asset was sold to Sheikh Gulzar…
A Town Reshaped
HASTINGS PIER The period of striking and complex change that Hastings has undergone over the past twelve years is seen very clearly in the story of Hastings Pier. Jason Ellis…
Not Last Orders Yet
GEOFF MARTIN Fear Of Last Orders erupted onto the Hastings live music scene with all the subtlety of a bar stool lobbed through a window at 2am, at a lock-in…
More Pier News
Gulzar Goes For Gold Sheikh Abid Gulzar, owner of Hastings Pier, has applied for listed building consent and planning permission to erect a new pavilion building on its eastern (lefthand)…
Pier Issued with Revised Licence Conditions
Following a meeting of the licensing sub-committee of Hastings Borough Council (HBC) on 2 September, the management of Hastings Pier has been issued with fresh licence conditions governing music events…
Pier Licence At Risk Over Safety Concerns
HUGH SULLIVAN The future of mass gathering events at Hastings Pier could be under threat when a licensing sub-committee of Hastings Borough Council (HBC) meets on Monday 2 September to…
Pier Company Threatened with Winding up Petition
Lions Hastings Pier Limited, the company which manages the pier for its owner Sheikh Abid Gulzar, is facing a potential winding up petition intended to be brought by former employees…
La Belle Vue: Restaurant on the Pier
STEVEN SHORT When Keir Halliday was thinking about opening her new restaurant, there was one location that was head and shoulders above the others. “I chose the pier because it’s…
Palestine on the Pier to Host UK’s First Heritage ‘Thobe’ Show
Hastings and Rye Palestine Solidarity Campaign tell us about this year’s Palestine on the Pier. Palestine on the Pier, the free cultural festival, returns to Hastings Pier on 4 September…
Happy Birthday Hastings Pier
Steve Peak presents the history of Hastings pier on its 150th birthday Hastings Pier celebrates its 150th birthday on 5 August. It started a new phase in the history of…
Pier Pressure
In HIP 201 we reported on the recent victory in the Employment Tribunal of the former Hastings Pier engineers Peter Wheeler and Daisy Hill in their claims against Lions Hastings…
Pier engineers vindicated at tribunal – but how will £68,000 awards be collected?
After a tortuous legal process, the former pier engineers Peter Wheeler and Daisy Hill have succeeded in legal claims for constructive dismissal brought against Lions Hastings Pier Limited, the company…
Let’s Go Round Again
By Nick Pelling Traditionally, fairground folk have not had a good press. They have generally been seen as travelling types who somehow live a ‘dodgy’ sort of lifestyle. But a…
Time to Go to Market
‘Freedom Day’ has been and gone, so now is the moment to make the most of the beautiful you need a day out then look no further, as there are…
FOOTBALL
Fan Park On The Pier While spectator sport remains largely confined to digital images with limited audience capacity, Hastings Pier is about to stretch those limitations to the ultimate. Its…
Three-Year Lease For Returning Pier Management
James Tovey and Mustafa Abdelhadi, who managed Hastings Pier for a limited season last summer, are back in control under a new three-year lease. The pier will reopen its gates…
End of the Pier Show
Hastings Pier was set on course for a long and empty winter last week when the borough council withdrew licensing approval for several scheduled live and DJ music events. The…
Pier Update:
Council Serves Control Notice, Gulzar Woos MP Following months of complaint from local critics that the owner of the pier, Sheikh Abid Gulzar, and his management company Lions Hastings Pier…
Hastings Pier: King Canute Lives
The operators of Hastings Pier, Lions Hastings Pier Limited, recently posted a sign at the entrance gates stating: “We would like to remind the general public that the land under…
Arts Diary
Beacon Jazz Fans of avant-garde music are in for a double treat at the Beacon in October. Free jazz trio Somersaults are touring their new album ‘Numerology of Birdsong’ (West…
Arts Diary
‘The Holy Rebel’ exhibition at Stella Dore Gallery continues until 20th July. Read the result of our interview with the artist, Rugman. Read the HIP's review here. ‘Sixty Feet of…
Not An Overnight Process
MP calls for an end to UK’s unfair allocation of quota Getting a fairer deal for under ten-metre fishing fleets around the country is “not an overnight process” according to…
An Eco-Warrior is born
Sustainability on Sea (SoS) meets Wendy Goodsell. By Rachel Holtom On weekdays, Wendy Goodsell works with the Parchment Trust, assisting young people with special needs. At weekends her concern is for…
What’s Next For Hastings Pier?
A look back over the twelve months since its sale. By Emma Harwood When the historic landmark was refurbished with £14 million of public, Heritage Lottery and shareholders money, it…
Youth Strike 4 Climate
By Mima Bone Young people gathered in Hastings once again on Friday 24th May to mark the 4th UK and 2nd international Youth Strike 4 Climate. Inspired by activist Greta…
Gambling on the Pier
On 1st May owner Sheikh Gulzar was given planning permission to turn the current visitor centre building on Hastings pier into a “family entertainments centre”, effectively to install amusement arcade…
Pier Reopens: Not Many Hands On Deck
By Emma Harwood Visitors to Hastings pier were able to stroll on the deck for the first time in nearly four months when the gates reopened to the public on…
News in Brief
• On 6th March the planning committee of Hastings Borough Council approved the application made by Sheikh Abid Gulzar, owner of Hastings pier, to erect five sheds on it. Three…
Tax Fraud Office Pursues Sheikh Gulzar
By Emma Harwood Hastings Pier owner Sheikh Abid Gulzar was fined thousands of pounds last week for breaching tax regulations along with two of his companies which had been ‘trading…
Pier Sale: The Reckoning
A formal account of the sale of the pier to Sheikh Abid Gulzar last June has finally been released into the public domain by the administrators of the Hastings Pier…
Friends of the Pier: “We’ll be here when the time comes”
Friends of Hastings Pier (FoHP), the community group whose bid to buy the pier in June was unsuccessful, remain buoyant despite the withdrawal from frontline action of two leading activists,…
Pier Blaze Quickly Extinguished
Fire officers have praised staff working on the pier for their quick response to a fire which broke out on Saturday morning in the Pavilion restaurant. The blaze, which started…
What Lies Beneath: Keeping Hastings Pier Safe
By Emma Harwood It won the RIBA Stirling Prize for its sophisticated, contemporary design last year. Yet almost half of the £14 million Heritage Lottery and other public funding spent…
Pier Plans: ‘Lord’ Brett Explains
Sheikh Abid Gulzar, owner of Hastings Pier, submitted long-anticipated planning and listed building consent applications to Hastings Borough Council (HBC) last week for enhancement of facilities on the pier. The…
Aping Amber
When MP Amber Rudd blogged a video about how all was well with Hastings, a number of residents took exception to her analysis. Local actor Sabina Arthur decided to produce…
SHEIKH GULZAR: The debt gets personal
Sheikh Abid Gulzar, recent controversial buyer of Hastings Pier, told HIP in an interview which we published last month (Issue 106) that he was spending his own ‘good hard-earned money’.…
The Night of 15th June: Pier Staff give their Account
by Emma Harwood Former staff have described how the swiftly completed sale of Hastings Pier last month precluded any formal communication from either the administrators or the new owner Sheikh…
“SHAMBOLIC”
Ten million pound private bid turned down by Emma Harwood The process which resulted in Hastings pier being sold like a “a cheap pub” has been slammed as ‘shambolic’ by a…
Judge a man by the company he keeps
So how did the Sheikh with a string of failed and failing companies get his pier bid approved? “The aim throughout the process was that the heritage asset be sold…
Boycott the Pier in the Hope it Fails Again
I never expected my investment to make a return. It was enough to be part of a community effort to save a historic artifact. There was the added bonus that…