Tag archives for Paul McLaughlin - Page 3
Hastings is No Place for Hate
PAUL McLAUGHLIN Hastings Town Hall Community Hub hosted a free event earlier this month (9 March) to help raise awareness of efforts to tackle hate crime within the town. Hastings…
DISSENT, DISORDER, DIVISION
Uproar As Mayor Terminates Council Meeting PAUL McLAUGHLIN AND HUGH SULLIVAN The last full meeting of Hastings Borough Council before May’s local elections was suspended and then abandoned last Wednesday…
BOORMAN’S BACK
Former council manager joins crisis response team at Old Roar PAUL McLAUGHLIN Hastings Borough Council (HBC) has set up a dedicated emergency response taskforce to coordinate efforts to help those…
HOMES AT RISK!
PAUL McLAUGHLIN Residents living in Foxcote and Penhurst Close (below Little Ridge Ave) have been forced to abandon their homes as a major landslip threatens to push their properties into the stream…
Independents Party Launch
PAUL McLAUGHLIN The newly formed Hastings Independents Party celebrated the launch of its breakaway political venture with 40-50 people crammed into Mike’s Bar in Norman Road, St Leonards last Friday…
What to do with Dorothy
PAUL McLAUGHLIN A campaign to save the historic fishing boat which greets visitors to Hastings as they exit the railway station has divided local opinion. The RX53 Dorothy Melinda is…
BARNETT’S BLUE MONDAY TURNS GREEN
HUGH SULLIVAN and PAUL McLAUGHLIN The third Monday of January has come to be coined as Blue Monday – the most depressing day of the year in the UK measured…
Council Anger: “They Have Trashed our Town”
PAUL McLAUGHLIN Trust in Southern Water amongst Hastings Borough Councillors has plunged to a new low in the wake of last month’s town centre flooding. At a simmering meeting of…
Councillors Address Safety Issues
PAUL McLAUGHLIN Last Wednesday (22 November), a full meeting of Hastings Borough councillors at Muriel Matters House discussed issues of violence, stab injuries and late night raves. White Ribbon Day …
Becca Horn: a seasoned Green campaigner
In the third of our series of interviews with the prospective parliamentary candidates (PPCs) of the main political parties ahead of the next general election, PAUL McLAUGHLIN talks to Becca…
Helena Dollimore: A force to be Reckoned With
The next General Election is likely to be called within the next 12 months. With the main political parties having now selected their candidates to contest the marginal parliamentary constituency…
Sally-Ann Hart
Paul McLaughlin The marginal parliamentary constituency of Hastings and Rye is a bellwether seat, which tends to elect an MP from the party that goes on to form the government.…
Tory Councillor Jumps Ship
Paul McLaughlin John Rankin John Rankin has resigned from the Conservative Party group on Hastings Borough Council and will now sit as an independent. He will continue to represent the…
Another Knotty Problem for Hastings
Paul McLaughlin Hastings has become one of the worst affected areas in East Sussex for Japanese knotweed according to new data published by Environet, one of the most established Japanese…
Privatisation of Water Was a “Mistake” Says Local MP
Paul McLaughlin Local MP Sally-Ann Hart expressed her “deep frustration” at the poor performance of Southern Water and now believes water privatisation was a “mistake… in hindsight.” In a wide-ranging…
Ambulance Waiting Times Shock
Paul McLaughlin The wait for an ambulance in Hastings and Rye is the longest of any constituency in the whole of the South East, according to data obtained using a…
Tories Lose Majority on County Council
PAUL McLAUGHLIN County Hall in Lewis The Conservatives have lost their majority on East Sussex County Council (ESCC) after being pushed into second place in a by-election last Thursday (3 August).…
Sewage Leak: Pump Up the Volume
PAUL McLAUGHLIN The Pumphouse in Alexandra Park was packed last week (14 July) for a meeting to discuss the recent sewage pollution of the Old Roar Gill. There was a…
Southern Water– Bad to Worse
PAUL McLAUGHLIN It has been yet another bad fortnight for Southern Water. After being roundly criticised (see HIP 228) over its failure to provide crucial data to an independent inquiry…
Southern Water rebuked again
Investigators of town centre floods demand further data PAUL McLAUGHLIN Southern Water has been roundly criticised once again – this time over its failure to provide crucial data to an…
Carers Week: Celebrating Diversity
PAUL McLAUGHLIN The Isabel Blackman Centre hosted the launch of Carers Week last Saturday (10 June), with local MP Sally-Ann Hart and the new Mayor of Hastings, Cllr Margi O’Callaghan, in attendance.…
Tory Fear, Labour Cheer
PAUL McLAUGHLIN It may have escaped the attention of some folk in Hastings, but last week voters across England went to the polls in the largest round of local elections…
May Day Mayday – Public Services in Crisis
PAUL McLAUGHLIN Jeremy Corbyn, the MP for Islington North, was guest of honour at the annual Hastings May Day Workers’ Day March last Saturday (29 April). Several hundred marchers set…
More School Strikes
PAUL McLAUGHLIN Schools across Hastings were once again disrupted last week as a result of industrial action taken by teachers belonging to the National Education Union. The Hastings Academy and…
More Raw Sewage Woes for Sally Ann Hart
PAUL McLAUGHLIN Local Conservative MP Sally-Ann Hart has been forced to issue an apology on the floor of the House of Commons after incorrectly claiming that Labour’s Jim McMahon, the…
The Stag Inn Named Best Pub in Sussex
PAUL McLAUGHLIN The Stag Inn, at the top of All Saints Street in the heart of Hastings Old Town, has been named a county winner in this year’s National Pub and…
Water Meadow
PAUL McLAUGHLIN Local businesses and residents in Queens Road have been left frustrated by Southern Water’s failure to take responsibility for fixing a burst water pipe which has been left…
Hart wins membership backing
PAUL MCLAUGHLIN Following an online ballot of local party members, sitting MP Sally-Ann Hart has been re-selected to stand as the Conservative parliamentary candidate for Hastings and Rye at the…
Battle lines drawn on clean water campaign
PAUL MCLAUGHLIN Government policy and programmes to stem the number of Channel crossings made by small boats of migrants/refugees are likely to be at the forefront of rival claims and…
Council Tax hikes, budgets approved
by PAUL MCLAUGHLIN Hastings Borough Council (HBC) agreed to raise the local council tax by the maximum amount allowed without holding a local referendum at a fiery meeting of the…
Ordinary People, Extra-Ordinary Day
BY PAUL MCLAUGHLIN On Saturday 28 January, the people of Hastings gathered for the annual service to mark Holocaust Memorial Day. The event was part of the international commemoration to…
Bathers Going Through the Motions
BY PAUL MCLAUGHLIN Hundreds of environmental campaigners recently gathered in St Leonards for the unveiling of a mock Blue Plaque to highlight the continued dumping of raw sewage into the…
Losing Hart?
BY HUGH SULLIVAN AND PAUL MCLAUGHLIN The political insider website Guido Fawkes reported last Sunday that the executive of the Hastings & Rye Conservative Association has voted not to re-adopt…
Swimming Against the Tide
By Paul McLaughin The Government decision to slash the funding of its Energy Bill Relief Scheme (ERBS), designed to help businesses with spiralling energy costs, is going to cause severe…
Pickets at the Conquest
By Paul McLaughlin Nurses from the Conquest Hospital in Hastings joined with their colleagues in 55 NHS trusts across England last Wednesday (18 January) to strike as part of the…
Council Plans to Buy Housing for Homeless
By Paul McLaughlin Hastings Borough Council (HBC) has unveiled an ambitious £11 million plan to buy up to 50 properties to provide temporary housing for local residents who need somewhere…
Say Hello, Waves Goodbye
By Paul McLaughlin A former amusement arcade and nightclub in the heart of Hastings Old Town has been sold for redevelopment. The property at 39-41 George Street has been vacant…
From Anger to Action
Local nurses vote to join nationwide walkouts By Paul McLaughlin Nurses employed by East Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust last week backed their leaders across the country in voting to take…
Enough is Enough: Union Demo at Station Plaza
By Paul McLaughlin In a demonstration mirrored simultaneously in towns and cities all over England, more than 200 people gathered at Station Plaza in Hastings last Saturday morning to protest…