Following intended local government reorganisation, a future unitary council – whether it administers the whole of East Sussex or some other territory – will assume responsibility for the services currently performed by Hastings Borough Council (HBC): dealing with waste and recycling, street cleaning, housing, environmental health, planning, licensing etc. But what about the land, buildings and physical assets which the borough council owns?

As former HBC leader Peter Chowney points out in Our Town, Our Council on page 9, there are many industrial estates and retail parks owned by the council which bring in substantial income. On the other hand, current Deputy Leader Cllr Julia Hilton told the full meeting of councillors on 14 January that, whatever the future of the council, “one thing is clear that people really care about: what happens to local land assets, including community buildings, historic buildings, leisure centres, and our green spaces. Will these be a focus in a much larger and probably overstretched council to give true care and consideration to things like our parks and community spaces?”

Cllr Hilton went on to argue that the borough should protect its interest in these assets by taking steps to set up a town council that would survive the reorganisation. More sceptical onlookers might wonder how much care and consideration is currently being given by HBC to a number of these assets that seem to have been consigned to a deep freeze.

AZUR

The freehold of the Azur Marina Pavilion on St Leonards seafront is owned by HBC, with a long lease granted to Sea Change Sussex. Nearly £2 million of regeneration money was spent two decades ago building a restaurant and bar above the older sun lounge and café on the lower promenade, and turning the lounge into a conference centre and other function rooms. But three successive operating companies struggled to make it profitable, each failing to pay due rent to Sea Change. It was repossessed in January 2024, and has been left empty for the past two years.

Some needed roof repairs were carried out in 2024, and Sea Change reported in June of that year that up to 11 potential operators had expressed an interest in taking a fresh lease. At one point the agents instructed to market the premises, Fleurets, marked it on their website as “Sold subject to contract”. However, it emerged that there were more complex issues with the mains electrical supply which is shared with the wider Marina Foreshore complex administered by HBC, including the neighbouring sailing club, public toilets, workshop and car park. HBC agreed with UK Power Networks, the monopoly network operator, that the latter would lay a fresh cable under the street, and its spokesperson admits that it received the money to do this in March 2025. But it avoided undertaking excavation works “during the summer holidays season”, and although a new electrical kiosk was installed in October, enabling HBC to proceed with internal re-wiring, the new cable has still not been energised.

In the meantime, the fabric of the building is suffering from another winter of damp, rust and storm damage, both inside and out.

ST MARY IN THE CASTLE

The former church and arts venue has been empty since November 2022 when the previous leaseholder trust handed it back to HBC. Ambitious ideas to use Town Deal funds to develop it as a potential reception area to be linked with Hastings Castle by a lift or escalator were rejected. More recently, it has been added to Historic England’s Heritage at Risk Register in the hope of attracting national rescue funding.

Two months ago – i.e. three years after it was vacated – HBC launched a formal Expression of Interest process “to identify a new partner, operator or consortium to take forward [its] revitalisation”.

Submissions closed on 15 December. It’s understood that one proposal is to turn the venue into a music resource centre with rehearsal and recording facilities. The council has not made any comment since then on what responses it has received in this process, though Deputy Leader Cllr Julia Hilton told the cabinet in January that the council would need to put money into a long-term strategy to save it.

THE OLD BATHING POOL, WEST ST LEONARDS

The site of the former bathing pool at West Marina, owned by HBC, was earmarked for a mix of housing and leisure use regeneration in the local plan of 2015. In October 2021 HBC granted a 250-year lease for this purpose to West Marina St Leonards Limited (WMSLL), a subsidiary of national developers County Gate Properties. Neither the council nor the developer has been willing to disclose the lease terms.

Following a lengthy period of ground surveys (assessing, among other things, the extent and quality of Southern Water tanks and pipes under the surface), WMSLL’s plans were exhibited as part of a pre-planning public consultation in April 2025. Detailed drawings and visual projections revealed their intention to build more than 150 new homes on the site. They have met vigorous opposition in the form of West St Leonards Neighbourhood Forum, local community activists who last year mounted a counter-exhibition proposing that the eastern end of the site be developed as a leisure destination with low buildings (if any), play and garden areas, and potential for a tidal pool or on-land lido.

No formal planning application has been forthcoming in the nine months since.

Assets Beyond the Council’s Remit

In fairness to HBC, however, there are plenty of other community and heritage assets of the town where needed development has also stalled or seems to be moving at a glacial pace. What might a Town Council do about these?

FORMER DEBENHAMS BUILDING

The building which formerly accommodated Debenhams at 1-3 Robertson Street in the town centre was bought in January 2020 by Moxie Management Two, a company owned by two sisters, Bella Landen and Sophie Hubble. It was dilapidated when they took it over, and renovated with the aid of public funds from the Town Deal. Part (over three floors) was – and remains – let to Freedom Works as office space; the rest, notoriously, to the ill-fated and short-lived Owens entertainments venture. Following the Owens collapse in September 2023, Moxie Management has indicated that it plans to sub-divide that part of the premises to accommodate a variety of commercial activities which may include retail and/or restaurant uses. A recent licence application was granted for a sports bar. Earlier this month Ms Landen told HIP that they “are exploring/working on a couple of potential opportunities for the site”. It seems improbable that any activity will be up and running there in the immediate future.

SUSSEX EXCHANGE

The Sussex Exchange was developed with public funds by Sea Change Sussex as a restaurant, bar, conference centre and restaurant centre on a 1.6-acre site off Queensway. It opened in 2012. Situated near the junction with the Combe Valley link road to Bexhill, it was aimed to serve other prospective regeneration developments in this hinterland area, but few of these have come to fruition. In July 2024 the operating company went bust owing large amounts of tax and rent. After remaining empty for a year, it was announced that it had been sold “to a local manufacturing company” on long lease, but there has been no indication of any commercial activity being conducted at the site over the last six months. A spokesperson for Sea Change told HIP this month that the new leaseholder “is expanding and seeking additional premises for research, development, training and conferencing purposes,” but is still declining to identify itself.

CLIFTON COURT

The block of 53 flats owned by housing association Orbit at the top corner of Cornwallis Gardens remains vacant more than four years after its tenants began to be decanted for prospective redevelopment. In the summer of 2024, it was briefly occupied by campaigners in the name of Housing Rebellion protesting at its being kept empty. A spokesperson for Orbit stated in April last year that demolition and rebuilding options were being discussed “in a working partnership with Hastings Borough Council”. Earlier this month another spokesperson insisted that Orbit is “committed to continuing to deliver new affordable homes across the Borough” and that it is “continuing to engage with the local authority to ensure delivery of as many affordable homes as possible to meet local housing needs and support the local authority’s housing strategy.” The council has offered no comment save that it “hasn’t seen any plans.”

HASTINGS PIER

As is well-known, this historic landmark was refurbished a decade ago with £14 million-plus of Heritage Lottery funds and local shareholder contributions, winning the RIBA Stirling Prize for best new building of 2017 (notwithstanding its 1872 substructure). It went bust the following year and was sold off by insolvency administrators Smith & Williamson to Eastbourne entrepreneur Sheikh Gulzar for all of £60,000. By way of justification, the administrators stated that out of the bids received, including from the community group Friends of Hastings Pier (FoHP), Mr Gulzar had demonstrated the best immediate finance capability: “It is anticipated that significant cash for working capital and investment purposes, amounting to over a million pounds, would be required to make the pier sustainable.”

In the seven and a half years since, no substantial investment has been forthcoming. Basic retail sheds were installed with temporary planning permission that has expired along with gold-painted décor that had none. Events have been limited to outdoor hospitality in summer, regularly falling foul both of licensing conditions and inclement weather. Maintenance of the substructure appears to have been minimal, the original engineers having been swiftly (and unlawfully) disengaged.

The pier has been registered by FoHP as an asset of community value and, when Mr Gulzar gave notice last October that he intended to put it up for sale, this triggered a six-month moratorium. MP Helena Dollimore claimed three months ago to have organised a meeting with local councillors and community organisations – “We are all united in our goal of ensuring that the pier is a valuable community asset for generations to come.” – but there has been little indication so far of any attempt to rally fresh public enthusiasm or raise public funds. Asked for a comment earlier this month, a spokesperson for FoHP said: “We are continuing to explore options.”

On the Hastings Town Deal website, the project entitled Hastings Castle World Heritage Destination is still described as “our flagship signature project for the whole Hastings Town Investment Plan”. 

The stated aim remains to transform the castle from “a neglected, inaccessible ruin” into “a modern interpretative attraction” targeting 250,000 visitors a year compared to a pre-Covid average of 30,000.

In June 2021, the Department of Levelling Up (DLUHC), which is providing the funds and monitoring their allocation, confirmed the £24.3m Town Deal award to Hastings. Of this, £3.5m was allocated towards an originally estimated project cost of £5.65m for the castle. The balance of £2.15m was initially shown as being provided by “matched funds” from Historic England and other contributories.

A business case was subsequently formulated and approved – by the Town Deal Board’s Investment Panel in January 2023 and by DLUHC some weeks later. However, Historic England have denied that they ever agreed to match-fund development proposals. Their role is only to administer applications received for Scheduled Monument Consent, which would be required for any renovation work at the site. Nor have any other contributors of funds been identified as coming forward. 

WEST HILL CAFE

On the other hand, Hastings Borough Council (HBC) announced last October that it had repossessed the West Hill Café, adjacent to the castle site, and was calling for Expressions of Interest from “experienced developers and operators” to put forward ideas and proposals “to restore the West Hill Café to its full potential” as part of the Town Deal Castle project. On 22 November, HBC’s then Health and Culture portfolio holder Andy Batsford told a meeting of the full council that 25 bids from national and local businesses had already been received, including plans to transform the landmark site and link it with St Mary in the Castle at the bottom of the Castle cliff.

What happened to these bids? Cllr Batsford is no longer at the helm, and no explanation has been offered. Instead, on 25 March, HBC announced a new initiative in the form of a Request for Proposals: they seek “an experienced partner within the Cultural Assets sector” to redevelop and re-purpose the West Hill Café, which remains vacant. The aim, it’s said, is to provide a “quality food and beverage facility as well as a springboard for innovative education and experience telling the story of Hastings Castle”. 

HBC’s press release continued: “Proposals should also incorporate access improvements to Ladies Parlour, with improved setting and landscaping of the surrounding castle grounds, acknowledging and enhancing the existing biodiversity of the site.”

FUNDING POT REDUCED

A spokesperson for the council has explained subsequently that “the funding mix and levels for the project will be changing” in the wake of responses to the Request, which must be received by 3 June. It was admitted that the overall funding pot was likely to be less than the original business case, and that “there are no other sources of public funding to match against the £3.4m [sic] Town Fund monies for the project at present. Once a new delivery partner has been agreed, HBC will be submitting a project change request to DLUHC for approval. This will cover all financial changes in the project scope and delivery”.

This itself demands some explanation. In the spring of 2023, a scheme was put to the Town Deal Board to repurpose St Mary in the Castle as the main visitors’ entrance to the castle above, connected by a lift or escalator up the rock face. This was reported at a Board meeting as “considered” by its Investment Panel, but rejected on the ground that DLUHC would regard it as a “new project”, excluded from benefiting from the £24.3m overall award. So what is not “new” about the latest intended project changes?

Café Dereliction 

Hastings Borough Council has confirmed that the West Hill Café will remain vacant pending its likely demolition in the autumn as part of the Castle Project redevelopment.

It was repossessed from its previous tenant last October “in a terrible and dangerous state including rotting floors”, according to an HBC source. Apparently it would require so much work to make safe that even a pop-up café operating over the summer months would be wholly unviable.

HBC has declined to make any comment upon why and how its Estates Office, as landlord of the premises over several years, allowed them to fall into this condition. 

East Sussex County Council, our Transport Authority, is planning for the future with its Local Transport Plan 4 (LTP4), Town Deal money is going to be invested in the town centre and ESCC are consulting us for our opinions on both.

At the same time Levelling Up money may soon be invested in making better use of the station forecourt, Queensbury House, Priory Street and Priory Quarter, including the multi-storey car park, and Stagecoach are looking to invest in lovely electric buses for towns which give them less congested routes to run on. 

It would be nice if Hastings residents’ and businesses were to take advantage of this confluence and respond to both consultations with an eye to making Hastings lovely and healthy to live in and a 21st century tourist destination – rich in things to see and do but also clean, bright and easy to get to and through…mostly without a car. Hastings Sustainable Transport Forum is ambitious for improvements and hope you are too. 

See the Hastings Town Centre and Green Connections design-map: 

If Hastings Town Centre is to be made like a new Town Park, connected to the sea, then its connections to the rest of town have to be part of the project. 

Arup have made it look lovely in the pictures, but it’ll be much less lovely once built if buses and very large delivery lorries are still routed to drive through the middle of it. 

Better would be to route the buses and lorries round the outside with unloading bays and bus stops within easy reach. For people with luggage or just not up for the walk – a light electric shuttle could run ceaselessly between seafront and station.

If buses were to drive out of the station to Devonshire Road, South Terrace and Queens Road, then they’d be faster and more enticing to use if car through-traffic no longer used the centre of town but only came as far as Priory Meadow Shopping Centre car park and Morrissons which would leave Queens Road traffic-free except for buses – which would be fantastic for footfall and spend in the shops.

If buses direct from the station only go east and buses going west use the Cambridge Gardens-Priory Street loop instead, then the walk from the station could be on a path through a new station garden, over a single-width road, to park-like Havelock Road, Town Centre and the sea. 

See 6 Hastings Bus Loops design-map:

Town bus routes could also be reviewed – we suggest 6 two-way loop services with all Borough residences and destinations within a ten-minute walk. Stagecoach, of course, would only be able to afford to run that pattern of service if the LTP4 provides for quiet roads, bus-only lanes and bus-priority traffic lights to give buses an advantage – and thus enough passengers to make them pay. 

See Hastings Smart Transport Network design-map:

For cars to have good through routes plus ‘access’ it would help to have the buses use other roads where possible, to have safe cycle routes so cycling can replace some car journeys and better walking pavements and crossings, so walking becomes a pleasure rather than a chore.

Tell ESCC what you’d like – deadline Feb 25th for the LTP4 and March 1st for the Town Centre. Don’t hold back!

https://consultation.eastsussex.gov.uk/economy-transport-environment/hastingsgreenconnections/consultation/

For the whole Hastings Sustainable Transport LTP4 consultation advice and link:

https://www.transitiontownhastings.org.uk/category/minutes/

For the 10 steps

https://www.facebook.com/hastingsurbanbikes

HUGH SULLIVAN

The cabinet of Hastings Borough Council (HBC) met on 6 November to debate a very mixed financial agenda. They were reviewing a latest update of the various projects within the £24.3 million Town Deal programme currently going forward, and went on to contemplate the prospect of receiving £40m of further levelling up awards to be bestowed upon Hastings from central government coffers over the next ten years. 

But they were also on the receiving end of two sobering reports from the council’s Chief Finance Officer, Kit Wheeler. A Medium Term Financial Strategy report which he presented to them shows a forecast £13.8m cumulative shortfall between council income and expenditure between now and March 2027, including £4.3m in the current financial year, described as “completely unsustainable for the future going concern of the council”. A declaration of insolvency would be unavoidable without substantial spending cuts and/or sales of capital assets to bridge the deficit.

Leader Paul Barnett began the meeting by reversing the order of agenda items, he said, to accommodate the majority in the public arena who had come to hear debate on the Town Deal programme. So the positive news came first. It was announced last month that Hastings would receive a further £20m to be spent on capital projects as a partner in the Levelling Up Partnership scheme promoted by DLUHC (Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities), plus another £20m spread over ten years as one of 55 towns to benefit from Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s Long Term Plan for Towns. Deputy leader Cllr Maya Evans, who is the council’s portfolio holder for Regeneration, told her colleagues that the £10m allocated for the garden town project from Town Deal funds is just “phase one”.

She spoke of the garden town regeneration covering an area of the town centre “two or three times bigger than what we plan at the moment,, and described it as “now a £100 million project”. To get to this figure she said that ”we’ll do our best to claw funding wherever available”. She made strong suggestions that Southern Water should be first in line to contribute.

“Housing, health and culture are the lynchpins which will inform our levelling up projects,” Cllr Evans concluded. “Hastings is transforming, and everyone needs to benefit… It’s a turning point in history, a really big step for the town.”

Fellow cabinet members piled in with enthusiastic support. Cllr Barnett described the current town centre as “awful” but assured his listeners that it “will look completely different in a couple of years time”. Cllr Andy Batsford said that this kind of transformation “is what we get involved in local politics for”. Cllr Judy Rogers seconded Cllr Evans’ motion “to continue to progress the implementation” of all Town Deal projects. It was universally approved.

BUDGET DEFICITS

Then came the presentation of the two reports outlining the council’s financial predicament. An immediate monitoring survey showed that HBC is now heading for a total overspend of £3.4m on its current year budget (which already anticipated a £0.9m deficit) as a result of the rise in homelessness coupled with salary increases across all departments in line with a nationwide local authority pay settlement. Recently appointed Head of Housing Chris Hancock told the cabinet that the trend of people needing temporary accommodation had “stabilised” but that development sites for new housing had been delayed – viz. at Harrow Lane – so that “we won’t make our target”. 

Mr Wheeler went on to present the red-ink figures for the following three years amounting to the cumulative total of £13.8m. “It’s a very big deficit we need to address.”

Cllr Barnett commented that councils all over the country had “lived in hope” for more than ten years – “those hopes have been dashed.”Hastings, he said, had “become a popular location as a creative, exciting and ‘dressing-up’ town”, but that success had itself produced a housing crisis, exacerbated by the government’s failure to stop evictions under Section 21 of the Housing Act. “I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s time to be really pessimistic… We’re not going to be bailed out. We have to take responsibility.”

A motion was passed under which the council is to halt any capital expenditure that isn’t a statutory responsibility or will lead to demonstrable revenue savings. It will look to identify further capital assets to be sold off. Savings in service costs will need to found so as to balance the budget, with a focus on reducing expenditure on temporary housing. 

Full Council should “note the actions to address the budget deficit and, if no conclusive savings [are] identified, that the issue of a Section 114 notice [a formal declaration of insolvency] will take place in 2024/25”.

So bloom or bust? Or both?

Provisional Town Deal projects to redevelop the Priory Street car park and the west wing of the Priory Meadow Shopping Centre were withdrawn at the end of the year resulting in a surplus figure of £6.9m to be reallocated between other projects.

As reported by HIP back in February, a community consortium promoted by Hastings Commons and Hastings Creatives saw an opportunity arising from this prospective reallocation to submit a scheme that would expand the existing Castle project – still described by the Town Deal website as the “flagship” of its overall programme – to include redevelopment of St Mary in the Castle. Under the scheme, this arts venue, once a church within the castle walls before its rock base crumbled, would become the main visitors’ entrance to the castle, connected by a lift or escalator up the rock face. 

 It was reported to a meeting of the Town Deal Board last Thursday (27 April) that the merits of this scheme had been “considered” by its investment panel, but that “clear guidance was given” (it’s not explained by whom) that it would be treated by the Department of Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC) as a “new project”, excluded from benefiting from the £24.3m overall award to Hastings. DLUHC were said to have confirmed this later in February. Instead, the whole of the £6.9m was to be re-directed to the existing Public Realm and Green Connections (PRGC) project, thus increasing the latter’s overall budget from £2.9m to £9.8m. It seems that this alternative expansion, though apparently transformed in scope by the reallocation, was not classed as “new”, because the original scheme designed by consultants Arup had budgeted for up to £10m expenditure.

“Quite in the dark”

The PRGC project is led by East Sussex County Council (ESCC) as highways authority for the streets affected. Board members complained to co-Chairs Graham Peters and Carole Dixon that the Arup designs for it were given to ESCC over a year ago but have never been displayed either publicly or even confidentially to Board members. Jess Steele took no issue over the rejection of the St Mary scheme, notwithstanding her personal involvement in it. She did, however, question the lack of transparency in relation to the favoured project. “I’d really like to see the initial designs,” she said. “I’m aware that Arup has worked on it for quite a long time. There must be some interesting stuff – maps, pictures, precedents, what’s inspired it…This is a big amount of money, it’s our major project, and yet I feel really quite in the dark about what it actually involves. That doesn’t feel very comfortable.”

John Bownas of Love Hastings, another Board member, was equally critical. “Most of us still haven’t had a sight of [Arup’s document]. I’ve got no idea what’s in it, and yet we’ve got to sign off millions of extra pounds to deliver it. I just feel we’ve been kept in the dark”.

Ian Sycamore, External Funding manager at Hastings Borough Council (HBC) and seemingly a member of the Town Deal investment panel, replied: “Now that the project seems to have been established, we’ll work on that. We could bring something to the next Town Deal Board meeting.”

HUGH SULLIVAN

There’s been a major upheaval in the management of OWENS, the entertainment centre opened last November in the former Debenhams store on Robertson Street. Graham Owen, a Sussex businessman who gave his name to the brand and was co-director of the company C&O which owns it, found his directorship removed in March by its shareholders. His wife Debbie, who was CEO of the company, resigned last month. Financial manager Justin Manning has also been removed from his post.

Replacing Mr Owen on the company board is the ‘C’ of C&O, Lubov Chernukhin, a former banker, whose husband was Russia’s deputy finance minister two decades ago. Mrs Chernukhin herself is seriously rich, identified in a Chatham House report in December 2021 as having given £2.1m to the Conservative Party – the highest figure of any female donor – and having purchased a property in Regent’s Park, London for £100m. In 2014 she famously paid £160,000 to play tennis with Boris Johnson, then London mayor.

Apart from the financial and political tittle-tattle, why is the internal management of a private company offering “family-friendly” entertainment a matter of concern to the citizens of Hastings? Because less than a year ago C&O, in partnership with a separate company Moxie Management Two Limited (MM2) which had bought the freehold of the former Debenhams premises, obtained a grant of £400,000 out of Hastings Town Deal funds – money which could otherwise have been applied to other town centre programmes. 

“Immersive experiences”

At that point the entertainment centre was already in the course of development by these companies. Their application was to extend its output over further floor space and to broaden its range of attractions by offering “immersive and interactive experiences” and virtual reality games as well as a more standard array of indoor bowling alleys, crazy golf courses, children’s play areas, and food and beverage outlets.

It’s not clear who initially presented C&O’s funding application to the Town Deal investment panel – the course of that negotiation has not been publicly revealed. But it was Graham Owen and Justin Manning who fronted it to the Town Deal Board itself, making no apparent mention of the financial resources of the company and its backers. Rather, these representatives stressed the community benefits that would accrue from the additional investment, as a local attraction for both visitors and residents, and as a fount of local employment.

Manning told the Board at its meeting on 21 September 2022 – “Entry to the centre will be free of charge, and all of the attractions are individually priced, lower than others across the country. A local resident’s discount pass is also being developed. There will be 75-90 full time equivalent jobs available at the centre, estimated to equate to 120-130 part time jobs.”

Among these jobs would be several for actors participating in immersive presentations: in one entitled “The 1066 Experience”, for instance, visitors would be greeted “with the sights, the sounds, the smells of what it was like to live in this part of the world on the eve of the Norman Conquest”; they would meet, according to Manning: “a peasant woman”, a blacksmith, a priest, a butcher, and King Harold. 

Cllr Evans told her fellow board members that there was already a “frenzy among my friends” to get jobs as actors in an immersive show of this kind. Board co-chair Graham Peters asked Manning whether the 1066 village would be “historically accurate”. Manning admitted that there would be potato-eating and hessian sacks – it’s “a bit tongue in cheek”, he concluded. 

But no questions were asked by any of the Board members attending the presentation on 21 September – who included Sally-Ann Hart MP, Andrew Harvey and John Bownas of Hastings BID and Sean Dennis of Hastings Chamber of Commerce – as to the financial basis of the company or why it should need an extra £400,000 to extend its range of attractions. In particular, there was no consideration at Board level, at least in any open meeting, as to whether C&O might have gone ahead with the investment from its own resources in any event; nor whether it might be more prudent to wait for the business to start operating (as it was clearly going to do regardless of contribution) before committing such a large amount of public funds. The Board were told merely that their investment panel had selected this investment – along with a separate £100,000 grant to Freedom Works for refurbishment of the top three floors of the Debenhams building – out of eight bids assembled at short notice after withdrawal of another project (redevelopment of the Sports Direct building in Wellington Place). 

In a report delivered to the Board on 30 June 2022 the Town Deal Programme Team, which seems to have consisted of borough council officers, had stated baldly that the Debenhams project “met the objectives of the town deal programme and will be able to deliver within the required timescales”. A “business case” for it, which was treated as ‘commercially sensitive’ was subsequently approved by DLUHC (the Department of Levelling Up, Communities and Housing), the ultimate providers of the funds, and the Board were asked to sign it off – which they duly did.

There were, no doubt, conditions attached to the £400,000 grant, as with any award of public sector funds, that required the recipients to demonstrate to the Programme Team and/or to DLUHC that the money was duly spent on building, fit-out and other costs, though there seem to be reasons to doubt what evaluation of costs or monitoring of expenditure has actually taken place. What’s not known, or at least has not been revealed to the Town Deal Board in any public forum, is whether any conditions were imposed to give assurance that the enterprise would continue to be managed in accordance with its presented prospectus. 

“Immensely proud”

But who would be so churlish as to doubt that? Mrs Chernukhin, identified as the financial backer of the enterprise, though not at that stage appointed as C&O director, made a speech at the official opening in November attended by Hastings mayor James Bacon and other borough councillors, declaring that she was “immensely proud to bring to fruition projects that help to revive our high streets, create jobs for local people and grow local economies”.

Graham Owen highlighted the distinctive approach taken by C&O. “We wanted to do something different, something immersive and adventurous. …entire shop floors have been converted into ‘other-worldly escapes’” – not only the 1066 village but a smuggler’s cave, a wild west saloon and “a foray into the vacuum of space”.

Cllr Bacon responded with enthusiasm that “mixing education with fun and culinary delights is a perfect recipe for success”.

Leader of Hastings Borough Council Paul Barnett wrote on the Town Deal website praising MM2 for investing in the site and “finding excellent tenants to create new facilities…An example of how to do regeneration in a way that serves the community rather than ignores it.”

The reality

What then is the reality five and a half months on? The overall spread of games, virtual reality experiences and hospitality areas appears intended to appeal to cross-generation families, though both older and younger members may baulk at the pervasive bright lights, dark recesses and very loud music. The ‘attractions’ seem to have been parcelled out as concessions shared between subsidiary operators. Mr Owen in fact still operates two crazy golf courses on the site, even though he no longer has any management position in the company. But following his removal as director, the 1066 Experience has been withdrawn, as has the Wild West saloon and any other “immersive” experiences which require more than a minimum level of active staffing. There remains, according to the woman on reception last weekend, a Jurassica Live presentation which does seem in description to involve some physical interaction; a number of virtual reality programmes such as a Soar Tour screen adventure; and a game called Vault, which she described as a virtual competition to rob a bank. But she admitted that the only entertainments for which there is high demand for bookings are the bowling alleys.

There are no discounts offered to local residents. Children are charged the same prices as adults, and there is general complaint among those who have sampled the attractions on offer that the prices of most of them are unaffordable as family entertainment, certainly on any regular basis. 

Is this the revitalisation of Hastings town centre which the Town Deal promised to foster? And did its very wealthy backers need a £400,000 top-up from the public funding entrusted for this purpose?

St Leonards Church hasn’t had the easiest history. From the destruction of its namesake in medieval times, it took hundreds of years to be built on its current site – within the cliffs – as a place of worship for James Burton’s wealthy settlers. It was regularly attended by Princess Victoria (the one who would be Queen) in 1834-35, and then a couple of years later it was crushed in a landslide. No engineer or planning officer seems to have taken the hint since.

But surely there’s something about struggle and challenge that really gives a church building its meaning, whether you’re religious or not. Each church is an early statement of that human desire to reach for the stars and change our world – do something remarkable. Many friends of St Leonards church have definitely thought so over the last two centuries, maintaining it against harsh opposition from land, sea and wind. 

In 1944 a damaged V1 bomb hit just outside its doors, causing the structure to entirely collapse. In its wisdom the War Damage Commission wanted the church rebuilt on the same site, despite its chequered past of rock falls and subsidence. Landslips put the church at risk again in 1987 and 1994, and proximity to the sea continually wears away at its structure. After various attempts to find the funds needed to keep the building and its surrounding site safe and well maintained, it was closed to the public in 2018. 

St Leonards is perhaps still the only church on England’s South Coast that looks directly out to the sea, with its external pulpit almost shouting out a challenge to the storm gods. Inside, the prow of a Galilean fishing boat forms the main pulpit, with the binnacle of the ship that brought it here as its lectern. 

The building is grade II listed, which is rare for anything constructed post-1945. Its turbulent history and unusual features give it a mystical character, and since the collapse of Sussex Steps, the footpath next to it is now the only cut-through from West Hill Road to the seafront. The church is now a tenuous but somehow unique and alluring link between two sections of the town that bears its name. 

Since the 2018 closure, at least one significant attempt has been made to gather the funds needed to shore up the cliffs and secure the church. Hastings Urban Design Group and allies tried to acquire Town Deal funding for ‘Science-on-Sea’, a project that would’ve seen the church become a satellite of London’s Science Museum in St Leonards. Sound exciting? Well, the project was rejected by the Town Deal board with minimal explanation given.

The cliffs aren’t just a threat to this historic building but any attempts to develop housing on nearby land – you might have noticed the concrete skeleton next to it on Undercliff. The cliffs will likely need a lot of funding to be properly stabilised, money that Hastings Borough Council (HBC) doesn’t have. And, if HBC did have it, they’d be more likely to spend it on cliffs that threaten the Old Town and other densely populated or more tourist-friendly hotspots. 

Despite this seemingly bleak situation for the church, a new organisation is forming to take charge of it from the Diocese, and build a strategy for how to go forward. A stakeholder group of conservationists, architects and other interested specialists is steadily becoming the St Leonards Church Charitable Trust. It’s stated aim is: “to protect, renovate, preserve and maintain for the benefit of the community the disused Grade II listed St Leonards Parish Church and its surrounds, including the listed Burton family tomb.” 

Although the retaining wall holding back the cliffs has clearly failed – and will need major repairs – St Leonards church itself seems to be in relatively good condition. Despite menacing ramparts placed against one of its internal walls, its structure is solid; these internal defences are precautionary, for now. The roof and ceiling are slightly damaged, which could be another expensive job, but doesn’t immediately put the building at risk. Some stained-glass windows have been broken, but most of the intricate glasswork remains. Otherwise the place mainly needs a tidy and a good dusting. 

A web of local and national organisations have some level of involvement with (or responsibility for) the site. Parts are East Sussex County Council, parts are HBC, parts are Crown Land. Elsewhere the Environment Agency has been convinced to fund cliff stabilisation projects. Our MP could lobby Westminster for some money, though Sally Ann Hart doesn’t seem hugely popular up there at the minute. 

Proposed members of the St Leonards Church Charitable Trust seem well qualified in working with historic buildings, and are optimistic about proceeding, despite the obvious challenges. But more legal experts and money managers would be helpful. Former chair of the Burton St Leonards Society, and current vice-chair of the Hastings & St Leonards Society, Dr Chris Joyce, is playing a key organisational role. Following a visit to the site on Friday 17 February, Dr Joyce said “Everyone emerged surprisingly upbeat. I think we’re looking at the biggest project to have arisen in Hastings since Duke William arrived on nearby shores 957 years ago!”

If worst comes to worst, the Trust’s job will be to ensure the safe demolition of the church, and – if the cliffs remain dangerous – the site would presumably remain unusable. At Birling Gap homes are being left to fall into the sea, and the nearby National Trust visitor centre simply plans to pull further back from the cliff face. There’s a serious question here about whether we want the battle with nature to continue, or to just get out of its way. 

If, on the other hand, funding is acquired and the cliff stabilised, the church would likely be transformed into a community and creative centre for a much-neglected stretch of seafront that desperately needs something to rally around, and rocks to stop falling on it.

On 6 March, at 18.30, the Hastings and St Leonards Society will host a public meeting at the White Rock Hotel to discuss the future of the Church. Please email hstlsoc@gmail.com if you would like to attend. Find more details at hastingsandstleonardssociety.org.uk. See previous proposals for the church on our website under “A Genuine Future for St Leonards Church?”

As previewed in HIP 218, the consortium’s proposal is for HBC to link St Mary with Hastings Castle above as the castle’s entry point and visitor centre, connected by a lift on or within the cliff face. The document submitted to the agents headed “The Levelling Up Lift” suggests three alternative technical options – an “Up and Over” vertical lift structure with a bridge to land at the top; an “Inclinator” using lift technology but set at an angle close to the cliff face; or a “Tunnel and Shaft”, consisting of a short tunnel from the vaults of St Mary into the cliff plus a lift shaft within. Initial costings for these alternatives have been provided.

The two venues are historically connected by the fact that there was an original church of St Mary within the castle walls before its rock base subsided. And the idea of re-linking them physically in the 21st century doesn’t just arise from the desire to save the arts venue. It’s also mindful of the hitherto quite separate scheme, the supposed “flagship” project of the Town Deal, under which over £6m of public funding is set to be channelled into turning the castle into a “world heritage destination”.

Town Deal equivocation

Members of the Town Deal Board heard at their last meeting on 18 January that the business case for this project was approved by its Investment Panel in December. However, reports given at the meeting by HBC officers involved in progressing its development were not only vague but seemingly equivocal. Ian Sycamore, External Funding Manager at HBC, said that the business case approval “does not exclude other ideas or concepts that may come up in the future to support the project”. Pranesh Datta, Economic Development Manager, described the project as “not currently good value for money and has high risk but could be turned around and the benefit cost ratio improved if additional funding could be provided”. Kevin Boorman, Marketing and Major Projects Manager, told the Board that the project “is still in its very early stages…[It] is still a concept and firm proposals and drawings are still needed…A project design team and architect will be appointed to get some firm plans costed up”. It seems plain from these reports that there remains an opening for the St Mary consortium to get their alternative concept considered. But they will have to move swiftly.

The commercial agents instructed by HBC for the disposal of St Mary, Dyer and Hobbis, had set a date of 4 February for “expressions of interest” to be submitted –as the consortium did (on the final day). If the recent nomination of the building to be registered as an Asset of Community Value is approved, that would effectively result in a six-month moratorium in the disposal process. However, the potential to have Town Deal funding re-directed, which is what the linkage proposal depends on, looks to have a much shorter time span.

Under an initiative co-ordinated on behalf of Hastings Creatives group by Glenys Jacques, trustee of Barefoot Opera and long-time collaborator on local theatre, film and arts projects, a petition will be delivered to Hastings Borough Council (HBC) next week calling upon it to register St Mary in the Castle as an Asset of Community Value (ACV).

A community body with a local connection is generally required to nominate a prospective ACV, but this can consist of an unincorporated group of 21 or more people who appear on the local electoral register. At the time of going to press, Ms Jacques’ petition had already attracted around 120 signatories, each of whom lives in the borough and claims a creative interest in St Mary as an arts venue and/or exhibition space. She was hoping this number would reach 200 by 1 February, when the petition is due to be served.

HBC put the property up for sale or lease with commercial agents Dyer and Hobbis in November, and leader Cllr Paul Barnett has stated that tenders for “future management options” have been invited for the council’s consideration by 4 February. But if, as seems likely, the council accepts the ACV nomination, it would result in a moratorium on disposal for a minimum of six months during which the local community can raise funds to mount a competitive bid.

Is this realistic? The Creatives group, led by Jess Steele of Hastings Commons and video entrepreneur Paul Walker, think so. As reported a fortnight ago in HIP 217, they propose that the council should link St Mary with Hastings Castle above as a single tourist attraction connected by a vertical stairway or lift shaft. Consulting engineers have pronounced this scheme technically feasible; costings, while steep, are capable of being justified on preliminary calculations of a business case. Historic England are said to be “very supportive” of the linkage idea, which should generate far higher footfall for the castle than the current viewings figure of 30,000 per year.

Most encouragingly, the Town Deal Board, of whom Ms Steele is a member, is reported to have shown “general interest” in the link project. The Board previously allocated a figure of £3.45m (out of their overall pot of £24m) to a stand-alone project which they have previously described as “Hastings Castle World Heritage Destination”, and apparently netted further potential match funding of £2.85m from other sources. But they have never exposed to any public scrutiny what is proposed. Could this be the plan they didn’t know they were looking for?

Commercial land agents Dyer & Hobbis are continuing to market former church-turned-arts-venue St Mary in the Castle for outright sale or lease on behalf of Hastings Borough Council. However, local entrepreneur Jess Steele has come up with a more radical idea – that the council should combine St Mary with Hastings castle above as a single attraction connected by a lift shaft or external cliff-face elevator/escalator operating directly between them. Boreholes in the rock could provide ground source heat to St Mary so as to resolve its perennial damp problems.

Ms Steele has written to leader of the council Paul Barnett and culture portfolio holder Andy Batsford putting this idea forward; she refers to finance potentially available from the allocation of Town Deal funds to an upgrade of the castle. Cllr Barnett’s initial response indicated that the council has invited tenders for alternative management options, but that the capital outlay on Ms Steele’s scheme was suspected to be prohibitive.

Supporters of the scheme were due to meet on Tuesday (10 January) for further discussion.

Cllr Barnett has assumed for himself the Climate Change portfolio, also formerly held by Cllr Hilton. Cllr Roark’s position as Chair of the Charity Committee has been awarded to new cabinet member John Cannan, ward councillor for Wishing Tree.

Revised council cabinet absent Cllr Maya Evans
CREDIT: Hastings Borough Council

Cllr Paul Barnett, leader of the council, has given no explanation as to why the two former Environment portfolios have been combined. However, he issued a statement: “I am delighted to bring John [Cannan] into Cabinet; he is Hastings through and through and such a passionate believer in public services being delivered for the greater good of all the residents of Hastings. His incredible work at Seaview talks to his deep compassion to those who have fallen on hard times, and I can think of no person better to join us as we face a deep crisis this winter for our elderly and struggling families.”

Green party reaction

Cllr Hilton commented: “As Ali [Roark] is only just taking on the Natural Environment role, and from experience I know it takes a while to get your head round, I certainly wouldn’t want to challenge her personally. However, I do think it made sense to split these two roles, as Glenn [Haffenden] found that little attention had been paid to the ‘urban’ bit of this portfolio when they were amalgamated and he was beginning to change that.

“With grounds maintenance coming in house and the strategic opportunities that brings for greater partnership working as well as the greater focus on the biodiversity crisis, it was good to be able to focus on the Natural Environment and the many links with opportunities to tackle climate change, particularly through nature-based solutions. Time will be lost while the new cabinet lead builds the connections that I had started to make both through my work as lead on Natural Environment and through the wider Hastings as Garden Town vision, which of course I can and will still work on.” 

Cllr Hilton went on to express concern that Cllr Barnett will have little time to focus on specific climate change solutions, given his already huge responsibilities as leader of the council and overseeing Regeneration. She said that she was had been in conversation with both local businesses and East Sussex College on how a town-wide forum could be built to share ideas on tackling the climate crisis. In her view, a cross-party working group is needed to focus on this.

Minority cabinet

She was also concerned that the new minority cabinet “can only draw on the skill set of less than half the councillors, and decisions will once again be made with little scrutiny and input from only the seven cabinet members”. 

No major decision could be made through the council except with either Green or Conservative support, she argued. Why should this be forthcoming if they have not been closely involved in decision-making at an early stage?

The Green party group will therefore propose a move to a committee system of governance where all councillors have a role in making decisions and deciding the future direction of the council, particularly on key areas of the council’s work, including the budget, housing, the Town Deal, climate change and the environment. It’s far from clear, however, that Cllr Barnett – or his party’s National Executive – will allow this.

There is no full Council meeting scheduled for the month of November. The next will be held on 14 December. Cllr Hilton expects that there will be cross-party discussions prior to that date “to agree a way forward”.

Hastings now has a commitment to become a garden town. Or, at least, one of the seven programmes making up the £24.4million Town Deal aims to make Castle Ward a Garden Town. The Town Centre Public Realm and Green Connections programme, piloted by community powerhouse Transition Town Hastings (TTH), is hailed as a “central system” complementing all other projects in the green-orientated Town Deal. The Deal’s funding focus is on regeneration and developing a “new sustainable future for the town centre”, in other words for Castle Ward. 

The Town Centre Public Realm and Green Connections programme, referred to hereafter as ‘Hastings Garden Town’, is inspired by Sheffield’s Gray to Green scheme, which has seen tarmac torn up and replaced with plant life. The Sheffield scheme was implemented partly as a flood defence and partly to reconnect severed and ignored parts of town, which have been seeing investment and development following the early phases of Gray to Green. Hastings Garden Town aspires to follow suit and re-envision Havelock Road as a flood-proofing and bountiful garden. The project is partially led by Fergus Garrett, gardener at the famously biodiverse Great Dixter House and Gardens, who will underpin its approach to creative ecology. This means encouraging the presence of bees, bugs and butterflies that would normally not be seen in a busy urban environment. Hastings garden town additionally plans to improve pedestrian and cycling infrastructure, promoting more sustainable means of travel for visitors and residents alike. 

Hastings Band of Brothers fill planters with soil alongside Julia Hilton and Sherry Clark

TTH has substantial grounding in green community work and encouraging volunteer participation, being responsible for the community garden and wildflower path at Warrior Square station and a series of community composting hubs – amongst various other co-operations and initiatives. In May, they also began ‘Gardening Our Streets’, a community-led scheme to plant and tend a selection of pop-up ‘parklets’ giving the town a hint of how more plant life will positively impact its sometimes drab and dire streets. This effort is partly a proof of concept for the Garden Town. On the 19 and 21 May, Gardening Our Streets volunteers filled and placed 16 oak planters built by local company Old Wood Works. The planters are wheeled – readily manoeuvrable if a little cumbersome – and have specialised watering systems, making them well-suited to the usually problematic conditions of paved and tarmacked streets. The plants inhabiting them are hardy seaside varieties accustomed to wind and hard wear. 

A selection of the planters were temporarily arranged in an empty parking space outside the wonderful Stooge Coffee, creating an island of calm – a parklet – where the sound of the breeze drifting through leaves could take the edge off even the dizziest caffeine or sugar high. Volunteers and visitors came from The Common Room and all over the Trinity Triangle to appreciate the space and included, as you might expect, some of our new Green councillors such as council member for Castle Ward, Claire Carr. Now the same oak planters remain in the area, giving a small hint of what the future could be.

Gardening Our Streets is operating independently of the Town Deal, securing its own resources by co-operation with other local organisations, including Energise Sussex Coast, Hastings Commons, Groundwork South, Holy Trinity Hastings, A Band of Brothers, and the Rough Sleepers Initiative. It was initially funded by the Trinity Triangle/America Ground Heritage Action Zone and later additionally by the Making It Happen programme.

CREDIT: Julia Hilton

Apart from working with organisations, Gardening Our Streets is pioneering a ‘time-bank’ called We Dig Hastings. Time-banks are a simple and effective way of rewarding volunteers for their hard work. In We Dig Hastings’ case, every volunteer between May and September is given one time credit for every hour of their labour, which can then be redeemed with partners such as Stooge Coffee, the Common Room and Great Dixter House and Gardens. Time-credits are also transferable, so volunteers who don’t feel the need to be paid can still share the community love by gifting their credits to anyone else.

Unlike the flagship, signature project to make Hastings Castle a more popular tourist attraction, Hastings Garden Town aims to improve the quality of life throughout the town centre and keep people involved in the maintenance of their lived environment. Its thorough approach to community-led creativity would be readily applicable in other parts of Hastings, as we can see to some extent at Warrior Square station. 

• To find out more, or even get involved, visit transitiontownhastings.org.uk or Thursday’s “Green Room” at the Common Room on Cambridge Road, just down from the Observer Building.