No-one deserves to be removed from their home and abandoned to the streets. Having grown up in Hastings, Karl (not his real name) worked as a fisherman for many years, surrounded by a strong local community, and also spent some happy years living abroad. But everything started to go downhill after health problems in his…
A 44-year-old mother of two is facing eviction. Hana (real name withheld) is a full time carer for her nine-year-old autistic daughter, and has been a Hastings resident since her teens – but she can no longer afford to live in this town. Why? To start with, a large number of homes are being taken…
Merlin Betts Hastings Housing Alliance has been formed to start fixing our local housing crisis from the ground up. But let’s not forget the lesson to be learned here: who can we trust to look after our housing, guaranteeing fair prices and good maintenance? Ourselves! Pictured above: 4 December launch day at the Observer Building,…
Merlin Betts Voting time on Acorn’s launch day at His Place Community Centre. Acorn is like a trade union that can represent people regardless of trade, especially renters. We need that in a town with rising rents and a housing crisis. They also lobby on related things that matter to us, like cost of living….
Sarah Gomes Harris co-founder of Hastings Rental Health, considers the very real consequences of living in a home that’s never allowed to be a home. “The sky hangs over us dark and low, like a dirty screen, on which the clouds are fighting fierce battles. That’s what our houses are for – to protect us…
Merlin Betts This article is part of a series. Find the previous article here, and overview here. Photo by Ben Guerin on Unsplash. In 2019 the ONS did a survey on deprivation across the UK. Hastings is the 14th most income-deprived area in the country. The closest to that in East Sussex is Eastbourne at…
Merlin Betts This article is part of a series. Find the previous article here, and overview here. The only other power here apart from rules-regulated government and profit-governed business is community. Yep, people getting things done through their own through goodwill, effective organisation and small-scale fundraising. We have a lot of growing community-led solutions to…
Merlin Betts This article is part of a series. Find the previous article here, and overview here. I didn’t go to the full council meeting that approved the preliminary budget, but I did watch the video. It kicks off with a classic Paul Barnett speech, sounding like a Hastings Independent Group manifesto the very day…
Merlin Betts This article is part of a series. Find the previous article here, and overview here. Alright, so the biggest single problem for our budget is the local housing crisis and how blindingly expensive it is to run temporary accommodation. Why do so many people need temporary accommodation? Hastings Borough Council’s chief housing officer,…
Merlin Betts This article is part of a series. Find the previous article here, and overview here. Photo by Steve Payne on Unsplash. When he was trying to get picked (‘elected’ they like to say) as Tory leader, Rishi Sunak stood at a Tunbridge Wells garden party and said he planned to take funding away…