October 15th, 2024.



Robert Holste writes:

The Sussex media is well aware of the underhand and cruel approach taken by Brighton & Hove City Council to housing the city’s homeless ‘out of area’ i.e. securing the cheapest accommodation elsewhere, not in Brighton & Hove.

Putting aside the complete absence of consultation with other local authorities and support agencies, the implications for these people have proven fatal for many. If you move someone with high dependency, be it drugs or alcohol, to a town they don’t know, that is devoid of support from close family, a trusted support worker or specialist health services, their tenuous grip on life quickly slips away.

It’s on record that people with complex needs died after being moved by BHCC out of area – there were multiple deaths in Newhaven (Kendal Court) and Eastbourne. Without doubt there are other related fatalities that the city council don’t want the media to know about.

This on-going scandal in plain sight also betrays the bulldozer mindset and arrogance behind Brighton’s devolution bid and why council representatives in East Sussex are so opposed to it.

I’m told that key figures at the top of BHCC are ‘licking their lips’ at the prospect of the open spaces in East Sussex solving the housing crisis in the city. They say, if the BHCC leadership keeps Angela Rayner on-side with their devo plan, any village with transport links will be on their list of potential new city satellite towns.

Assuming ‘transport links’ means any countryside settlement with a railway station and serviceable roads, you don’t have to be a town planner to look at a map of East Sussex and work out why people enjoying village life in parts of East Sussex – Berwick is a standout example - may soon have more than a new A27 to worry about.

This is the real story behind the BHCC devolution bid and I would encourage you to pay close attention to it.

Robert Holste
Seaford