Hastings Observer Articles Local Elections
9th May 2024 / 9th May 2024 by juliahilton
At last week’s local elections, Hastings residents gave the local Green Party eight new councillors, bringing the total to twelve. We feel honoured by your trust and energised by the responsibility that entails. Throughout the campaign you told us you’d had enough of bickering between parties, disliked all negative campaigning and wanted us to work […]
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Hastings Observer Articles
2nd March 2024 / 5th April 2024 by juliahilton
This has been a devastating week for some Hastings residents, who have had to leave their homes due to landslides in both Old Roar Gill and Caves Road. On Wednesday evening Deputy Leader Glenn Haffenden and I, along with other councillors and senior officers, met with residents who have been affected by the landslip at […]
20th February 2024 / 5th April 2024 by juliahilton
Next week we will finalise the budget for the council. The good news is that, thanks to hard work by officers to identify additional savings after years of government cuts to our budget, Hastings Borough Council is NOT going bankrupt. The situation is still challenging, requiring savings of £3.9 million because of the expenditure required […]
24th July 2023 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
The world is witnessing a colossal decline in global biodiversity, with one million animal and plant species threatened with extinction. In 2019, a State of Nature report by the UK State of Nature Partnership presented an overview of how UK wildlife is faring, looking back over 50 years of monitoring. It found the UK to […]
15th June 2023 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
Observer article June 2023 Last week the Hastings Labour cabinet discussed a report that sets out the current situation with Hastings United Football Club. They concluded that the current proposal to develop a new football stadium at Tile Kiln is not financially viable. We have had to wait 6 months for a report which, while […]
24th May 2023 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
Observer Article May 2023 Last week the water companies of England issued what seemed to be a coordinated and belated apology for repeated sewage spills and pledged to invest £10bn this decade in an attempt to quell public anger over pollution in seas and rivers. It sounded good until discovering that all this will be […]
25th April 2023 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
As this year’s 40th anniversary Jack in the Green celebrations start this weekend so does the local tourist season, but this has been a matter of much discussion and concern in the town recently. Hastings Borough Councils finances have stood on a cliff edge for some time, due to a perfect storm of poor decision […]
24th March 2023 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
In the cold sunshine of a February afternoon The Stade Open Space is filled with the beautiful sound of Ukrainian songs as we stand together with those who came to Hastings to seek safety from the war in Ukraine a year ago. In my hand is a placard made by one of the Ukrainian children, […]
24th February 2023 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
Observer Article February 2023. This winter has been extremely tough for many people and there has been an explosion in demand for help accessing services and funding. It is heartening to see Green councillors coming up with innovative neighbourhood solutions to providing help and support. Last week saw the first Keep Well and Warm event […]
30th January 2023 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
Observer article Jan 31 2023 January has been quite a month for Hastings, with strikes, fire and flooding reminding us of the reason for investment in the public sector, both workers and infrastructure. Our sewage and drainage systems are not up to the task of dealing with extreme rainfall events, which are likely to be […]
24th December 2022 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
For many years Hastings Borough Council was run by a majority Labour administration. At the elections last May that authority was lost, and the council is now in ‘no overall control’. Until a few weeks ago Labour and the Greens ran the council as an alliance, but interference from Labour’s National Executive put paid to […]
24th October 2022 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
Observer article for October 2022 – Julia Hilton By the time you read this article, Hastings Borough Council will have voted on whether to bring back in house the maintenance of our town’s astonishing 690 hectares of green space. For the last decade the care of our parks, gardens and wild land has been contracted […]
24th September 2022 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
Observer Article – September 2022 One thing I have learnt, in all the wall to wall coverage of the Queen’s life this week, is that as well as having a great sense of humour she was a true matriarch, quietly wielding a lot of soft power behind the scenes. Matriarchal power is the kind exercised […]
24th August 2022 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
We are one of the wealthiest countries in the world and yet this summer we are facing both an energy and a water crisis. A decent home that provides refuge from both extreme heat and cold and access to food and clean water are basic human rights and yet we are facing a winter where […]
19th July 2022 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
Just too hot It’s been a tough week in Hastings if you struggle with the heat. Hastings missed the worst of the UK’s first “red heatwave” warning. Even so, Friends of the Earth research shows over 16,000 households in Hastings could be vulnerable to extreme heat. Often these will be the same households who suffer […]
24th June 2022 / 19th March 2024 by juliahilton
First of all, thank you to the Observer for offering me this weekly column on all things Green. I will use this space to celebrate all the community initiatives that are already under way to green our town and reduce our carbon footprint, but also to issue an urgent call to action. We need the […]
