savethearcheryground.net

Gladedale Homes lack Freemasons talent in a 200 year old Hastings saga that even includes Hastings Pier.

From www.savethearcheryground.org

Today’s Hastings Observer (5 February 2010, page 2) says that three of our conservative councillors are Freemasons. 

http://www.hastingsobserver.co.uk/newshastings/Three-Tory-councillors-revealed-as.6044960.jp

I wonder if I should declare my own affiliations before I go any further.  Our campaign group (Save The Archery Ground or STAG) held our first public meeting in the Assembly Rooms in St Leonards which was donated free of charge and is also the home of a number of Masonic Lodges.  I believe they use the basement.   I confess I am a fully paid up member of the National Trust and I did join the St Leonards Arts forum for £20, a worthy organisation. 

I am also a Freeman of the City of London, not a Freemason.  I have worked in paper and publishing all my life so joined one of the old London Guilds called The Company of Stationers and Papermakers, they have old manuscripts and the like, though a lot of the original archive was destroyed in the great fire of London.  No secret ceremonies, we don’t role up our trouser legs or have special handshakes. In the case of The Company of Stationers and Newspaper makers, the membership comes from the related trades, printers, publishers and paper people.  The origins are probably similar in that it was a guild of trades people originally set up to protect their interests.  In the case of Stationers there were copyright issues for printers and publishers and the crown was concerned about unauthorised versions of the bible getting printed (God forbid!), so Stationers got a Royal Charter.  But many of these self interest organisations progressed and modernised through time.

Freemasons have had a history of secrecy and distrust, though they have clearly tried to be more open in recent years.  But where did it all start and where does it end?

Well I have to say I did email the Grand Master in Brighton some weeks ago, but heard nothing back, but that’s probably more to do with poor web site administration than secrecy.  I was told that Decimus and James Burton, who built much of St Leonards, were Freemasons and I have had so much fun researching this fact.  My goodness, there is a lot of suspicion about Freemasons and this site set up by a Freemason of 25 years promises to reveal all (if you buy his books).  Watch the film and enjoy. I laughed from start to finish – it’s a kind of Freemason da Vinci code trailer.

http://www.secretsofmasons.com/index1.htm

And if you decide you wanted to pose as a Freemason you can get the tee-shirt at any one of these Freemasons regalia stores. I might get the tee-shirt as it may confuse the planners next time I drop by with a petition

https://www.clerkenwellregalia.co.uk/main.htm

http://www.freemasonstore.com/?gclid=CNiDn5Cr258CFcIB4wod9nyBGg

Now for those of you with a real academic interest there is the Centre for Research into Freemasonry at the University of Sheffield.  They may be a little biased, but they are quite open about it.

http://freemasonry.dept.shef.ac.uk/index.php?lang=2&type=page&level0=242&level1=265&level2=269&op=746

And perhaps a little more local history, according to the Hastings Chronicle website, Freemasons set up the first Lodge in the town in 1799

http://www.hastingschronicle.co.uk/

‘1799 – The first Freemason lodge in Hastings was set up, the Harmony. It merged with the second, the Derwent, in 1817’

But the real trouble started later with the building of the Pier

‘The most vociferous of these councillors was leading local builder John Howell, an influential Liberal. In 1866 Howell was given a £25,000 contract by his fellow councillors to build major drainage facilities across the town, and he had his eyes on a similar sum for a pier. But he had no guarantee of laying his hands on that contract if the pier company was not controlled by his fellow local freemasons – and the Pier and Harbour Company was not. In addition, the 1861 Act gave Simpson’s company certain exclusive legal rights for building a pier in Hastings, and put serious constraints on any other scheme, including any backed by Hastings Council’

The reputation for skull duggery amongst Freemasons goes back some 200 years then, almost as long as our smuggling tradition.  But like smuggling I suspect it’s somewhat exaggerated nowadays, more a popular myth.  Still it might be nice if smugglers declared a public interest, then we would all know where to go for cheap booze and CD’s.

Jeremy Birch told the Observer he hoped membership of what he calls the ‘secret brotherhood’ does not affect decision making, but how would anyone know? The council has a deliberate policy of not recording the individual votes of committee members. This is unlike Eastbourne and Brighton, where the councils believe it is important to maintain an audit trail of voting patterns, both to protect the public interest and to defend councillors from false allegations. They also believe it is important to keep a full record of planning decisions for future historians. Perhaps it’s not the ‘secret brotherhood’ we should be worried about, but the lack of transparency within the council itself.

Three Tory members of HBC are Freemasons – Matthew Lock, John Wilson and Terry Fawthrop. Wilson is a member of the planning committee, Fawthrop is its chairman, and Lock is the portfolio holder for planning.  I’m sure they are all decent, upstanding members of our community, but you must make up your own mind.

 Martin Bloomfield

Chairman

www.savethearcheryground.org

Saint Leonard is the Patron Saint of prisoners.  Gladedale can keep making ammendments to a really poor planning proposal and it is the ordinary folk of St Leonards, who are imprisoned and will ultimately have to serve the sentence.

Saint Leonard renounced the world in order to lead a more perfect life.  That’s obviously why we are all here!  It seems that prisoners who invoked Saint leonard from thier cells saw their heavy chains break before thier eyes.  If only we, the hostages of furtune to Gladedale could invoke Saint Leonard right now, we may yet see the chains break.

Gladedale were asked if they wanted to withdraw thier application at a meeting with HBC last year.  They declined prefering to make a continuous round of ammendments.  There is a very short consultation period allowed for each ammendment. 

Gladedale provided some draft plans this week for disscussion at the a meeting they had with HBC today.  There were no obvious changes to the plans that we could see, although one block did appear larger.  Notably block A with towers 18 metres above Highlands and block B just in front of it were not detailed.  We may, or may not get the detail of the meeting, but what is clear is that Gladedale seek agreement from planners before finalising drawings for consultation with you and I.

Now you’ll understand I dont actually know that much about Saint Leonard, but from what I read he was a very dedicated and fair man, I don’t think he would have approved.

It’s that time of year again,  so I thought you might like to read my slimming diary:

‘Shallow Hal’ was the film on the plane out to New York.  His perception organ was altered so he sees only the inner beauty.  Falls in love with bosses daughter, then back to Normal and realises she is somewhat more substantial than he imagined. 

 Must do more research on perception organs.  I wonder what other organs I might have that I don’t know about?

 Strange thing, everyone on the plane looks ‘normal’.  Reckon there’s something in the Virgin cola, hope it lasts.

 Tactical error today.  Ate a chicken sandwich and fruit salad before we took off because travel details said light snack provided, and I hadn’t had breakfast and I was hungry.  Heavy duty vegetable risotto, salad, cheese. Coffee and cake.  The cake sat there and grinned at me for 45 minutes, until the stewardess removed it.  She looked at me and said, ‘would you like me to take this away now’, in that high pitched irritating voice.  What gives them the right to torture innocent people in this way?  Write to the BAA.

Later the same red coated young lady turned up with a choc ice on a stick.  Why give ice creams out on a stick?  Sure it’s a conspiracy to torment me and resolve to write to Richard Branson and complain.

Bad news, tourist film on New York claims ‘Nobody loves food more than a New Yorker’.  The pressure is immense, what if I miss out on something really good just because I need to lose a few pounds.  Started to note down interesting restaurants like ‘Katz, where Harry met Sally and women cry out in ecstasy’.  That’s not going to happen in ArdVark, but briefly contemplated the possibility.

The Virgin Cola has side effects, also noted down address of the New York Dog Spa Hotel at 145 West 18^th Street.  I don’t even have a dog.

Meet for Dinner in Little Italy, thin people everywhere.  A new tourist film runs through my head; ‘New York – The thin city, fat people go somewhere else’.  A substantial plate of spaghetti Carbonara later, I toiled with the desert menu.  Fortunately one of our party suggested we go across the road for desert and coffee.  The bracing air brought me around and I got by with a coffee….and cream.

Hope tomorrow goes better.

Hastings and St Leonards On sea – Gladedale Homes development of the College grounds in Archery Road will leave a legacy for generations.
 
I was thinking this morning about the Chief Planner, Tim Cookson.  It can’t be very easy in his job.  He can’t express a personal opinion except to his very closest alies.  He has to be seen to adhere to process and he has people sniping from every possible corner and angle and , of course, he has councillors of different political persuasion to deal with. He has a very large organisation and he can’t possibly know all there is to know about every development in the Town.  But somehow we would all expect him to know.  And like all large organisations things sometimes go wrong on his watch.  I have occasionally felt sorry for politicians or senior people who have had to resign because something bad happened on thier watch that shouldn’t have happened.
 
History will be the judge.  Time will tell whether some of the developments, like the Archery Road proposals, prove to be bad for the area.  Of course there are hundreds of people in St Leonards who already know that the Gladedale proposals for Archery Road are wrong.  Not every campaign in the town is necessarily right, some have mixed reactions, but I haven’t heard anyone yet say that the Gladedale plans are a good idea and I doubt there are many campaigns that have generated 500 or more letters of protest and not one in support.
 
History will be the judge, let’s hope that our planners, our councillors and our parliamentary politicians along with English heritage have persuaded Mr Cookson that there is something happening on his watch and it ain’t good.

Back to STAG website:  www.savethearcheryground.org

I was struck by the letter in Hastings Observer from Peter Moffat-Bailey (6th Jan 2010). Can he be right that Hastings and St leonards is more densely populated than anywhere else in England by 7 times the average? Wow, thats incredeible. And what’s more incredible is that developers like Gladedale can plough through conservation areas like St Leonards and feel it’s OK to propose developments that are more than twice the minimum national reccomended density, with buildings that include underground car parks and tower 18 metres above the roadside boundary currently covered in protected trees and the habitat of owls and badgers. And guess what? Even though Hastings and St Leonards already has 75% more flats on average than the rest of the UK according to Mr Moffat-Bailey most of the proposed development consists mostly of one and two bedroomed flats. Where do these lunatics come from and how dare they abuse our town with what one councillor called an ‘abomination’. They do though, and watch out, because they know there way around the planning system. We asked a planning barrister to tell us what it might cost for thier services to fight Gladedale at an inquiry. I’d have to sell my flat to pay and that’s assuming it didn’t go to appeal. Don’t kid yourself, if it happens near you, it could change your life. More importantly it could destroy the character of your town forever. Don’t leave it to developers alone or we’ll get what we deserve. Whatever anyone thinks, I believe HBC have listened and listen still. OK I’ve got my fingers crossed! I’d like Gladedale to take the high ground, withdraw the application and enter a period of constructive consultation. The Princes Regeneration Trust already work with Gladedale, maybe that’s the answer. So come on guys, let’s see some positive action, some good old fashioned community engagement and let’s get this towns regeneration on the road.

Is Gladedale turning Archery Road into an abomination for generations to come?
 
The battle of Hasting – it’s just not cricket.

I was looking at the relaunched history site www.hastingschronicle.co.uk/ the other night and there is a film from 21 years ago of the Priory Meadow cricket ground.  I remember it well, but my partner (a Brighton rose) was astonished that such a beautiful open space in the centre of town could possibly be built over.  The ground was compulsory purchased from a trust.
 
Why is it that regeneration always seems to involve taking any piece of unbuilt land and building on it?  So is the Archery Road site our Priory Meadow in St Leonards?  It was compulsory purchased back in the late 1950’s and the covenants that went with the titles preventing mere mortals such as ourselves from building on the land, were swept aside by the council through the courts, and the 1960’s style college concrete tower block erected in the middle of the site opposite a grand Burton terrace, now grade 2 listed art school.  The old houses and gardens are still within living memory for some in St Leonards and there are still calls to turn the grounds into a Park.  Wouldn’t that be lovely, but not very likely.
 
So why does regeneration seem to involve the removal of open space for future generations and to leave surrounding buildings incomplete or even derelict?  And why when land is developed does it have to be done with such incredible mass and density, so the new development proposals always dominate over the surrounding landscape.  In this case a conservation area.
 
I wonder if the question asked over 20 years ago in Hastings was ‘How can we regenerate this town’ or was it, ‘I wonder what we could build on that big open space in the centre of town?’.  Back in the 1960’s there was another kind of building frenzy and nothing was going to get in the way of the building of new colleges.  Sounds familiar, yes it does doesn’t it?  It’s that frenzy for education that led to Archery Road being developed into a college site, and now 50 years later, it’s that frenzy that will finally destroy the site, the remaining buildings and boundaries and the wildlife.  Not to mention the overbearing impact on the area and it’s conservation.
 
There is time, it’s still at application stage and the application can be rejected.  But it requires huge public support.  Sign the petition today and write to Hastings Borough Council, your councillor and your MP.
 
Next time you see an open space think about what might get built on it one day, nothing is sacred.  I support regeneration, but I would like to have seen a lot more thought put into how the Archery Road site might have better served the community in the regeneration of St Leonards.  That process shpould have been started 4 or 5 years ago.  We all failed then, let’s get it right now.