New Romney and Its Perfect Cousins
There are few things more revealing in local government than a row about street sweeping. Not because it is glamorous. Quite the opposite. When residents start arguing over how often the council sends out the brushes, it usually means they have already concluded they are somewhere near the bottom of the district pecking order.
That was the point lurking behind Cllr Paul Thomas’s question at Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s full council meeting on 1 April. He asked why New Romney High Street sits in Section 2A of the street-cleaning schedule while Hythe High Street, and parts of Folkestone, enjoy the higher-status Zone Z treatment. His point was simple enough: if New Romney’s main shopping street is getting a lesser service, that has consequences for traders, residents and the general look of the town.
Cabinet member Jeremy Speakman responded in the usual careful council dialect. The zoning, he said, reflects expected intensity of use rather than different standards. Different areas need different levels of intervention to reach the same result. He said he would ask the waste team to consider the request and, if necessary, obtain the cost of options.
That all sounds perfectly reasonable until you translate it out of municipal language and into English. Some places get cleaned more often because the council thinks they matter more in practical terms. The “standard” may be dressed up as equal, but the service is plainly not.
And there lies the real grievance on Romney Marsh.
For years, many residents have felt the Marsh gets what is left after Folkestone and Hythe have had the lion’s share of attention. The civic centre will never put it that way, naturally. Councils do not issue press releases saying, “You are our forgotten outpost and here are your administrative crumbs.” They prefer softer language about reviews, priorities and operational need. But the feeling on the ground is much the same.
If you are in Folkestone, Sandgate or Hythe, your concerns tend to carry weight because you sit closer to the district’s political centre of gravity. If you are on the Marsh, the suspicion is that you can shout for quite a long time before anyone in authority removes the earplugs.
That is why this question mattered. It was not really about litter. It was about standing.
A high street is a shop window for a town. If it looks neglected, people do not conclude that the cleansing matrix is slightly sub-optimal. They conclude the place itself is being treated as second class. And when New Romney can see Hythe sitting in the top service band while it remains lower down the list, the message is not subtle.
This is especially raw at a time when Marsh communities already have more than enough to be fed up about. Dymchurch and Littlestone have been battered by the reputational damage of poor bathing-water warnings. Local businesses, tourism operators and residents have every reason to feel that their corner of the district takes the hit while the political energy is directed elsewhere. Add a visibly lower street-cleansing category to that mix and it is not hard to see why people start talking about being treated like forgotten cousins.
Speakman at least did not bat the question away. He promised to look at it, and that is better than the usual council sport of politely doing nothing while drafting a paragraph about ongoing engagement. But the administration now has a choice. It can either treat this as a fair challenge and review New Romney’s status properly, or it can hide behind the usual bureaucratic incense and hope everyone gets bored.
That would be a mistake.
Because once residents start noticing that one town gets the municipal equivalent of silver service while another gets the broom cupboard, the argument stops being about street cleansing altogether. It becomes a question of whether some parts of Folkestone & Hythe are treated as the district’s proper front room, while others are left to make do in the shed.
And on Romney Marsh, more and more people have decided they know exactly which room they have been put in.
The Shepway Vox Team
Not Owned By Hedgefunds, Barons or Billionaires
As a lifelong resident of Folkestone is it obvious that everywhere outside of Folkestone and Hythe gets ignored. If anyone wasn’t already aware of that, surely the name change from Shepway (which included everyone in the District) to Folkestone & Hythe made it perfectly plain who the council were interested in, and it wasn’t anywhere on the Marsh, nor out in the “rural” areas of Lyminge, Elham, Stelling Minnis, etc.
A very true and honest reflection of local people, in summary.
Lower usage by comparison?
As the main coastal artery between Dover and Rye for over 1,000 years, the streets certainly handle more usage 24/7 than Hythe high street, without doubt.
Sweeping is one issue, part of a larger mismanagement.
The A 259 between Dymchurch and New Romney has been besieged by road works, at best attended by a single guy on his phone in a car, the traffic line between St. Mary’s Bay to Dymchurch, and Dymchurch to Palmarsh, bumper to bumper.
Just another example of council first and second class behavior, or, perhaps, The Marsh is dismissed as third class, most would seemingly agree, a case of let the streets be dirty, ignore the roads, the millions in financial income frustrated by over weight people making decisions in comfy chairs, as usual.
Where is any business experience here, or indeed, awareness that Kent is extremely slow in catching up with how the world works outside the ivery tower.