Folkestone & Hythe District Council

Otterpool Park Update: £24m Paid Out, Sewage Works Approved, Delivery Questions Remain

May 8, 2026 // 1 Comment

Before a single Otterpool Park home has been built, Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s own payment data shows nearly £24m in Otterpool equity, share-capital and [...]

FHDC Council Chairs and Allowances: Who Got Which Seat

May 7, 2026 // 0 Comments

The music stopped at Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s annual general meeting on Wednesday 6 May 2026. Cllr Paul Thomas got the big civic chair, most committee [...]

Folkestone & Hythe District Council Temporary Accommodation Bill Hits £1.52m

May 7, 2026 // 0 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s published payments for temporary accommodation reached £1,520,865.70 in 2025/26 under just two descriptions: Bed & Breakfast [...]

FHDC Temporary Accommodation Contracts Show £570k Spending Gap

May 7, 2026 // 2 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s temporary accommodation trail shows two contract periods where the published payments appear to exceed the published values by a [...]

Folkestone & Hythe HMO Licensing Gap: 312 Estimated Shared Houses, 63 Licences

April 27, 2026 // 4 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe says HMOs with five or more people in two or more households need a licence. Yet the latest MHCLG housing return points to an estimated 312 [...]

Folkestone & Hythe Has Kent’s Highest Band D Council Tax for the 23rd Year in a Row

April 24, 2026 // 1 Comment

The official Band D benchmark says Folkestone & Hythe has sat at the top of Kent’s council tax table since 2004-05. It did so under the Conservatives who ran the [...]

Folkestone & Hythe Tops Kent Table for Serious Private Rented Housing Hazards

April 22, 2026 // 1 Comment

Kent housing officers said the local evidence base on poor housing conditions was “scarce”. Even so, MHCLG’s latest return shows Folkestone & Hythe with the highest [...]

Folkestone & Hythe District Council Expenses: Officers Get Higher Meal Allowances Than Councillors

April 20, 2026 // 0 Comments

“All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others,” George Orwell wrote, and at Folkestone & Hythe District Council that principle appears to have [...]

Folkestone & Hythe District Council Pay Gap Widens Between Top Officers and Lowest-Paid Staff

April 17, 2026 // 0 Comments

There is a neat trick in local authority pay stories. Look only at percentages and the whole thing can start to seem almost modest. Look at the pounds, though, and the [...]

Exclusive: How Otterpool Park’s Places for People Deal Ended in a Claim

April 16, 2026 // 0 Comments

David Monk’s Otterpool strategy was built on a simple commercial idea: service the land, parcel it up and sell it on. By 2023, Places for People had emerged in public as [...]

Otterpool Park Minutes Reveal Places for People Claim

April 15, 2026 // 1 Comment

For years, Otterpool Park LLP’s public minutes were written in that familiar regeneration dialect: lots of “delivery”, “collaboration” and “transition”, not [...]

Kent Councils Gender Pay Gap League Table: Which Employers Favour Men, Women or Neither?

April 15, 2026 // 0 Comments

Kent’s council gender pay gap story is no longer a simple tale of men doing better everywhere. In some authorities the median gap still clearly favours men. In some it is [...]

Exclusive: Places for People Silent Over Otterpool Park Contract Dispute

April 14, 2026 // 1 Comment

Exclusive Places for People pulled out of plans to become an Otterpool Park joint venture partner in autumn 2024. Now, after being asked whether it is taking or preparing [...]

Folkestone & Hythe Rents Rise as Home Ownership Moves Further Out of Reach

April 13, 2026 // 2 Comments

Private rents in Folkestone & Hythe remain lower than the South East average in cash terms. But they are rising faster locally, and the gap between earnings and house [...]

Folkestone & Hythe Has Weekly Food Waste Collections. The Real Problem Is Getting Residents to Use Them

April 12, 2026 // 0 Comments

The service is here. The caddies are here. The council says the food waste is turned into renewable energy. The real local question is whether enough people are actually [...]

Otterpool Park Update: Homes England’s Westenhanger Land Move and the Pack Field Silence

April 10, 2026 // 2 Comments

Updated: 06:50 11/04/26 At Lympne Parish Council Annual Meeting on 8 April, FHDC leader Jim Martin said Homes England is in the process of acquiring land within walking [...]

Exclusive: David Wimble’s Two Unsatisfied CCJs and the Question Reform UK Cannot Dodge.

April 10, 2026 // 7 Comments

Exclusive The Reform UK politician who sits at the top table in Kent politics now has two unsatisfied County Court judgments showing at his Littlestone address. One might be [...]

Folkestone & Hythe Ward Budgets: Where the Money Went

April 10, 2026 // 0 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s ward budget scheme ought to be one of the easiest things in local government to follow. Thirty councillors. Up to £3,000 each. Up [...]

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s New Finance System Raises Old Questions

April 8, 2026 // 0 Comments

Cllr Tim Prater says Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s new finance system should improve things. He may be right. But the awkward truth is that this is not really a [...]

Southern Water Sewage: Why Some Kent Councils Investigate and Others Look Away

April 6, 2026 // 0 Comments

Two Kent councils are now investigating possible statutory nuisance complaints over alleged untreated sewage discharges by Southern Water. Others are hesitating, dragging [...]

New Romney and Its Perfect Cousins

April 4, 2026 // 2 Comments

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 [...]

David Wimble and the long trail of false claims and official corrections

April 3, 2026 // 3 Comments

For years, David Wimble (pictured) has mixed life as a councillor with life as a publisher. That is not the problem. The problem is what happens when the man with the [...]

Folkestone & Hythe Council Backs East Stour and Romney Marsh Sewage Testing

April 2, 2026 // 1 Comment

There are some council debates that arrive gift-wrapped for local government purists: knotty, procedural, full of worthy intent and decorated with enough amendments to make [...]

Otterpool Park Update: Phase 1B Emerges as Likely Start for Early Homes

March 31, 2026 // 0 Comments

The latest Homes England announcement is dressed in the usual language of collaboration, momentum and delivery. But the most important Otterpool development is not in the [...]

Kent solar panel data raises questions over MP Tony Vaughan’s rooftop energy plan

March 30, 2026 // 1 Comment

New Department for Energy Security and Net Zero figures show rooftop solar is already well established across Kent. But while Tony Vaughan KC MP is plainly right that more [...]

	Graham on Otterpool Park Update: £24m Pa…
	Cathy on Stodmarsh Nutrient Credits: Wi…
	shepwayvox on FHDC Temporary Accommodation C…
	Ian on FHDC Temporary Accommodation C…
	Rudy on Trauma Does Not Exist? What Ad…