Folkestone & Hythe District Council

Folkestone & Hythe District Council Portfolio Holder Reports: Otterpool Park, Budget Pressures, Parking Changes and Housing Costs Explained

January 22, 2026 // 0 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Full Council will receive its latest set of Portfolio Holder reports on Wednesday 28 January 2026 as Agenda Item 9 — a familiar [...]

Romney Marsh Solar Farm Approved 8–4: What Folkestone & Hythe Councillors Were Told, What the Papers Contradict, and What Happens Next (25/0542/FH)

January 21, 2026 // 1 Comment

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Planning and Licensing Committee has approved planning application 25/0542/FH for a 40-hectare (98.8-acre) solar farm on land [...]

Folkestone Sports Centre: The Sports Trust’s Accounts, FHDC’s £2.4m Grant, and the UK Subsidy Control Questions

January 20, 2026 // 0 Comments

A beloved community sports complex in Folkestone is on course for a resurrection after an abrupt closure – but only if a £2.4 million council grant gets the green light. [...]

FOLCA 2 Explained: The NHS Medical Centre Deal, the £13.2m Business Case, and the Tender Trail Behind Folkestone’s Town-Centre Redevelopment

January 20, 2026 // 1 Comment

On Tuesday 27 January, Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Overview & Scrutiny Committee will look at a draft Cabinet paper that lands formally on the Cabinet [...]

Who Owns the St Mary’s Solar Farm Land? The Furnival Title Deed, Enviromena’s Funding Chain, and What Planning Committee Must Ask (25/0542/FH)

January 17, 2026 // 0 Comments

We’ve spent the last few days doing the thing that residents always end up doing when a big infrastructure proposal lands on the Marsh: taking the glossy brochure claims, [...]

Lidl Folkestone Planning Application 26/0002/FH: Health, Highway Safety and Contamination — The Evidence Behind the Objections

January 16, 2026 // 1 Comment

A planning application is supposed to be a tidy exercise: drawings, reports, consultations, decision. Planning committees like certainty. Communities like clarity. Developers [...]

Folkestone & Hythe Council Tax Rise Explained: Where the Money Goes and What It Means for Local Services

January 14, 2026 // 1 Comment

Folkestone & Hythe District Council has begun the annual civic tradition of explaining why everything costs more, while promising not to make it feel like it does. Last [...]

Folkestone Ship Street Gasworks Housing Plan: “Health Impact” Tick-Box, Toxic Land Risks, and Equality Act Red Flags in a Deprived Coastal Ward

January 12, 2026 // 1 Comment

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s proposal to transform the derelict former gasworks at Ship Street into 135 homes (planning ref: 25/1316/FH) is now out for public [...]

FHDC Councillor Allowances 2026/27: £128k Rise After Change Fails

January 9, 2026 // 1 Comment

When Folkestone & Hythe District Council set its 2024/25 budget, councillor allowances were quietly pulled into the political bargaining. Now, in the 2026/27 budget [...]

FHDC Budget 2026/27: £6m Hythe Pool Spend, Grant Cliff-Edges and Hidden Costs for Residents

January 8, 2026 // 1 Comment

Folkestone and Hythe District Council (FHDC) is proposing a budget that pours millions into leisure facilities – including a £6 million refurbishment of Hythe Swimming [...]

Why Benefit Fraud Makes Headlines — and Council Insider Fraud Rarely Does

January 1, 2026 // 0 Comments

A familiar story did the rounds in the run-up to Christmas: a benefits claimant exposed by covert video, prosecuted, and written up in a way that leaves little doubt about [...]

Otterpool Park’s 1001-Day Section 106 Delay Exposes England’s Planning Logjam

December 30, 2025 // 0 Comments

On 4 April 2023, Folkestone & Hythe’s Planning and Licensing Committee resolved to grant outline planning permission for Otterpool Park—a new garden town proposed at [...]

Folkestone & Hythe DC Funding 2025/26–2028/29: Core Spending Power, Council Tax and the Real Squeeze

December 28, 2025 // 0 Comments

On 17 December 2025, Government published the provisional Local Government Finance Settlement for 2026/27 to 2028/29 (a three-year settlement, with later years still subject [...]

Draft NPPF 2025 Explained: What’s Changed Since 2024 and What It Means for Planning Decisions, Housing Numbers and the Green Belt

December 24, 2025 // 0 Comments

Yes — we know you love it. We know you wanted it under the Christmas tree. And the Government, in the spirit of festive excess, has delivered: a brand-new Draft National [...]

Wood-Burner Boom in Folkestone & Hythe District: 1,356 Recorded Installs — and the Council’s Blind Spot

December 22, 2025 // 1 Comment

An Environmental Information request has forced Folkestone & Hythe District Council to put hard numbers on something residents have been arguing about for years: how fast [...]

Otterpool Park: More Than £76m Spent, 0 Homes Built — Ten Years After Folkestone & Hythe’s Garden Town Land Buy

December 18, 2025 // 0 Comments

More than £38,967,500 has been spent assembling land and property for Otterpool Park (according to the Land Registry and the council’s asset-register spreadsheet). Add [...]

Princes Parade Write-Off and Oportunitas Valuation Error: Audit Scrutiny Intensifies as Folkestone & Hythe Audit & Governance Meeting Is Postponed

December 16, 2025 // 0 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Audit & Governance Committee was due to meet tomorrow evening (Wednesday 17 December, 6pm) to scrutinise the 2024/25 Statement [...]

Freemasons in Local Government: How Secret Membership and £5bn Procurement Fraud Risk Are Undermining Trust in UK Councils

December 12, 2025 // 1 Comment

The government’s own anti-corruption documents and fraud figures leave little doubt: local government is now a frontline battleground against fraud and corruption – and [...]

Folkestone & Hythe Developer Contributions: CIL & Section 106 Millions, Missing Data, and Infrastructure Funding Statement Compliance Failures (2020–2025)

December 8, 2025 // 0 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Infrastructure Funding Statement (IFS) is meant to be the public’s annual “receipt and report card” for developer [...]

Folkestone & Hythe District Council Procurement Cards: DVLA, Amazon, Hospitality and Vouchers Exposed in 2022–2025 Spend Data

December 3, 2025 // 0 Comments

For more than a decade, procurement cards have been sold to the public as a simple idea: a controlled payment card for low-value goods and services, intended to cut paperwork [...]

Green cabinet member Stephen Scoffham’s clean-air blind spot in Folkestone & Hythe: no PM2.5/PM10 monitoring, no Smoke Control Areas

December 2, 2025 // 0 Comments

A familiar winter scene in Folkestone & Hythe is the smell of smoke hanging in the still air — sometimes cosy, sometimes cloying, sometimes downright intrusive. [...]

Why Folkestone & Hythe Backed the East Kent Unitary ‘Option 3A’ – Democracy, Devolution and the District’s Future Explained

November 20, 2025 // 0 Comments

The old believe everything, the middle-aged suspect everything, the young know everything. Oscar Wilde Folkestone & Hythe District Council has formally backed the [...]

Otterpool Park Exposed: How Folkestone & Hythe’s 10,000-Home ‘Garden Town’ Is Spending Millions Without Planning Permission

November 18, 2025 // 3 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council is gearing up for yet another intense round of work on Otterpool Park – still without an actual planning permission in place, more [...]

Folkestone & Hythe Council Housing: Strong Budget, Slow New Homes

November 18, 2025 // 0 Comments

By any normal measure, Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Housing Revenue Account (HRA) is being run cautiously. At the halfway point of 2025/26, the latest [...]

Folkestone & Hythe District Council Budget Half-Time Score: Council Tax, Reserves and Capital Borrowing Explained

November 17, 2025 // 0 Comments

Six months after councillors approved this year’s budget on 26 February 2025, new second-quarter (Q2) monitoring reports show a familiar picture at Folkestone & Hythe [...]

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