ShepwayVox Dissent is not a Crime

HMRC names & shames Alcaline and Shepherd Neame, among others, for NOT paying minimum-wage

November 6, 2025 // 0 Comments

Kent’s latest “name and shame” list from HM Revenue & Customs reads like a roll call of penny-pinching employers who failed to pay legal minimum rates. The current [...]

The Air We Don’t Measure: Folkestone & Hythe’s DCs PM2.5 Blind Spot and Wood-Burner Pollution

November 6, 2025 // 0 Comments

The council’s latest Air-Quality Report 2025 measures nitrogen dioxide to the decimal point — but sidesteps the particles most linked to early deaths. Meanwhile, Hythe is [...]

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Ward Budgets: £43k Gap in Council Report

November 5, 2025 // 0 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s draft Equality & Diversity report 2024-25, to go before Cabinet on the 12 Novemeber, claims £83,000 in ward grants supporting [...]

Folkestone & Hythe s106 Breach at Sandgate Pavilions: Stoneleigh House Link Not Secured—14 Affordable Homes Lost

November 4, 2025 // 1 Comment

On 3 May 2016, Folkestone & Hythe’s Tory controlled Planning Committee approved Sandgate Pavilions (owned by a David Pownceby Company) (Y15/1154/SH) subject to a [...]

Stoneleigh House and the £1.716m Question: Where Did the Affordable Homes Go?

November 3, 2025 // 0 Comments

Updated: 09:35 on 3 Nov 2025 A fire-damaged Stoneleigh House on Tram Road, Folkestone, goes to auction this month with its 2018 consent for 14 affordable flats long since [...]

Is KentOnline Biased? KCC Coverage of Reform UK vs Conservatives

November 1, 2025 // 1 Comment

Kent County Council has generated noticeably more headlines since Reform UK took control in May. Is that bias — or simply more news? Some readers have suggested KentOnline [...]

Napier Barracks: Clearsprings Profits as Kent’s Private Rental Market Squeezed

November 1, 2025 // 0 Comments

On the edge of town, Napier Barracks has come to symbolise a national experiment in mass asylum accommodation that a High Court judge ruled unlawful in 2021. The Home [...]

Folkestone Harbour: Deprivation Endures Despite Regeneration

October 31, 2025 // 2 Comments

Folkestone’s waterfront has been remade with panache: the derelict Harbour Arm became a promenade of bars and food stalls; a boardwalk curls along the beach; the first [...]

Kent’s East–West Health Divide: Coastal Communities Falling Behind

October 31, 2025 // 0 Comments

A decade of Conservative-led austerity in Britain has coincided with worsening health gaps and stalled life expectancy. Recent reviews warn that cuts to public spending have [...]

Kent’s Most Deprived Areas: Rankings, Trends, and What Must Change

October 30, 2025 // 3 Comments

New government data shows Kent districts have slipped down England’s deprivation league over the past decade — and it has done so against the backdrop of Conservative [...]

Deprivation Deepens in Folkestone & Hythe, Latest Data Shows

October 30, 2025 // 1 Comment

An initial look at the latest Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD) shows Folkestone & Hythe has fallen further down England’s deprivation table. On the headline “rank [...]

Kent County Council No Use Empty (NUE) loans: £195,600 paid out before approval, FOI reveals

October 29, 2025 // 0 Comments

Kent County Council’s No Use Empty (NUE) loan programme is facing accuracy questions after an audit of the council’s FOI spreadsheet found two entries where the first [...]

Britain First protest at Lydd Town Hall; meeting cancelled over paperwork

October 29, 2025 // 1 Comment

Britain First supporters are planning to demonstrate outside Lydd Town Hall on Monday 3 November at 7.30pm. Kent Police have been notified; in an email seen by The Shepway [...]

Ameet Kotecha, Panama Papers and Hythe Care Home: Explained

October 29, 2025 // 1 Comment

Boutique Care Homes is building a 66-bed care home on Hythe’s former Smiths Medical site, with the scheme regularly showcased as a local regeneration success. Coverage this [...]

Why Folkestone & Hythe is getting poorer — and how to turn it around

October 28, 2025 // 1 Comment

New official slides from the district’s Community Safety Partnership (CSP) confirm what many residents have felt for years: Folkestone & Hythe has grown poorer relative [...]

Folkestone and Hythe Council: A Decade of Temporary Staff Costs

October 28, 2025 // 0 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s temporary staff costs have seesawed over the past decade, peaking at about £1.66m in 2022/23 before falling to £853,699 in [...]

Folkestone & Hythe District Council homelessness costs: the complete guide

October 27, 2025 // 0 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe’s homelessness ledger tells a stark story. Between April and September 2025, the district council paid £543,556.40 for temporary accommodation, [...]

Brexit Freedom? UK Travellers Meet EU Fingerprint Checks & Facial Scans

October 23, 2025 // 1 Comment

We took a blowtorch to the UK’s ID card database in 2011, congratulated ourselves on liberty, and then—fast-forward—built weekend plans around pressing our fingers on [...]

Kent County Council audit: clean opinion, deep financial risks

October 23, 2025 // 0 Comments

Kent audit signs off the Tories’ final year — but warns of structural risks the new Reform UK leadership must now tackle Grant Thornton will issue an unqualified opinion [...]

Council Tax Bailiffs in Kent: Councils Ranked and What It Means for You

October 21, 2025 // 0 Comments

The numbers are rising. After a fall in 2023/24, Kent’s 12 district councils sharply increased the number of Council Tax debts sent to enforcement agents in 2024/25 — [...]

Is FHDC’s Council Tax Policy Unfair to Disabled Universal Credit Claimants?

October 21, 2025 // 0 Comments

An FHDC case exposes a fixable flaw in working-age Council Tax Reduction—and a lawful route the Council could use today. The Story In A Nutshell A disabled resident who [...]

Otterpool Park LLP: £2.2m Interest Owed on £24m Folkestone & Hythe District Council Loans — Explained

October 19, 2025 // 0 Comments

Otterpool Park LLP—the master-developer vehicle wholly controlled by Folkestone & Hythe District Council—has leaned ever more heavily on council loans while tangible [...]

Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Plan to Cut Temporary Accommodation Costs

October 17, 2025 // 0 Comments

Cabinet backs a £5m plan to buy 20 council-owned homes for temporary accommodation and temporarily switch up to 20 existing council properties — as usage has doubled from [...]

Seven Days or Ten? FHDC’s Council Tax Clock Doesn’t Match Its Own Rules

October 16, 2025 // 0 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council (FHDC) tells residents two different things about the same, high-stakes moment: how quickly you must clear council tax arrears after a [...]

Green-Led Folkestone & Hythe Council Falling Short on Climate Action

October 15, 2025 // 0 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council has joined the call for Westminster to pass the Climate and Nature Bill. That is welcome symbolism. But the council’s own climate [...]

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