Allotment fees growing in Brighton and Hove (From The Argus)

Pete West. It is becoming clear that the Greens are turning this town into a home for the rich only and the poorer are being penalised.
Many allotment holders use their plots to grow food for their families and to subsidise low incomes ie the elderly.
There is a careful balance between crop yield and outlay ie growing crops which will guarantee to produce and crops which can be stored throughout winter to feed a family.
These increases will actually make it difficult for a plot to pay a genuine return, and therefore, allotments will become the home of Preston Park Green voting hobby gardeners who turn up in their 4x4s with fancy sheds and shingle and can afford to pay the fee to potter about and put a few unusual cabbages in the plot and plant fruit trees and flowers.
You are pricing out people who need the land for genuine use.
Utterly disgraceful but not surprising from these urban Greens who think being Green is installing electricity points for cars (even though the electric is generated by coal) and who want to put solar panels on council houses while the bloody windows fall out, and the Greens who allowed people to illegally camp all over our Green spaces during the key breeding species of animals.
Townies the lot of them, with their towny, posh mates pricing out ordinary people.
Pete West you are a disgrace and this is the sort of policy you would expect from the grasping Tories.

I can think of a better way to balance the books.....get rid of all the jobsworths on the payroll...they don't do anything productive except find good reasons to be 'indispensable', while the people who deliver services we pay for get culled..

and...Football, with changing rooms up from £56 to £80
Wouldnt be so bad if they actually provided pitches which were level, properly marked out and preferably had playable surfaces...

Maxwell's Ghost wrote:
Pete West. It is becoming clear that the Greens are turning this town into a home for the rich only and the poorer are being penalised.
Many allotment holders use their plots to grow food for their families and to subsidise low incomes ie the elderly.
There is a careful balance between crop yield and outlay ie growing crops which will guarantee to produce and crops which can be stored throughout winter to feed a family.
These increases will actually make it difficult for a plot to pay a genuine return, and therefore, allotments will become the home of Preston Park Green voting hobby gardeners who turn up in their 4x4s with fancy sheds and shingle and can afford to pay the fee to potter about and put a few unusual cabbages in the plot and plant fruit trees and flowers.
You are pricing out people who need the land for genuine use.
Utterly disgraceful but not surprising from these urban Greens who think being Green is installing electricity points for cars (even though the electric is generated by coal) and who want to put solar panels on council houses while the bloody windows fall out, and the Greens who allowed people to illegally camp all over our Green spaces during the key breeding species of animals.
Townies the lot of them, with their towny, posh mates pricing out ordinary people.
Pete West you are a disgrace and this is the sort of policy you would expect from the grasping Tories.

Very eloquent, however you just seem to have a chip on BOTH shoulders.

How stupid - surely allotments are EXACTLY the life style the greens want people to have ? Local produce not transported via the road. It clearly shows the Greens real agenda - more and more and more and more and more tax increases under the guise of government cuts. As an allotment holder already they provide absolutely NO service at all for the money. Goodbye IDIOT Greens !!!!!!!!!!!

Absolutely Fight Back. Allotments were always full of ordinary working people genuinely trying to feed families with open stretches of earth planted for maximum crop yield and old folk living on a basic pension who walk to the plots from nearby homes.
In the past few years, these folk have been squeezed out by several increases in the rental of a plot which is making it impossible to make a plot pay so you end up with hobby gardeners on the plot who actually don't really need the plot and yes, they do turn up with massive 4x4s, shingle for the pathways around their raised beds, and half a darned plot of flowers for the windowsill instead of food for the table.
And then they only last two seasons when they realise that turning over a plot once or twice a year is heavy work and nothing like Felicity Kendall's Good Life.
And bog, I would have chips on both shoulders if I could afford the hike in the allotment price to grow my King Edwards, but perhaps my 'dig' unearthed some truth for you.
How's the purple srouting broccoli?

hi all ... RE proposed price hike of 67% on allotment fees....... Meridian tonight have been in touch with me and subject to confirmation tomorrow morning are coming to whitehawk hill allotments to cover the story tomorrow at around midday, Would be great if as many people as possible could turn up to air their views please let me know if you could attend 07897208435

It might be a story if the fees post increase were too high. They still seem ridiculously low to me and should be increased to at least £2 per week absolute minimum and then higher.

Why, oh why do people believe they should get some special deal because they do s*d all?

And yes, I do grow my own and no I am not rich.

Remember if its too cheap someone else is paying for it....get a life!

how does bob marley like his doughnuts?

jam in!!!

Maxwell's Ghost you are a lover scorned.

I can't say I am too thrilled by increases in fees or council tax, but this should be laid at the door of those that got us into this mess in the first place i.e. a Labour government and big finance and now savage local grant cutting by the Tories. Recent consultation demonstrated people wanted more services, not fewer.

You should be careful what you wish for locally; we have recently had a Conservative administration that was a waste of space and out of keeping with a forward looking city and a Labour administration that wasted its opportunity to change B&H while times were good.

Yes i'm right wrote:
It might be a story if the fees post increase were too high. They still seem ridiculously low to me and should be increased to at least £2 per week absolute minimum and then higher.

Why, oh why do people believe they should get some special deal because they do s*d all?

And yes, I do grow my own and no I am not rich.

Remember if its too cheap someone else is paying for it....get a life!

Yes, let's make it as expensive as a TV licence - how sensible ! Allotments, as Maxwell's Ghost has mentioned, should be for growing food. Put the price up too much and it becomes cheaper to buy from the supermarket - you know - those devil incarnates called Tesco and Sainsburys that the Greens hate so much. I took on an allotment at £33 a year to grow food for the table and to teach my children where food came from. The allotments are NOT for Yuppies like you "Yes I'm Right" - they are for hard working low paid people. Would you care to pay the increase for me ? It wouldn't be so bad if the council handed over allotments that were vacated BEFORE they over grew but they don't - it took me over a year to clear mine and all they provide for the cost is a little water. The Greens are only interested in one thing - MONEY. Greedy so in so's !

Maxwell's Ghost wrote:
Pete West. It is becoming clear that the Greens are turning this town into a home for the rich only and the poorer are being penalised. Many allotment holders use their plots to grow food for their families and to subsidise low incomes ie the elderly. There is a careful balance between crop yield and outlay ie growing crops which will guarantee to produce and crops which can be stored throughout winter to feed a family. These increases will actually make it difficult for a plot to pay a genuine return, and therefore, allotments will become the home of Preston Park Green voting hobby gardeners who turn up in their 4x4s with fancy sheds and shingle and can afford to pay the fee to potter about and put a few unusual cabbages in the plot and plant fruit trees and flowers. You are pricing out people who need the land for genuine use. Utterly disgraceful but not surprising from these urban Greens who think being Green is installing electricity points for cars (even though the electric is generated by coal) and who want to put solar panels on council houses while the bloody windows fall out, and the Greens who allowed people to illegally camp all over our Green spaces during the key breeding species of animals. Townies the lot of them, with their towny, posh mates pricing out ordinary people. Pete West you are a disgrace and this is the sort of policy you would expect from the grasping Tories.

Dead right, plus Brighton residents put their names on neighbouring councils lists, which are cheaper

The cost of an allotment is £66 today not £33. If you want to see more back ground look at my Argus blog on £110 Lottie- its a rich man's world.

This is lazy economics by an out-of-touch administration. All we have seen is cut, cut, cut, cut and increase, increase, increase, hitting working people the hardest and this issue will hit those who try to support thier own families without asking for State handouts.
Pete West do you actually know anything about the environment, agriculture or people, apart from the features you have read in The Guardian environment section?
Do you know that £66 will mean people wont grown enough veg to cover the cost of the plot?

Maxwell's Ghost wrote:
This is lazy economics by an out-of-touch administration. All we have seen is cut, cut, cut, cut and increase, increase, increase, hitting working people the hardest and this issue will hit those who try to support thier own families without asking for State handouts. Pete West do you actually know anything about the environment, agriculture or people, apart from the features you have read in The Guardian environment section? Do you know that £66 will mean people wont grown enough veg to cover the cost of the plot?

However he was very keen to cut down the oak trees in wild park, I have been told there were 177 of them, take the money from government funding and put sheep there, which we pay, I was also told £2 a week for each sheep. Then there is the problem of the travellers yet again on the top of the park

Fight Back wrote:

Yes i'm right wrote:
It might be a story if the fees post increase were too high. They still seem ridiculously low to me and should be increased to at least £2 per week absolute minimum and then higher.

Why, oh why do people believe they should get some special deal because they do s*d all?

And yes, I do grow my own and no I am not rich.

Remember if its too cheap someone else is paying for it....get a life!

Yes, let's make it as expensive as a TV licence - how sensible ! Allotments, as Maxwell's Ghost has mentioned, should be for growing food. Put the price up too much and it becomes cheaper to buy from the supermarket - you know - those devil incarnates called Tesco and Sainsburys that the Greens hate so much. I took on an allotment at £33 a year to grow food for the table and to teach my children where food came from. The allotments are NOT for Yuppies like you "Yes I'm Right" - they are for hard working low paid people. Would you care to pay the increase for me ? It wouldn't be so bad if the council handed over allotments that were vacated BEFORE they over grew but they don't - it took me over a year to clear mine and all they provide for the cost is a little water. The Greens are only interested in one thing - MONEY. Greedy so in so's !

Maybe, just maybe you should take a little extra time reading comments before commenting.

As I wrote, I grow my own!

Suggest you stop drinking and smoking and pay the extra!

Clueless

Why not make the skips or A boards look like caravans then they will let you put them anywhere for as long you want for free... or park a caravan on an allotment you will get that free then as well

Alan Phillips wrote:
The cost of an allotment is £66 today not £33. If you want to see more back ground look at my Argus blog on £110 Lottie- its a rich man's world.

Alan, in 2011, the council, in their wisdom, altered the size of a plot from 10 rods to 5 rods, so you now rent two plots, making it £66.
Also in their wisdom, they now give out the new sized half plots to newcomers, that's two and a half rods, big enough for a shed, a water butt and two cabbages.
Your cost will rise to £110.80 over the next two years, I have two old, now four new size plots, and I think that with the rising costs, and the thefts of crops, it will not be worthwhile in the future and this will be the last year that I rent them.

Get used to it - these are just more stealth taxes. You'll be seeing a lot more of them over the next couple of years before local election season. Halving the size of a plot and then putting up its cost is fairly typical, as is removing the option of 30-minute parking at a meter, which I've seen over the last year. The one that really takes the biscuit is £921.85 for dedicating a bench. Add the plaque and that's more than a grand. The greens are turning out to be a throwback to Denis Healey. But he at least only wanted to squeeze the rich until they squeaked and not everyone else as well.

brightonbas wrote:
Rent may increased at any time provided the council takes reasonable
steps to give at least six months notice by way of signs on notice
boards and gates, or by news letters etc. Failure to give notice to any
individual tenant will not invalidate the tenants rent increase.

brightonbas, not bas"sam" by any chance?
Whatever, you sound as if you are a spokesman for the council.
Do you work for them?

Like many other allotmenters I was shocked to hear that my rent would be going up a from £66 to a whopping £110.80.
In 1981 judgement on the Harwood v Borough of Reigate and Banstead held that it was unlawful for local authorities to discriminate against allotment holders by applying higher increases against them as compared with the increases applied against the users of other council owned recreational facilities. Are the council to rise other recreational facilities in lline with this increase?
Secondly, the Election Manifesto states that the Greens will 'provide more land for local food growing'. So why is the Environment minister Pete West planning to subdivide allotments again? This will not provide any more ground for local people to grow food, it will give less land per person.
The Green Party are meeting to agree to the allotment rises on February 9th.I would urge the Green Party to reconsider the proposed rises when they meet and the effect it will have on people who may otherwise have been sympathetic to green principles.

Samslottie- The Greens are proposing to remove ALL financial support for allotments. ie out of the millions of pounds in council tax that allotmenters pay them the Greens plan to re-invest NOTHING into allotments.
Zero.
Nada.
Thanks a lot Greens
Thanks a lot
We will fight back
We will win

A face book group has been set up yesterday to organise opposition to the Green cuts to the allotment subsidy..

link below.. if it doesnt work google 'green council cuts subsidy allotments facebook'

http://www.facebook.
com/pages/Stop-the-G
reen-Council-in-Brig
hton-ending-the-Allo
tments-subsidy/10776
9532685572