Peacehaven council looking at black scarecrow at allotments

The dummy, believed to have been created for a Pride event, has triggered multiple complaints with one visitor telling The Argus she was horrified by it.

The woman, who wanted to remain anonymous, was shocked that it has been allowed at the allotments in Cornwall Avenue, Peacehaven.

She said: “Surely there must be rules against this sort of thing because it’s very offensive.

“I have got family from Kenya and Sri Lanka. It’s a caricature, I’m almost lost for words that someone would put it up and that it’s allowed to be there.

“You can see it just from walking past. You don’t even have to go into the allotment.

“The whole thing, it’s just awful and I wouldn’t want my family to see that. From my perspective, it normalises racist stereotypes.”

The model appears to be of a black woman with a red evening dress, wide eyes and full red lips.

Peacehaven Town Council has said they are “fully aware” of the controversial figure on the allotments.

Tony Allen, town clerk for Peacehaven Town Council, stated that while some people have been offended, many people also like it and believes there were no racist intentions.

He said: “We’re very open, we’re a very inclusive council but we do take people’s comments seriously and as I said, there are a number of people expressed being offended by the scarecrow. There are also a number of people who said they like it.

“So it’s a difficult one for the council because we can’t please everybody, but we’re currently updating our allotments policy to include these types of scarecrows and effigies and so on.

“The policy isn’t quite clear on this aspect so it would be nice to just update the policy to have a clear mention of how scarecrows, effigies and that kind of thing should be dealt with.”

Mr Allen admitted that the model could be taken down temporarily while they come up with a solution.

He added: “It would be very easy for the council to insist that the scarecrow, or whatever you want to call it, is taken down and that is definitely an option that we’re looking at.

“We could say well while this is being looked into, please remove the scarecrow because it is causing some people some offence.

“I know that if we do that, we will get some people saying ‘what’s wrong with you? Why have you ordered this to be taken down? Are you a close-minded bolshy council?’”

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While the council is discussing the issue currently, they also have a leisure and amenities meeting planned for September 7, which will include a discussion on scarecrows and effigies in allotments and look to have a clearer resolution for what is allowed.

He added: “We’re not waiting for the meeting, we’re discussing it at the moment but one option which is on the table of course is just to ask for it to be taken down in the interim.”

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