A wasted opportunity

Two councils have succeeded in getting almost £50 million from the Government to help deal with a mountain of waste.

But unless they stop feuding over sites where the rubbish can be placed, all the cash may be wasted too.

East Sussex County Council, and Brighton and Hove Council, have done well to persuade the Government to agree that a private finance initiative is necessary to deal with waste in the future.

It means they can go ahead and advertise for a contractor who will undertake the huge jobs, likely to cost approaching £1 billion over the next 25 years.

Most of the sites for waste are in place. But there's still doubt over where an incinerator should be placed to deal with waste for the west of the area and where a land raising tip can be built.

Sites were agreed last year by officers and councillors from both authorities. But the nerve of county councillors failed at the last moment.

They will have to be bold now and choose sites quickly, knowing there will be opposition wherever they go.

Otherwise, all the hard work involved in making this bid to Westminster will have been wasted.

Airheads

Disabled Samuel Johnston was flown to Paris and the USA without any problems.

But the Australian airline Qantas is raising problems over his dream holiday to Sydney, which means he can't go.

Samuel needs to catheterise himself every three hours and this has been achieved before without any problems. Qantas insists this should be done in the cabin toilet which he can't use.

The airline is being unnecessarily petty in sticking to its rules. Surely it could make an exception for Samuel.

Flick off

Anyone who's ever flicked a footballer across a nylon pitch will feel a pang of pain at the news that Subbuteo is to be made no more.

Computer games have ensured that the celebrated table football game has been ruled offside by manufacturers Hasbro.

Now the makers of computer games are over the moon. Traditionalists must be as sick as a parrot.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.