The trouble erupted when Connex South Central signed a deal with a private hire firm to manage two ranks at the station.

This incurred the wrath of taxi drivers who don't want to buy permits costing more than £400 enabling them to pick up fares at the station.

There's never been any love lost between cabbies and their private hire rivals.

Arrangements such as the one just started at Eastbourne are bound to run into trouble.

Nationally, the Government should abolish the distinction between cabs and private hire.

It causes loads of trouble and is not understood by most passengers.

Locally, cabbies will just have to buy the permits or lose business at the station. After a lot of huffing and puffing, most of them will because they can't afford not to.

JAY Kensett was only 16 and full of life when he was stabbed to death on the Whitehawk estate in Brighton.

It was a shocking tragedy, not only for Jay and his family, but also for his young fiancee Cassie Watts.

Her dreams of a long and happy life together with Jay will sadly not come true. She will never forget him but she is young enough to rebuild her life in time.

THE Brighton Promettes combined glamour with information when they strolled along the seafront in the Fifties and Sixties.

They sold Brighton to the world and were mightily successful at doing so for many years.

Their day has long gone - but couldn't we have just a one-off revival for the millennium to show today's visitors what they are missing?

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