No dignity in death

Death has not been dignified for scores of patients who spent their last days at Eastbourne District General Hospital over the Christmas and New Year period.

Because the hospital mortuary has been full, the bodies have been placed in a refrigerated lorry in the grounds.

The flu epidemic has led to a soaring death rate for elderly people in recent weeks. Yet astonishingly, the local crematorium was open for only two days over the holiday.

The hospital did the best it could in the circumstances by hiring the lorry. But it should not have been placed in such an invidious position.

Eastbourne Borough Council must have known before Christmas that deaths were rising rapidly, yet it did nothing to keep the crematorium open for longer than normal.

Death does not take a holiday and neither should council staff when there is a real emergency like this.

Street action

Residents of Woodland Drive in Hove took direct action when they were worried about their road being used as a racetrack.

They parked their cars in lines so that traffic could not roar down the road at more than 50mph as usual.

This was after a traffic-calming scheme had been rejected by Brighton and Hove councillors.

Now, more than a year later, the authority has prepared a new scheme that should solve the problem. It has been welcomed by councillors and residents alike.

What a pity this scheme wasn't put into place in 1998. It would have saved an awful lot of time and trouble.

Gift horse wins

Road contractor Tommy Thompson felt so sorry for a bedraggled horse he found sheltering under a tree that he footed the bill for it to be nursed back to health.

Now the horse, called Mullintor, has repaid his faith in it by winning the Victor Chandler Sussex National race at Fontwell.

Mullintor has now won around £20,000 in prize money proving that you should never look a gift horse in the mouth.

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