Profit before the people

Money talks louder than compassion when it comes to closing the French Convalescent Home in Kemp Town.

Why else should trustees want to shut a home which is almost full when there is still strong demand for its services?

The decision is disgraceful. It's been done because the home occupies a large site on the seafront which is worth a lot of cash.

How much more profitable to put 66 very sheltered flats there than to keep a much-loved home going for the old folk who love it.

The slab-like building proposed by Bovis Retirement Homes for the site is no substitute for the grand chateau-like home that's been there for more than a century.

No wonder our petition to save the home already has more than 1,000 signatures and people have been queueing up to sign it.

It could and should be saved. And it's still not too late for trustees and Bovis to do the decent thing and admit they were wrong.

Sitting it out

The simple ideas are often the best. Sussex police officers have been told to park their cars outside the homes of known villains.

While the police carry out their paperwork, drug dealers can't receive any customers and burglars don't want to go out.

Critics may call it legalised harassment or stalking but what's wrong with that?

If it sends criminals mad and stops them carrying out their dirty work, we should all be grateful.

Memories remain

When Camberwick Green and Trumpton went out of fashion, creator Gordon Murray had no sentiment about the puppets he'd created.

He put all the characters, created out of odds and ends, on a bonfire and they went up in smoke.

Now there's a resurgence of interest in these children's programmes, what a pity they've all gone.

But it wasn't a surprise that Trumpton Fire Brigade never managed to put the bonfire out.

That's because Pugh, Pugh, Barney Mcgrew, Cuthbert, Dibble and Grubb were on it.

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