Thanet Under Threat by Independent Media Society is now available on youtube.com - but you don't have to go looking for this film because here it is along with an opportunity for you to share you opinion.



What is your opinion on the development going on in Thanet?

Do we have a democratic voice?

Has Thanet's local council become nothing more than an administrator of Central Government?

What can we do?

The site at Thanet Earth made the news recently because a rare archaeological find was made prior to the concreting over of the land. Rather than repeating others with this one here is a video that tells all.

Caroline Lucas, Green MEP for the South East (and a blogger), will be leading a public meeting as he principle speaker on 12th December in Ramsgate to discuss "the future for Thanet". On the agenda will be the China Gateway and Thanet Earth as well as topics touching the local airport and Phase 2 of the East Kent Access road.

Caroline Lucas is proposing a "green New Deal" although I have no details as to what that might be. Also speeking will be Hilary Newport of CPRE and John Stewart of Aiport Watch. Local filmmaker Norman Thomas will chair the meeting chairing.

The meeting will take place at half past seven on the 12th December in St George's Church Hall Ramsgate (CT11 8RG).

Are you planning on going? What do you think might be achieved (if anything)? What do you think?

The big buzz at the moment is that the Turner Contemporary have put together a board of directors. The thing that has a few people upset is that so few people from Thanet or even Kent are on this board. However with the likes of Roly Keating and Sir David Manning in there maybe we have a hope of seeing some Turner works in the Turner Centre.

Councillor Clive Hart is said to be "disappointed" that the members of the board have less connection to Margate. Whereas I'm just happy about the minimal influence of our local council. Maybe with actual talent involved now it might be a project of worth.

This also means that the lack of direction beyond product launches and lunches could now be thing of the past. We might even see progress.

What do you think?

Read Tony Flaigs View, the official announcements ...I'll add more as they are published.

Yes it'sNovember and for those of us with a need to write more than just a blog post a day it's time to dust off the fiction skills and begin the month long novel writing quest. 50,000 words in 30 days. So far I am on track to win.

NaNoWriMo as it is known is the (inter) National Novel Writing Month and it is ten years old this year. I'm taking part and this year my fiction is set on an estate much like the ones we have so many of around here. They do say it is best to write what you know and I am.

Next I'll be asking "what should Chris Godden do to improve his reputation on-line in Thanet?" (aside from that, or that...)

Until then enjoy what you do because the world has yet to end. Thanet is still here and we still have our health.

See you later.

In a recent (undated) press release Thanet District Council have announced their "plan" to "save" £4.5 million over the next three years. This plan boils down to "restructuring" so either the council has been running a sub optimal ship for years or they plan to shed some 50 jobs or so.

One also has to ask - if this is so efficient and the savings so easy to find was the council running at excessive cost before?

The biggest proposed saving is to come from a "restructure" of the council’s Revenues and Benefits services, which, they say, is expected to bring savings of around £400,000. Given that the listed savings account for only £950,000 and over four years this is only £3.8 million one must assume that this is per year. So I make that approximately 20 jobs are to go from this "department".

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» Continue Reading: Thanet District Council Stealth Announce Redundancies

The China Gateway, Thanet. It's big news right now and a lot of people are talking about it (still) and search for it (Check Thanet's own search engine on China Gateway to see how much has been said of late).

So I thought I'd give you a quick tour of some of the sites talking about it.

Thanet Finder Blog Portal - China Gateway Page gives a good breakdown of the latest and greatest news and blog views on the subject. However space there is tight so let's look a little deeper.

First I guess we should look at the Thanet Council Disision on the subject before flipping over to the BBC coverage of the China Gateway story. From there you should find links to further stories on the subject.

Research and reporting guru Michael Child talks candidly about the risks having now been convinced that the environmental risks are too great. Read everything he has had to say on the subject here. Nip over to Michael's website to see which way each councillor voted.

The water supply is just the thing that one blogger felt needed saving savethanetswatersupply.blogspot.com was the result.

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» Continue Reading: China Gateway, Thanet

David Green's post Tory Crisis at Thanet Council expands on a point he raised in an earlier post Monitoring the Council's Budget in which the short fall in Council budget was seen to be about £2M. The fact that the council has lost us £3M in bad property speculation suggests that we are now going to have to pay for a gamble that went very, very wrong.

Who pays most though?

Sure we tax payers are going to feel the bite as another slcie of our pie is eaten by the council but it is the poor that I worry most about. I have seen and heard some shocking stories of the way the benefits department have treated claimants of late. While the tax payer might loose some of their pie the benefits claimant is in danger not only of loosing the whole pie but retrospectively owing last year's and next's too.

It's all well and good for those (currently) with jobs to call all needy people lazy and wish to cancel all benefits but the truth is that we would be a lot worse off than we are now. Poverty is not an easy problem to address and no trite quickies are going to solve it. Studies have shown that even after the original causes of poverty are removed problems still persist well over a hundred years later. What the council is currently doing with the local benefits system is only making a bad problem worse and likely to last a lot longer.

As it is we are still feeling the effects of the last Conservative budget crises in Thanet and in no way do we need to have our most vulnerable people forced to endure a second one.

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» Continue Reading: Council Treatment of the Poor is Very Poor

Did you know that Thanet has a "Bus Strategy" (whatever that might be). It basically sketches out the idea that from 2000 to 2010 TDC and KCC want to achieve a few things and are willing to pay to get there.

Should you want to you can read the Thanet Bus Plan here: http://www.thanet.go...THANET170304.pdf.

Up until now I had wondered why Stagecoach seemed to suddenly gain such a strong hold in the area and why a number of the little bus companies (such as the much cheaper "Thanet Bus") vanished at the end of the 1990s. The answer it seems is that TDC and KCC wanted it that way.

Keep reading to find out more.

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» Continue Reading: Buses - TDC's Answer to Traffic Problems (apparently)

Today's post is by guest blogger Markus Skupeika from Florida. What can an American of all people have to say to us in Thanet? Quite a lot as it turns out. Markus talks about local search engine marketting and how it can serve your business far more effectively than targetting global traffic (most of whom will not want to buy from you).

Local Search Engine Marketing To Improve Your Local Business

By Markus Skupeika

Do you run a local business and want to get only the local clients from your website?

Yes, it is possible. You can put the emphasis on local search engine marketing to provide you the required support.

For long this had been a great problem for websites of small business owners. A lot of them used to get more global visitors than the local. The conversion rate had been to poor and so was sale. You must remember that a website is not about a few pages. And if you want to run an eCommerce site, you need to invest a lot on providing backend support.

Even if you outsource your SEO and other promotional and backend support jobs to a third party for lesser amount, the wastage had always been huge. The best solution for optimum use of your money is to put emphasis on local search engine marketing.

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» Continue Reading: Local Search Engine Marketing To Improve Your Local Business