We no longer have a Green council in the People’s Republic of Brighton and Hove – but it often feels that way. Way back before Zack Polanski was even dreaming of being a nipple-charming, breast-enhancing hypnotist, we had the first Green MP, Caroline Lucas, from 2010 to 2024. She seemed somewhat wacky at the time, wanting “ecocide” to be made a crime at the International Criminal Court, up there with genocide, but now seems to have the gravitas of Baroness Betty Boothroyd in comparison to the strange gang of characters who have succeeded her.
Much as I love my adopted city, it would be Brighton and Hove which spawned an unwashed monster. We are blessed with a huge student population, most posh and incoming. It’s a weary gag among my friends who live in streets colonised by them that the less “house-proud” the front yard, the more likely a house is to have a “VOTE GREEN” poster in the window at election times.
A few years back, the University of Sussex announced that it intended to set aside nearly half of its land for “rewilding”. You can see why the students don’t bother clearing up their mess, when their elders opine that the best way to achieve “biodiversity” is by mowing the grass a limited number of times – or not at all.
The line between being biodiverse and being dangerous has been blurred a good deal in this once-lovely city by the sea, where the Green council “rewilded” miles of pavement, causing several disabled and elderly people to end up in A&E. It was a relief when Labour got the council back (can’t believe I wrote that), but after four years, “rewilding” had caused lasting damage to pavements and even more damage to the confidence of disabled people who found it difficult to negotiate this shambles.
In 2024, Labour councillor Tim Rowkins, chair of the environment committee, said the council was spending £50,000 a month on repairs to pavements, with a backlog of repairs totalling £60m, and weeds being the main cause of damage: “Parts of the city are completely wild and many of our residents – wheelchair users, parents and carers with buggies, those with visual or mobility impairments – simply can’t travel the distance of their own street safely.”
Luckily, as I am blessed with an uxorious husband and a chorus line of female fans, this has never bothered me personally – but not every paraplegic is as pampered as I am and many must find their way around on their own.
After taking over Brighton and Hove, Labour council leader Bella Sankey said the weeds situation was giving her “sleepless nights”.
“During certain months of the year many pavements are not accessible for wheelchair users, parents and carers with buggies and those with visual or mobility impairments… as well as multiple resident injuries, our manual weeders have also had injuries and are now only able to weed for a maximum of three hours a day given the physical risk.”
Oh, innocent days, when the election of a Labour council was a source of joy for my fellow wheelchair warriors, when the promise of weedkiller becoming as strong a smell on the streets of Brighton and Hove as marijuana. But now they’ve turned out to be as dismissive of us as their less-washed comrades, with a recent motion from the Conservatives on the council accusing them of “a lack of focus on the lives of the disabled and elderly” – easily a fair charge, in my opinion.
Councillor Anne Meadows counted the ways: “Higher parking fees affect Blue Badge holders to a greater extent because they rely on their cars even more than able-bodied users. Lack of focus on dangerously uneven paving and obstructions such as advertising A-boards which take up a significant amount of pavement space add to the challenges the disabled and elderly face. The roll-out of EV charging points without public consultation has potentially made it harder for Blue Badge holders and the elderly to park close to home. Huge investment has been focused on cycling and e-scooters to the detriment of the disabled and elderly through the removal of disabled bays.”
The relegation of the disabled in Brighton and Hove’s top 10 of preferred pressure groups has been matched by the promotion of the cycling lobby. Cyclists really rule the roost here; a fortune has been spent on cycle lanes, but many of these clowns still ride bikes the size of motorbikes on the pavements. I’ve had beef with them since long before I was in a wheelchair, but it’s far worse now. Cars will often stop chivalrously to let me get across the street when the drop-kerb is not near a crossing – bikes, no chance. I understand that cyclists believe “four wheels bad, two wheels good” – but my two wheels seem to inspire no solidarity in them, as they shriek at me to get out of the way.
In London, Sadiq Khan’s plan to pedestrianise Oxford Street at the end of October has received a sharp rebuke from Inclusion London, pointing out that the now-demonised taxis and buses are essential to our ability to move from one postcode to another.
Though both Brighton and Hove and London are Labour, we see in their attitude towards the truly “vulnerable” the creeping influence of Green thought. I can’t help thinking that behind all the Be Kind blather, the core of the nature-worship which initially inspired the Green movement is a misanthropy which often sees the people outside of one’s favoured circle as little more than a blot on the landscape.
If this is true of the able-bodied members of the pack, how much more so of the weak and wounded? You need a loud voice and sharp elbows to get to the top of the grievances hot-list these days, and qualify as a member of a “vulnerable” group deserving respect and attention; something which we, the disabled, tend to be lacking in, broken in varying degrees as we are.