Congratulations to Shoreham Wordfest for an excellent programme over the last three weeks. I caught a well-attended talk on archaeology at the Shoreham Centre and an intriguing brush by with some of Shoreham’s fascinating historical figures at Marlipins from Charles ll to the Pashley Brothers of Shoreham Airport fame. They would have been horrified to see the demise of the FTA flying school at the airport earlier this year and I have been working with the students affected and the British Airline Pilots Association to raise the problems threatening pilot training in Parliament.
I have been receiving a lot of complaints about erratic post deliveries recently which is not limited to Sussex as Royal Mail faces national problems with recruitment and sickness. East Worthing & Shoreham is served by 4 sorting offices at Portsalde, Shoreham, Lancing and Worthing. There is a particular problem at the moment with parts of Worthing and Southwick so last week I visited the Portsalde sorting office to meet staff and the area manager who covers the coastal stretch from Newhaven to Arundel.
I have published an account of my meeting on my website but essentially at one stage around half of the posties there were off work through illness especially succumbing to covid again. They are also struggling to recruit new staff which was suspended during the industrial dispute fortunately now resolved. When I visited though there was no post more than 24 hours old in the depot and I did scout around out back to make sure they were not sacks piling up. I have asked to be kept up to speed with future problems which may impact my constituents.
Good to see Herald reader Eric Waters from Lancing has read my newspaper delivered through his door and is musing on the title ‘NEW&S.’ I will put him out of his misery. EW&S is the East Worthing & Shoreham constituency and an N in front makes it NEWS – local news. Simples.
