Bus plea

CAMPAIGNERS are calling for better bus services to the Conquest hospital.

Hastings SOS Bus Campaign blasted present services as 'ridiculous'.

Barrie Ashby, chairman, said at the group's monthly meeting last Thursday: "It seems ridiculous that people coming to the hospital from elsewhere have to change buses. It's out of order.

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"I heard that a pregnant woman from Rye had to catch a train into Hastings and get another bus to the Conquest.

"After she left the hospital she could not get home because there was no bus."

Mr Ashby called for the 710, which runs between Hastings, Bexhill and Eastbourne, and the 711 service to and from Dover in Kent, which stops in Rye and Camber, to call additionally at the Conquest so people living in these areas are not forced to change buses at Silverhill.

He said the extra cost to Stagecoach would be 'minimal'.

Mr Ashby said: "We are not talking about huge amounts of money here.

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"A lot of people from Bexhill and Rye have to come into Hastings to use the Conquest.

"The 710 for instance only stops in Silverhill and people have to get another bus."

The chairman said the company had made 55m in profits between April and October this year across all of its services in Hastings and the rest of the UK.

Mr Ashby added that people living in Rye, Bexhill and elsewhere never knew whenever Stagecoach introduced revisions or improvements to its timetables.

He said: "Its marketing is pitiful and pathetic."

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Hastings SOS Bus Campaign is hoping to set up a meeting between its members, representatives from the Patient and Public Involvement Forum (PPI) and Stagecoach management in January of February to discuss the issue.