Shingle row at beach beauty spot

Steve Hall, who owns part of the beach at Herbrand Walk, claimed Councillor Joanne Gadd arranged for shingle to be moved by the Environment Agency without consulting him first.

He said: “She has got no right.

“She is not part of any department that can tell the Environment Agency to move the shingle back.”

Mr Hall had pushed the shingle away from the roadside last spring to create space for car parking.

The work took two days and cost approximately £2,000.

Now he is “fuming” because this shingle has been partly moved back with no approach made to himself and says this was done at the behest of Cllr Gadd.

Mr Hall had hoped to set up a kayak centre and applied to Rother District Council last year to install changing facilities, public toilets, lifeguard hut, bicycle stands and car parking, as well as information signs.

He said: “This has nothing to do with me having planning permission or not.

“What right has she got to tell the Environment Agency to move the shingle back? None whatsoever.

“She is just against me – that’s all. She has made it personal.”

He added: “She has gone over everybody’s head, and off her own bat done this.”

Cllr Gadd would not confirm or deny her involvement to the Observer. “I am not saying if I did it or not,” she said.

She did say however she was concerned about an eight-inch drop from the side of the road along the beach down to the ground and felt if a car overtook another at speed this was a source of danger.

She also said she had asked East Sussex County Council to have the shingle “put back properly” since Mr Hall pushed it away last April.

She claimed he shouldn’t have done this “without planning permission in the first place” and added: “He went against planning regulations because he was turned down... he still started to go ahead with it, and then it was left in a dangerous position.

“I was on and on to the county council and the highways department to get it sorted because of the accidents that could happen, plus the fact someone could trip up over it – it was nearly an eight inch drop.”

Steve Hall agreed that the kerb drop highlighted by Cllr Gadd is still there, and is approximately three metres in width, but he said moving the shingle half a metre towards it made no difference anyway.

He added: “That problem has not gone away. This has not solved anything. It has just made it worse again.”

He is now bracing himself for complaints from motorists that there is nowhere to park or requests for help to pull vehicles out of trouble.

Visitor Chris Finch, of Brighton, has already been towed away because he drove onto the beach and went deep in the shingle – he had to call the AA to help.

“It went right up to the axle,” said Mr Finch.

“We had a dickens of a job getting it out.”

A spokesman for the Environment Agency confirmed that contractors moved the shingle in the area of Herbrand Walk Beach from March 21-25 and completed tidying up on Saturday April 2.  

“It was agreed with the local councillor (Mrs Joanne Gadd) and East Sussex County Highways that shingle would be pushed back close to the road whilst re-grading of the beach was being done.

“Although the beach is privately owned, under the Land Drainage Act the Environment Agency has right of access to repair damaged sea defences which pose a flood risk to the public.”