Their demand for an extraordinary meeting of Hastings Borough Council has been granted.

It is being held as a result of an important recent council debate on controversial proposals which could mean either Hastings or Eastbourne losing their specialist maternity units being cut short.

Veteran Lib Dem politician Pam Brown, former long serving local councillor, said:

 “This is the first time the Council has held an extraordinary meeting.”

 The special meeting will be held on September 5 and will give Lib Dem leader Richard Stevens the opportunity to finish his speech which was savagely curtailed at the council meeting on July 25, when “time lord” Mayor Maureen Charlesworth brought the meeting to a shock closure. She cut off Cllr Stevens mid-speech, and did not call on members for an extension to the meeting.

Only Cllr Stevens and Tory deputy leader of the council Matthew Beaver have supported Option 5 to continue maternity services in both towns.

The call for an extraordinary meeting was also backed by Independent Cllr Stephen Springthorpe, who resigned from the Conservative Party over the issue. Tories and Labour cabinet members have voted together for Option 4 – for maternity services to remain in Hastings only.

Freeman of the borough Pam Brown declared :

 “Hands off the Conquest campaigners had have rightly warned against playing ‘us and them' with Eastbourne – the decision for another service in the future could well favour Eastbourne at the expense of Hastings .”

Richard Stevens added:

“Labour and the Conservatives are increasingly out of touch with local priorities. People are saying to me that it is time for a change. It's time for the Liberal Democrats.”

Councillor Bond says, ‘I have been impressed by the way that local people have taken up the challenge of presenting their cases to the Council, and I am glad that the Council appears to have listened.

‘I have been out and about explaining the implications of the scheme and have had a number of helpful conversations where residents have identified potential problems, and I have been able to feed these back to the Twin Bin team.

‘The Council's decision of 3 August is a welcome one, and I hope that we can move forward, as a town, to recycling solutions that help the environment and make sense locally.'

If you are having problems, why not call the Twin Bin team on 0845 274 1077.

The plans, launched by the Liberal Democrats at the end of July, include:

• Reforming the massively complicated tax credits system to make it simpler and to end the massive overpayments
• Increasing child benefit by around £5 a week for families in Hastings and Rye
• A “pupil premium” that will boost schools in deprived areas
• Immediately restoring the earnings link to the basic state pension to ensure the income of older people does not fall further behind that of the rest of the population.

David Hancock, chair of the local party said,

“Under Labour, the difference between rich and poor is wider than it was under Margaret Thatcher. As Chancellor, Gordon Brown has allowed the tax burden to go up on those with the lowest incomes.

 “He has given us the massively complicated tax credits system that is riddled with errors.

 “Yet at the same time, the tax credit system is a disincentive to people on benefits to work. Our proposals to tackle poverty will ensure there is a greater incentive to work and save for retirement.

 “By scrapping council tax and lowering the rate of income tax, we will ensure that when people come off benefits and start work, less of their hard earned money is taken from them by the government.

 “Furthermore, the additional £5 a week for all families with children will be a significant helping hand to many people living Hastings and Rye.  

“As a former teacher, I know that our proposals for additional funding for children from the most deprived areas going straight to their schools will give them a better start in life. With a better education, they are less likely to become dependent on benefits in later life.

 “Council tax falls most heavily on those on low incomes and I am delighted to see that the Liberal Democrats are calling for it to be scrapped and replaced by a fairer local income tax, based on ability to pay.

 “As a local campaigner, I meet many elderly people and I have seen how their income and standard of living of a large number of our senior citizens has fallen behind that of the rest of the population.

 “So I fully support the proposal to link immediately the basic state pension to the average rise in pay.

 “In a wealthy country such as Britain, we should not have such a huge gap between rich and poor as we have now under Labour.

 “Our plans will go a long way to closing the poverty gap by giving people a real incentive to work. They will end some of the penalties imposed on people who have saved for their retirement.

 “The proposals will be debated at our national conference in September and I am looking forward to voting for them .”

Their formal request to the Town Hall follows last week's council meeting (July 25) when a vital debate on the future of maternity services in Hastings and Eastbourne was cut short. Mayor Maureen Charlesworth turned “Time Lord” at the meeting, cutting off Lib Dem leader Richard Stevens mid-sentence in his speech supporting Option 5: to preserve maternity services for both Hastings and Eastbourne.

She failed to ask members if they wished to extend the meeting's three hours' limit which she judged had run out. It meant that the Council also failed to debate the twin bins rubbish collection scheme and the authority's accounts.

Independent councillor Stephen Springthorpe is backing the request for an extraordinary meeting.

Cllr Richard Stevens says,

“Labour and the Conservatives tried to close down the debate last Wednesday because it was too uncomfortable for them.

 “They made a mockery of democracy by using red tape to stop us discussing Option 5, the Twin Bins and the Council accounts.

 “But we will not be silenced when it comes to getting local people's voices heard. We are using the Council's constitution to call an extraordinary meeting, so we can finish the debate. And we are also asking for the August Cabinet meeting to be reinstated, after it was cancelled on 27 July.

 “The sad reality is that, just as Labour and the Tories are getting into a cosy consensus at national level, they are bedding down in Hastings . “Let us be absolutely clear: the Conservatives and Labour have formed an unholy alliance here. I want local people to know that the Lib Dems are listening, and that we are the real alternative for this town.”