St Leonards pirate street drinker

Hastings City of Culture’s rum deal

A proposal to rebrand street drinkers in Hastings and St Leonards as pirates is just one of the ideas being put forward as part of the town’s bid to become the UK’s City of Culture for 2017 writes HOT’s John Diamond-White.

The idea would see street drinkers issued with bandanas, eye patches, striped T-shirts, stuffed parrots and other pirate paraphernalia in an effort to gentrify the town, where street drinking has reached epidemic proportions. Plastic hooks and cutlasses may also be made available, subject to health and safety risk assessments by Town Hall staff.

Silver tankards would replace beer cans in the scheme which could be eligible for arts funding as Hastings, St Leonards and Bexhill compete against 10 other towns and cities across the UK for the title of City of Culture. Street drinkers may also be required to attend sea shanty singing classes or risk losing some of their benefits.

According to the proposal, currently in the consultation phase, the boozy pirates “would reflect and celebrate the town’s rich history of smuggling and other anti-social behaviour from days gone by, engaging with and entertaining visitors at key destination points in Hastings during 2017.”

But concerned resident Franciscus Harends of St Leonards, one of the 14,231 people who took part in the world’s biggest gathering of pirates in Hastings last summer slammed the concept. “It’s an absolutely terrible idea,” he says. “Street drinking is a big problem in St Leonards where we probably have 20 or more drinkers on the streets on a daily basis,  but we need to look at why it’s happening and how we can resolve the problem, not turn it into a fancy dress party.”

Speaking about the overall bid for City of Culture, leader of Hastings Council Jeremy Birch has said, “We are in the premier league of cultural destinations… we’re in with the big boys in the national cultural scene.” He has also said that the bid would be “taking culture into the communities, onto the doorsteps. So you leave behind amongst ordinary people a better understanding and appreciation of the importance of culture in their lives.”

The consultation closes on 5 April. All 11 towns have until 30 April 2013 to submit their initial bids to an independent advisory panel who will decide on a shortlist to be announced in June 2013.

If you’d like to comment on this proposal, email pirates@hastings.gov.uk by midnight on Monday April 1^st.

Also in: One Long Party