The Legends Cabaret Big Top will form the heart of the Brighton Pride Festival in Preston Park on Saturday, August 4.
AS Brighton Pride gets set toColour My World, your host, Miss Lola Lasagne has gathered together the very best of the UK’s LGBT+ cabaret scene.
Legends Maisie Trollette and Dave Lynn will headline a divine combination of song and laughter, backed up, by among others, Spice and Miss Jason while Sandra, Jennie Castell and Kara Van Park will provide some light, shade and contrast, finishing off with a tartan blaze of glory that is Mary Mac and an extended medley of the powerhouse vocals belonging to the D.E. Experience.
The Legends Cabaret Tent should be your first stop on Preston Park for a riotous celebration of queer, camp entertainment only made possible with the continued support of Tony Chapman and Legends, it shows off Brighton’s community spirit which makes Brighton Pride so special.
2.00pm – 4.00pm Lola Lasagne, Sally Vate, Stephanie Von Klitz, Mrs Moore, Sandra, Spice, Lady Imelda and Miss Penny
4.00pm – 6.00pm Miss Jason, Maisie Trollette, Lucinda Lashes, Davina Sparkle, Dave Lynn, Martha D’arthur and Son Ofa Tutu
6.00pm – 8.30pm Lola Lasagne, Rose Garden, Jennie Castell, Kara Von Park, Mary Mac and D.E. Experience
As the cost of emergency accommodation in Brighton & Hove skyrockets, millions of pounds of public money is going into the pockets of private landlords.
Cllr David Gibson
THE alarming increase in the cost of short-term accommodation has prompted Green Councillors on Brighton and Hove City Council to renew their calls for the Council to bring this service in-house.
A response to a question from Green housing spokesperson Cllr David Gibson revealed that the net cost of privately-run temporary accommodation to the council has increased every year since 2014/15.
Over £2.77m was spent last year – an increase of £829k on the previous year with net losses to the Council increasing by as much as 500% across the past four years.
With the costs of such accommodation continuing to rise, Greens want to see public money used to provide services to those at risk of rough sleeping, rather than given to private companies.
A set of proposals put forward by the Greens in December 2017 called for an investigation into the savings that could be achieved through Council ownership of short-term accommodation. Despite the proposals being backed by all political parties, Greens say the Labour Council has yet to deliver a report on the matter.
With costs to the Council escalating, Greens are calling for urgent action and have criticised the Labour Council for failing to back Green budget proposals that would have made funds available to buy suitable accommodation.
Green Councillor David Gibson said: “It is shocking that privately provided short-term emergency accommodation costs £2.77m – an increase of over £800,000 on the previous year. Instead of publicly subsidised rents going to private landlords, it’s a no brainer that the Council should provide its own emergency and temporary accommodation, which could be done at a much lower cost to the public purse.
“With resources tight, we are calling for our proposals to use cheap borrowing to buy buildings to be properly explored. We called for this to be investigated back in December. Now the costs are escalating, it is more urgent than ever and the Labour Council needs to get a move on and look at the options for Council-run short-term accommodation. Other Councils that have started doing this have already reported huge savings – but crucially also a better service.”
Greens have argued that the Council could also provide a better service to homeless people through delivering its own emergency accommodation. Private landlords are currently under no obligation to provide support services to vulnerable tenants in emergency accommodation.
A Labour group spokesperson responded saying:“Everyone is aware of the high cost of providing emergency and temporary accommodation for people in urgent housing need, especially in a city like Brighton and Hove. Unfortunately, due to the national housing crisis and Conservative austerity policies, costs have continued to rise.
“However, the Green Party will know that as a Labour council we are already delivering new council-owned temporary accommodation for those in housing need – with 10 new homes completed at Stonehurst Court, and 12 new homes planned at Oxford Street. Court is now occupied and, alongside giving families new high quality accommodation, we are making savings which will continue as we move forward with schemes like these. Another scheme for 15 more temporary accommodation units is also planned, and we intend to carry on working hard to provide more council-owned temporary and emergency accommodation.
“So we agree with Cllr Gibson that the cost of emergency and temporary accommodation for residents is a valid concern, but what really matters is the delivery of new council-owned units, which is taking place, alongside our work to try to reduce the number of households that reach a housing crisis.
“We would welcome Cllr Gibson acknowledging that as a Labour council we have been more focussed on delivering new council-owned temporary accommodation than when his party led the council.”
ScotRail Alliance brand trains with Pride rainbows to support Pride Glasgow.
(Left to right) ScotRail Alliance Sustainability & Safety Assurance Director David Lister, Pride Glasgow Trustee David Sinclair, John Moore of Pride Glasgow and Queen Street Station team members Josie & Marta.
AS Scotland gears up for Pride Glasgow 2018, three ScotRail trains have been branded with the rainbow symbol to support Scotlands biggest LGBT+ festival.
Three ScotRail Class 170 trains have been branded with Pride’s iconic rainbow symbol to mark Pride Glasgow, taking place this weekend on Saturday 14 and Sunday, July 15.
The trains will be in service across the country, including on the popular Edinburgh – Glasgow Queen Street main line, and the Borders Railway.
ScotRail Alliance employees from Network Rail and ScotRail will join the Pride parade on Saturday, July 14 as it makes its way through the streets of Glasgow.
Last month, the ScotRail Alliance supported Pride Edinburgh with two rainbow branded Class 170 trains.
At the unveiling of the trains in Glasgow Queen Street, ScotRail Alliance Sustainability & Safety Assurance Director David Lister said:“It’s great to see our trains fitted with the rainbow flag again for Pride Glasgow, just weeks after marking Pride Edinburgh with its own set.
“At the ScotRail Alliance we are committed to achieving a workforce that reflects the diversity of our customers and we’re proud to have so many colleagues taking part in the march.
“I would encourage anybody attending Pride Glasgow, or with an interest in LGBT+ issues, to get in touch with us to find out more about the work the ScotRail Alliance is doing to celebrate diversity and promote equality.”
Pride Glasgow Trustee David Sinclair said: “The support the ScotRail Alliance is showing to the LGBTI community is fantastic.
“These trains looks brilliant, and it will be great to see them in Scotland’s major cities. It will certainly brighten up the railway.”
On Friday, August 3, 2018, for the fourth year in a row, Joe Steven (right) and George Oakley (left) from OS Barbers in George Street, Brighton will be raising money for the Sussex Beacon.
George Oakley (left) and Joe Steven (right)
THE boys will be offering charity haircuts with ALL proceeds from ALL haircuts during the day going to the Sussex Beacon.
The Sussex Beacon provides specialist support and care to people living with HIV, offering both inpatient and outpatient services to improve health and promote independence for people living with HIV.
Last year they raised £410.00 from a similar charity day for the Beacon on Pride Friday.
No appointments are needed, just pop in between 10am – 7pm and let the boys run their fingers through your hair.
OS Barbers
52 George Street,
Kemptown, BN2 1RJ
07548 351901
Shakespeare’s Scottish play is grounded in our obsession with time – “tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow”, “this ignorant present”. And “what’s done cannot be undone” to mention just three references in the play.
Photo Credit : The Other Richard
AS if to emphasise this, Polly Findlay’s Grand Prix-speed production of Macbeth is played in front of a giant digital countdown clock whose two-hour traffic races us towards inevitable doom. Once he is dead, and Malcolm is crowned, the clock resumes is inevitable ticking down to another cycle of death and destruction – just a matter of time away.
The play is timely in another way – centring on the murder of a Scottish King – written just a year after the failed Gunpowder Plot of 1605. The resonance of regicide and treason which resounded with Shakespeare’s audience doesn’t today.
Niamh Cusack is electrifying as the utterly ruthless and ambitious Lady Macbeth frenetically rushes round the stage even in her highly charged sleep-walking scene.
Very few actors seem to get to grips with the contradictory character of Macbeth and maybe it’s not the best developed of Shakespeare’s villains. And to quote Macbeth himself, they are often “full of sound and fury signifying nothing.”
Christopher Eccleston as the man who would be king or maybe isn’t bothered is impressive as the burly, swaggering, blustering warrior, but too often he mutters the magic poetry of the part and is inaudible when he turns upstage.
His finest moments come after his rushed coronation when his self-confidence and clarity of thought show what the actor might have made of the rest of the part.
Polly Findlay has also decided to make this into a horror film. The witches are played by children in eerie polka dot onesies, clutching manic dolls and intoning in unison in a truly scary Stephen King style.
And full marks to Michael Hodgson as the Pinteresque Porter, chillingly acts sad Satan’s doorkeeper, chalking up the hundreds of deaths on the back wall of the stage.
Edward Bennett as Macduff is heart-wrenching when he discovers his wife and little children have been murdered. “ all? All? All? All? “ he repeats in a barely audible voice – a true moment of visceral theatre in this highly unorthodox production.
In our times of political upheaval in the USA and Europe, Shakespeare’s most poignant line in the play may be “poor country almost afraid to know itself”.
Macbeth runs at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre, Stratford-upon-Avon till September then transfers to London’s Barbican.
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