Two cultural services providers operating in Southend have secured £1.5m funding to continue their work for a further four years.
 
Arts’ Council England have announced that Focal Point Gallery will receive £745,536 over four years. Meanwhile, Metal in Southend, will receive £753,837 over four years as a proportion of their overall award, which covers their operations in Liverpool and Peterborough too.
 
Both Focal Point Gallery and Metal secured the funding through Arts’ Council England’s “National Portfolio programme”, which recognises key cultural venues throughout England.
 
Since it started its operations in Southend, Metal has most notably delivered the annual festivals Village Green and Village Beach; NetPark, the world’s first digital art park in Chalkwell Park; and the new pan-regional, Estuary Festival.
 
Meanwhile, Focal Point Gallery has delivered an internationally recognised programme of exhibitions and offsite projects as well as the Radical Essex project, since opening in the town more than twenty five years ago.
 
Cllr Ann Holland, Executive Councillor for Culture, Tourism and the Economy, welcomed the announcement. She said: “Both Focal Point Gallery and Metal contribute a huge amount to the cultural offer in Southend.
 
“The funding announced by Arts Council England will mean that both can now build upon their fantastic track record in the borough and add to the town’s overall cultural mix.
 
“This is vital, not only for local residents, but as a means of continuing to attract the 6m plus visitors a year, which are a hugely important contributor to our local economy.
 
“That is why we have made the town’s cultural offer a key component of the borough’s Tourism Strategy, which we are currently developing with the Southend Tourism Partnership”.
 
Joe Hill, Director of Focal Point Gallery, said: “We are delighted that Arts Council England will continue to support the work the gallery does to bring the best of contemporary visual art to Southend and help to build a strong and vibrant cultural community in the region. We hope that the creative programme at the gallery will continue to drive new visitors to South Essex, inspire our local people and help to define cultural perceptions of the region.”
 
Colette Bailey, Artistic Director of Metal said: “It’s fantastic news that Arts Council England have continued to invest in the cultural life of Southend in this way.  We look forward to continuing our work with local, regional, national and international artists working in all disciplines to build ideas and creative projects with people of all ages and from all walks of life across South Essex.”

​A new housing company will be set up by Southend-on-Sea Borough Council that will look to increase the supply of housing for local people to buy and rent.
 
The council’s cabinet (Tuesday 20th June) agreed proposals for a new company that would build and/or acquire homes, and offer a range of buying and renting options including private sale, private rent and shared ownership as well as affordable rent.
 
Cllr John Lamb, Leader of the Council, said: “This is an exciting proposal that builds on our clear commitment and action to create new housing throughout the Borough. The company also has the potential to generate income for the Council to reinvest back into local public services and regenerate several areas of Southend-on-Sea, which in turn will help to improve and sustain the local economy.”
 
Cllr Mark Flewitt, Executive Councillor for Housing, said: “It is well known that nationally we are facing a housing crisis as rents continue to rise and the availability of affordable housing continues to fall.
 
“One of the Council’s key priorities is to build new affordable homes to meet a range of local housing needs and this new housing investment company will allow us to do that and offer these at an affordable rent or a mixture of shared ownership and rent.
 
“We will also look to develop private housing for rent and sale too where appropriate and the income generated from this could be reinvested into more affordable housing and to sustain Council services.”
 
The company is currently in the early stages of development, with initial steps including the identification of suitable sites for building new homes.
 
The plans to set up a housing investment company follow on from the council’s recent commitment to build more council houses, seen recently with the completion of 18 houses and flats in Shoeburyness, and plans in the pipeline for 15 homes and a bungalow for disabled use on two underutilised garage sites at Rochford Road and Audleys Close.
 

Southend-on-Sea Borough Council has made an offer to buy the former gasworks site on Southend seafront.
 
The derelict land, which has blighted the golden mile for a number of years, provides the council with a ‘unique opportunity’ to look at future development opportunities for what is a prime investment site.
 
Cllr John Lamb, Leader of the Council, says: “This is a unique opportunity to buy a prime seafront site that has the potential to offer strategic and regeneration benefits to the Council and the seafront area particularly for future development opportunities and car parking.

“This site has been a blot on the landscape for many years now, so we have made a bid, which if successful would give us the opportunity to step in, regenerate and greatly improve the appearance of the site, deal with the remediation and put the land to positive use.”
 
The 3.5 acre prime seafront site was previously owned by Robert Leonard Estates who secured planning permission for a substantial residential, commercial and hotel development. However works were never commenced and the planning permission has expired.
 
Councillors considered a commercially sensitive report on the subject at Cabinet on Tuesday.

Brand new routes to Dublin, Glasgow and Manchester are highlights of the winter schedule that will be available from London Southend Airport, operated through Stobart Air’s franchise partnership with Flybe.

Flights to the hugely popular Irish capital will operate up to three times daily. The route to the UK’s 2013 ‘Capital of Culture’ – Manchester – will also fly up to three times daily, and you can take off to Scotland’s largest city and a ‘Gateway to the Highlands’ – Glasgow – up to twice daily Sunday-Friday.

All the new routes start on 29 October 2017. Tickets are one sale from today (20 June 2017) at www.flybe.com starting from £29.99 per person one way (including taxes and charges).

Flights to Budapest, Lyon, Milan Malpensa, Prague and Vienna – all of which have been hugely popular since taking off in May – will also continue into the winter months.

This takes the total number of routes available from London Southend this winter to 24.

Glyn Jones, CEO at London Southend Airport said “The announcement of these new, domestic routes further builds on our ambition to make London Southend the capital’s next big airport by providing fantastic leisure and business destinations to passengers from Essex, London and the South East, and now we can add regional connectivity to that mix. These routes to Dublin, Glasgow and Manchester also show she we are listening to our customers and responding – as routes to Ireland and Scotland are among the most requested destinations. LSA is perfectly placed to serve London’s growing travel market especially in the face of the other London airport capacity constraints.”

According to Graeme Buchanan, Chief Executive at Stobart Air, the expansion of its services with three additional routes from London Southend Airport this winter reflects the airlines ambition for its London base, “We are delighted to add more routes for winter 2017 at London Southend. The addition of these new routes bring to nine, the number of Flybe services we will operate from London Southend as part of our winter 2017 flying schedule – an additional six routes this winter on last year’s operation. Our London Southend routes are performing well and we see great potential in these new services, particularly among business and leisure passengers travelling between Dublin and London on a regular basis. We look forward to continuing to work with the Southend Airport team to grow and further develop our London Southend services.”

Vincent Hodder, Flybe Chief Revenue Officer, said “We are delighted to introduce the new winter schedule from London Southend airport this coming winter. The brand-new routes further increase connectivity and choice for passengers across the UK and Europe and we look forward to welcoming everyone on-board in October.”

An ambitious 10-year blueprint to make Southend the number one coastal destination in England is to be considered.

Councillors are being asked to comment on the draft tourism strategy, titled “Destination Southend-on-Sea”, which has been authored by Southend Tourism Partnership working with Southend-on-Sea Borough Council. The document outlines how public and private sector partners across the borough should work together to further build upon the town’s thriving visitor economy, which supports 6,500 local jobs and attracts over six million annual visitors.
 
Key aims of the strategy include:

• Improving communications and marketing, to encourage more people to visit and longer stays.
• Infrastructure – making it easier for people to get into the town and move around different attractions once they are here. This will work alongside the Council’s emerging parking strategy to ensure parking supply and demand are effectively matched.
• Destination development – improving the quality of existing attractions and facilities, making the most of new developments coming online and maximising the opportunities presented within the Leigh-on-Sea and Shoeburyness Coastal Communities teams.
• Events and cultural tourism – further development of the town’s events programme throughout the year.
• Make Southend Sparkle – mobilising local citizens, businesses and volunteers to welcome and assist visitors to the town and act as champions for its visitor offer.

Key partners identified in the strategy include:

• Southend Tourism Partnership
• The Leigh Coastal Community Team
• The Shoeburyness Coastal Communities Team
• The Southend Business Investment District (BID
• Southend-on-Sea Borough Council

Cllr Ann Holland, Executive Councillor for Culture, Tourism and the Economy, said: “This draft strategy presents a deliberately ambitious but achievable way forward for developing the Borough’s visitor economy, from Shoeburyness to Leigh-on-Sea, from our famous beaches to our award-winning parks and historical buildings.
 
“Southend was built on tourism and this strategy will position the resort for future generations, providing jobs, wealth and an attractive place for all to live, work and visit.”
 
Jacqui Dallimore, Chair of Southend Tourism Partnership, said: “This strategy sees Southend aspiring to be the best with a strong focus on delivery.
 
“Success will require willing participation by stakeholders who value the past but look to the future needs of our visitors and how our economy can be stronger with coordinated tourism activity at its heart.
 
Once reviewed by the Cabinet, the draft strategy will be further developed before being taken through the Council’s political cycle for adoption.
 
You can view the draft strategy in full here.

ouncillors will receive an update on important plans to create more secondary school places in Southend.
 
The council’s cabinet (Tuesday 20th June) will be asked to agree that expansion plans for Shoeburyness and St Thomas More High Schools are progressed to the procurement stage and that discussions continue with Belfairs Academy, Eastwood Academy and St Bernard’s High School to provide a total of 150 new places by September 2018.
 
An update on plans to support a bid to build a new free school providing an additional 180 year 7 places by September 2019 will also be given. The expansion is required due to increased recent birth levels and information from Essex County Council suggesting that, due to their own pressures, they will be unable to accept Southend resident pupils from September 2019 onwards.
 
Cllr James Courtenay, Executive Councillor for Children and Learning, said: “We have a statutory duty to ensure that there are sufficient primary and secondary places available in the borough and these plans follow quickly on from our recently completed £25m primary school expansion programme.
 
“This report details how we can meet the need for September 2018 through expansion. But to meet the need by September 2019, we must support an academy trust bid to build a new free school in the Borough. We will do this by supporting the bid and identifying a council-owned site for the school to be built on, which will strengthen the bid.  Not doing this would potentially delay the programme and hamper our ability to provide enough secondary spaces by September 2019.
 
“We have identified a number of possible council-owned sites, but a decision is yet to be made on the preferred site, as it would be subject to legal permissions, proper consultation with relevant stakeholders and gaining successful planning consent. As soon as we are clearer on our preferred option, we will be able to announce our intentions further and carry out the relevant consultations.”