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Dear Editor

I am very interested in contacting Graham Miles, [featured in the Oct/Nov edition]. My 21 year old son, Sam, has been told he is paralysed. I read about Graham six weeks ago when my son became ill. I learnt that Graham had started his recovery by concentrating on his breathing. So, even though Sam was asleep most of the time, I told him to breathe.  He is still on the ventilator but is being weaned off slowly and the medical staff are very pleased with him. If you are in contact with Graham, please could you pass my details on to him?
Veronica Guilfoyle, Yorkshire

[Happily, we were able to put Veronica in touch with Graham, and many other people asked us for some more information about Graham, so we asked him to tell us a little bit more about himself – Ed]

Dear Editor
I am/was a physicist, engineer, quality and procedural expert and writer. During the past few years I have written some forty poems [see one of them on page 9 – Ed]. Since I achieved my racing licence, five years after leaving hospital following locked-in syndrome, I have entered the Brighton National Speed Trials every year since 2000. Continue reading Letters →

Letters

Letters to The Whistler

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Dear Editor
I’ve seen some correspondence in The Whistler recently about the heartbreak that grandparents suffer when they are denied contact with their grandchildren. Readers may like to know about BeGrand.net a new website for grandparents, which can offer support.

It has information and advice on a whole host of topics, from the serious issues like denied contact through to helping children to learn at home and fun activities that grandparents and children can do together. The website contains expert advice on caring for children and keeping them safe, as well as guidance on everyday issues around growing up, and there are confidential online advisers trained to deal with legal and social issues. Most importantly, it is a place for grandparents to talk to each other about the issues that matter. If any grandparents in the area need any support on any aspect of grandparenting, they’ll find help at www.begrand.net
Julia Shipston

Dear Readers
The new extension to Area ‘H’ has created problems for various businesses and, most of all, for Mac’s Café in Arundel Road. The Council did not include any exclusive pay and display bays, only shared bays or permit only. This is causing a great problem when trying to park and visit the café or shops in the area. I have presented a petition to ask the Council to correct this oversight, and that a 1 hour tariff be included rather than just half and two hour charges.
Continue reading Letters to The Whistler →

Letters

Letters to The Whistler

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Dear Editor
I was very disappointed that I did not  get any replies to my letter in the Feb/March issue of The Whistler, regarding the loss of contact with my grandchildren due to a family breakdown. Surely there must be people who your readers know to whom it has happened? It does not necessarily have to be in our Whistler area – anywhere in Brighton, Hove or the surrounding areas. Please could you let me know if you know of anyone? It does not have to be family, it could be friends or maybe people with whom you work. Here is our story…

Five years ago our daughter’s first marriage broke up and she met her present partner. She has a daughter from her first marriage who we were always able to see from the time she was born. After a few months our daughter got pregnant with her new partner and we were told that we would not see this child. That was devastating for us. We accepted it, as, at the time, we did not have the resources to fight it.

After nearly 5 years we decided to go to court to get access to the youngest granddaughter. We managed to get legal aid for a good solicitor and barrister. It took 14 months of court cases before we were finally given access to her. At first, we had to go to a contact  centre, as our little granddaughter did not know us.

Thankfully, it all went well and we now see her once a month and our other granddaughter every other weekend as she is with her dad the other times. The court case was mentally very upsetting, but thanks to family and friends, and the support of two grandparent websites we got through,(www.grandparentsplus.org.uk). We were horrified to see that there are millions of grandparents who have tried to gain access to no avail, due to all the costs. If you would like to hear any more about this story we would love to tell you. Please email me on lonelygrannie@gmail.com.  

Celia Steer

Letters

Letter to The Whistler

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Dear Editor
After reading the letter by Celia Steer (The Whistler Feb/Mar) regarding the mental strain her and her husband went through to gain access to their grandchildren, I wondered if the community would be interested in a free introduction to EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) also known as Tapping. Last summer I spent a lot of time on Brighton seafront tapping people for a whole host of issues and you can see videos here www.tappingguru.com which, if you have not encountered EFT before, should show you the use that it can be put to. If you think this could be useful, I’d happily donate a few hours of my time to show people how it works. It’s quick and simple to learn and will give  a life time of benefits.
Ivan Clements, EFT and Emotion Code Practitioner, 32 Montpelier Crescent

If you would like to join Ivan, then the WHCA will set up an afternoon or evening session at West Hill Hall with him. Please write to us as whwhistler@aol.com so we can gauge the interest in Ivan’s offer and at the same time let us know the nature of your problem, eg phobia, muscle/joint pain, trauma etc then Ivan can be prepared to deal with those at the session – Ed.

Dear Residents of West Hill
I am still receiving complaints about selfish parking. One suggestion is to leave a note on the offending vehicle, asking the driver to give more consideration to other users of the parking bays and make them aware if it happens to them when searching for a space late at night they will understand how it feels.

The matter of the large black waste bins being parked on the pavements and parking bays has provoked a few people. It has become obvious that without the bin having its own marked area, it is a licence to place it wherever the operator decides. I have spoken to the Council about this and I am told that City Clean can place them wherever they please. The pavement is considered to be part of the highway but if you park on the pavement you could be fined. The matter of the dropped kerbs in Wilbury Avenue and other roads is still a cause for concern. It appears that the Council do not intend to put matters right by removing the white guidance lines and replacing them with double yellow lines. This means that the owners of property with off-street parking access have no legal right to that access. [A candidate for the Kafka Club? – Ed].

Please contact me with your queries and problems via our new email address theppp@gmx.com or call me on 07768 002328 between 11am and 6pm.
Steve Percy, (chairman) PPP

Letters

Letters to The Whistler

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Dear Editor
Through your Letters’ column, I should like to express my shock and dissatisfaction with the decision of the Council’s planning committee to refuse permission to Community Base, a unique organisation in the town centre, offering office accommodation to charity groups, to use its large ugly wall as advertising space. The site is a prominent spot on the route from Brighton station to the city centre and sea front. Although planning decisions may only be made on the information known and according to conscience, not on political or financial grounds, the committee heard several times of the Tories’ disgust that this site had been used to display a Green Party poster. That, and the fact that the Tory councillors forced a decision on the Green and Labour members, who were in favour of granting the application would seem to make it clearly a political decision. What price conscience now?
Iris Gardener, Seven Dials


Dear Residents of West Hill
The Council is now in the process of producing guidance pamphlets to advise on Permits, PCNs, Blue Badge Holders, and general parking in Brighton & Hove. A site visit is planned to try and rectify issues of confusing signs and lines that have been raised by shopkeepers and motorists in the Melville and Dyke Road area. The Dropped Kerb problem is an on-going subject of discussion between the Council and our team. They are trying to convince us that the parking bays outside the drive-in access to people’s homes in Wilbury Avenue and other areas is perfectly legal. It cannot be legal to prevent use of the driveway into your own house by allowing vehicles to park across your access using Pay and Display. I will take this up with the Assistant Sustainable Transport Manager, Mark Prior, at the next meeting of The Transport Partnership.

The change of double yellow lines back to single ones is a possibility in certain areas but might need the local Ward Councillor to speak to residents of the affected areas about this. Personally, I do not think that it should be an issue requiring a petition as the residents did not ask the lines to be changed in the first place. They were not consulted on this matter and should not have to ask for them to be reinstated. As there is a lack of disabled bays, the only option to use a Blue Badge for an overnight stay is a single yellow line. If you park on a double yellow line with a disabled Blue Badge you have to move it to a different area every three hours. Not very practical for anyone, let alone a disabled person. Extended hours of operation for the permit bays is something the Council is not prepared to change without the consultation of residents and their Ward Councillor. The local Ward Councillor, Pete West, will also be at the Transport Partnership meeting. I will speak to him about the issues and report back to you in the next issue of The Whistler. Please contact me with your queries and problems via our new email address theppp@gmx.com or call me on 07768 002328 between 11am and 6pm.
Steve Percy, (chairman) PPP