At last! Two moves in the right direction

In the week that Rother council announces that it is starting legal action to ensure removal at long last of the eyesore Grand Hotel ruin it also reveals that it is planning to invest 2.1m in creating an industrial park on the old Sidley goods yard site.

Jobs in the Sidley area, the town centre rid of the hideous mess that has blighted it since February 2003 '“ the prospects for progress and encouraging and give hope for the future.

Practical difficulties are, as always, legion. It remains to be seen how engineers will overcome the problems of access to the goods yard development and the Link Road which will pass through the site.

No matter, the principle of making productive use of all of the valuable area of land is sound, particularly the idea of creating start units for entrepreneurs with good business ideas and needing a swift and easy means of getting going.

For the good of the town economy and of its job-seekers, we wish the scheme well.

Rother has not endeared itself to the public over its handling of the Grand Hotel site saga.