A complaint has been made about the arrest of a teenage boy in Margate after footage emerged of an officer appearing to knee them in the stomach.
Police had been called to Dane Park following reports a group possibly had weapons.
Sir Keir Starmer has been in Medway to launch Labour's general election campaign.
Rishi Sunak announced yesterday that we will go to the polls on July 4th.
Figures show more drivers are being caught speeding around the Dartford Crossing than anywhere else in the county.
More than 64,000 notices and fixed penalties have been issued on the approach road and through the tunnels in the last five years, generating more than £1.6 million in revenue.
Residents say plans to build an energy storage plant near Gravesend will destroy farmland and ruin the green belt landscape.
Battery units and other equipment to hold excess electricity could be installed off Foxhounds Lane in Southfleet.
And more families in Kent are being urged to consider fostering a child with additional needs, to tackle a shortage of carers.
The managing director of Credo Care Disability Fostering on Romney Marsh says there are lots of youngsters who need a loving home instead of growing up in hospital or a residential home.
10. We'll get on to some general election news later, but first, a complaint has been made about the arrest of a teenage boy in Margate after footage emerged of an officer appearing to neither in the stomach. Kate's here with more details, so Kate tell us exactly what happened. Well, police were called to Dane Park on the 5th of May following reports a group possibly had weapons and a spursal order had already been put in place, giving officers additional powers to move on anyone causing nuisance, harassment or distress. Footage recorded that day shows a large group of young people near the park and two male police officers. One boy approaches one of the officers, here's a clip from the video. In the footage, an officer seems to push a boy against a wall. The teenager appears to put his hands on the constable, and then the officer can be seen ning him in the stomach before pushing him to the floor and placing him under arrest. And what have Kent police said in response to the footage? Well, they've confirmed the 14-year-old boy was detained on suspicion of assaulting an emergency worker. A 14-year-old girl was also detained on suspicion of a public order offense, while another girl, whose 15 was questioned on suspicion of breaching a dispersal order. The spokesman goes on to say a complaint has since been received regarding one of the arrests and this is currently being reviewed. The police federation was also approached for a response but said they can't comment on a live investigation. Thanks, Kate. Kent Online News A man's been arrested after a crash between a bus and a tractor in Meppom left 17 people injured. There was a huge emergency response following the collision on the A227 South Street yesterday afternoon. The bus driver and 12 children were taken to hospital and four others were treated by paramedics at the scene. Police say one child remains in a London hospital in a serious but stable condition. A 33-year-old from East Sussex has been questioned on suspicion of causing serious injury by dangerous driving and released on bail. Investigators want to hear from anyone who has footage on their phone or dashcam. A man's been arrested following reports he was seen carrying a weapon in Margate armed police and a search helicopter were called to Queens Parade yesterday evening. A man in his 50s was detained on Milton Avenue and officers seized an imitation firearm. The countdowns on for the general election after Rishi Sunak called on for the 4th of July. Parliament will be dissolved next Thursday then there will be five weeks of campaigning before we get to vote. Our political editor Paul Francis has been reacting to yesterday's announcement. Well, I know correspondence like myself are supposed to know these things in advance but I have to say that I was a little surprised when Rishi Sunak confirmed that the date of the election was going to be July the 4th. They're surprised partly because the lines that were being given by considered party strategists that when Rishi Sunak spoke about the second half of the year he was referring more to the autumn Christmas period. So why did he choose this date? Well, there was an element of surprise in it. Might have hoped to court labour of guard but more than that I think he wanted to get on with it and do so at a time when some of these indicators of the vibrancy of the economy and the stability in the housing market and some of these other economic indicators were more positive and he could weave those into a campaign whereas some of those indicators might change coming the autumn or winter period. Now, while some of the economic indicators are showing signs of improving, the one rating that Rishi Sunak doesn't like is the fact that he's 20% behind in the polls and his own personal approval ratings are going through the floor. So going for a poll in the summer is quite hard to see why he would want to do that when historically there's no other election where a party has gone into the campaign in such a dire position and succeeded in turning things around and winning the election. But he's nothing if not confident Rishi Sunak and he's going to give it his best shot. The leaders of the two main parties have already been out appealing to voters. Sakeer Starmer was in Medway this morning to launch Labour's campaign. It's great to be here in Gilliam. Last time under a Labour government, Gilliam was in the same league as Manchester City. So that's a good place to start but look at long last the election has been called. The time has come and the wait is over and that means through the power of our democracy, the voters now get to choose the power of the vote, the power each and every one of you has to change our country, our community and your future for the better. So whether you're a family that's been battling the cost of living, dealing with antisocial behaviour, whether you're a business that's been struggling for years against the odds of the economy that's in chaos under this government, whether you've served your country, whatever way this election is for you because you now have the power, the chance to end the chaos, to turn the page and to rebuild Britain. The reporter Robert Baudie was watching his speech at Priest Field Stadium. He had something in particular to ask the Labour leader. Medway Council and Kent County Council both faced serious financial problems recently. Locally in Medway, the Labour group chalks out to the reduction of the revenue support grants since 2010. Will a Labour government increase the revenue support grant or fund councils into by the way and how much by? I think what you're seeing in Medway in other places is the damage that 14 years of a Tory government have done. We've seen councils across the country, frankly, struggling financially because of the chaos of this government. And yes, we do want to change that. We want to ensure we've got a stable economy with strong fiscal rules so we don't have that sort of turbulence because voters are worried about their public services. So I'm pleased that we may be on the cusp of being able to change the chaos and division that's caused so much difficulty under this government. For so many councils. Thank you. Elsewhere, Rishi Sunak headed north to speak to voters in Derbyshire. It is great to be with you all this morning. And the first thing I'm going to say is it's been tough the last few years. You know that. I know that. We were dealing with a pandemic and all the drama that that caused to everyone's lives just as we were getting recovered from that. We got hit by a war in Ukraine and the impact on all your energy bills. But I hope you know that during those times, I was there to do what I could to help you. The first time most of you got to know me was during Covid and the furlough scheme that helped protect so many people's jobs. Then with energy bills, the government stepped in to try and alleviate some of the increase in those bills as well. But now look what's happened collectively thanks to all your hard work or your sacrifice, your resilience. We've really made progress. We just got the news yesterday. Inflation down from 11% when I got this job down back to normal just over 2%. Energy bills now falling by hundreds of pounds. Wages have been rising by faster than prices for almost 10 months now. And the economy we discovered in the first few months of this year is growing faster than pretty much all our major competitors. So look, even though there's more work to do and I know it will take time for you to see the benefits of that, the plan is working and we have that economic stability back. The leaders of the Lib Dems and the Reform Party are also beginning their election campaigns today. Nigel Farage has announced he won't be standing. Ken's online reports. The reports found a plane that crashed at Blue Bell Hill after taking off from Rochester Airport was probably too heavy. Two people were on board the light aircraft, which got stuck in a tree for more than four hours in October 2022. Another pilot said he wouldn't have flown the plane from Rochester with full fuel and a passenger. An East Farley drink driver, who was nearly three times the legal limit when she got her car wedged on a bollard, has been banned from driving. Sarah Shock was seen trying to manoeuvre her Peugeot free of the collision on Heathrow'd near Maidstone on Christmas Eve. The 50-year-old from Victoria Court lost her license for three years and nine months. She must wear an alcohol abstinence tag, attend rehab and pay nearly £200. Now figures seen by Kent online show more drivers have been caught speeding around the Dartford Crossing than anywhere else in the county. More than 64,000 notices and fixed penalties have been issued on the approach road and through the tunnels in the last five years, it's raised more than £1.6 million in revenue. Sophia from our colleagues at KMTV has been speaking to Craig West, who's head of Kent's Roads Policing Unit. I don't know if technology has advanced to the point where we're catching more drivers. I think it's just Kent's road to becoming increasingly busy and we are determined to send that safety message out and it does. It's really disappointing, but people are still continuing to speed. The roads you mention are particularly busy roads with high volumes of traffic, hence the high enforcement rate. Yeah, because there was some quite a few of the roads came up year-on-year, like the Dartford Tunnel parts of the M25. So is it kind of those roads where you're seeing more people using their cars that more people are often speeding? The locations of the fixed camera sites are determined on the casualty rate of particular locations. So we will only put a camera, a location where we're going to have a positive influence on road safety. But yes again, they are very frequently used roads and highways, so they're going to naturally, we're putting a naturally in force against the high volume of road users. I noticed that over the past five years, actually the cameras that were police operated actually ended up making more revenue. So why is that? Because the officers are handing out more fines or they're just able to catch more people speeding with the police-operated ones rather than the fixed ones. I think that's probably due to motorists tend to become aware of the fixed camera sites. They're more alert to those camera sites and we do again disappointingly see people slow down just for the appeal of that camera before accelerating again. The benefits of using the handheld devices is that we can deploy them whenever we want 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year. So people do not know where the next site will be created. So I think that's the reason why we're probably enforcing more people now through the handheld devices. But again, the revenue goes into the core system. You can see a map of the top five places where the most speeding finds have been issued over on our website. Kent Online News. Shoppers have criticised a hike in parking charges at the designer outlet in Ashford. The MacArthur Glen site was initially free when it opened in 2000. It's now £2.50 for four hours. Other centres, including Bluewater and Westwood Cross, remain free but bosses say the change was necessary due to increased costs. Residents say plans to build an energy storage plant near Gravesend will destroy farmland and ruin the Greenbelt landscape. A company called EcoDev want to install 140 battery units and other equipment off Fox Hounds Lane in Southlete. The facility will be able to store enough excess electricity to power up more than 124,000 homes. Lynn Carter lives nearby and isn't happy. We're losing prime agricultural land that at a time when we've been encouraged to protect our grounds, our lands, to protect our gardens, our species of animals and birds and wildlife that we'd even consider losing so much. And we don't know the implications of this long-term use of these batteries. We don't know the implications of how they will impact on the actual ground, the soil. We know there'll be light pollution. We know there'll be noise pollution. We know there'll be huge disruption to the area while they're building this installation if it goes ahead. But we don't know what the long-term implications will be. It's being voiced, mooted as a green project. I don't understand the technicalities of it but what I do think is that how can it be green and it seems to be a system that will buy in cheap electricity from the National Grid, store it, set it at a higher price when demand is higher. But our National Grid isn't green. Our National Grid might use some green energy with reference to wind turbines and solar panels but our grid is not totally green. So how can this be promoted as green, particularly with the impact that the installation will have on the land? This is known to be a flood area, Park Corner Road, Foxhans Road, floods regularly, roads get closed regularly. And yet the proposition is to build these huge concrete plinths on a land that is flood-prone anyway. So I can only assume that will reduce the impact of the land to absorb the water and store the water. So I think the, there is this issue about how houses will be devalued, that there will be issues about selling property. There's new property being built very close to me. I suspect that might be difficult to sell when their rear view will be the major impact of this installation should it go ahead. Planning legislation doesn't recognise the prices of houses will be devalued, the prices that houses might be difficult to sell, that isn't recognised in planning law, but it is an impact on people as individuals. A decision on the application is due to be made in July. More families in Kent are being urged to consider fostering a disabled child to tackle a shortage of carers and awareness campaigns running this month to try and get more people interested in doing it. Crado Care Disability Fostering on Romley Marsh has spent more than 20 years finding placements for youngsters with additional needs. Kate's been chatting to managing director Richard Powell. There is the challenge of the fact that you've got to be there for the children. And for Crado Care Disability Fostering, predominantly that's going to be most people have one person in household if it's a couple having to probably give up work to provide that care long term probably to a child with those additional needs. That can be a challenge. So we tend to find that the passion and the drive that people want to provide in giving a child a permanent home, a loving home does require some commitment, possibly financially. But there's rewards and support and pay for us to provide and support that carers to do that. And do you find that placing children with additional needs can be more challenging than placing children without? In terms of placing children, it has its challenges. But we're quite successful in Crado Care, we believe. And you know, we're probably the premier agency to do that in the agency world. However, not everybody believes that they can do caring for a child with additional needs, maybe in a wheelchair, maybe with sort of certain special needs that they feel unskilled to do. But you know, we've got great training, we've got great support. And I believe a lot more people can do it. But they just don't realise it. Would somebody considering taking on a or fostering a child with additional needs, would they require any extra, you know, training or skills? As you said, I know you provide some, but are you looking for people that have first aid training or any sort of medical knowledge? No, not necessarily. We provide all that. All our carers do pediatric first aid training, but we provide all that through nurse trainers or outside agencies who are specialising those sorts of trainings. But it's not not all of our children come with those sort of high medical needs. Sometimes, you know, just need great parents and you can be single, you can be a couple, you don't have to be married. It's really open to you to think, can I do this? And I believe people can. I think you mentioned before as well, it can be quite a challenging process. Why is it so important that we give this recognition to foster carers? Obviously, I know they work, you know, very, very hard to provide a loving environment for these children, but why should we shine a light on them and just recognise their great work? We have a lot of children who are coming to care for all different reasons. Some are voluntarily with their parents' agreement and some not. However, what we want is family-based care for the majority of children who can have it. And we have a lot of children who go into hospital or residential care because of their particular needs, but we believe we can offer a family for them. So the more people that want to foster, the more families that we can offer those children an opportunity to come out of residential care and live with a family. And we're very successful at doing that. And we've placed many children who probably would have had a life in an institution that they no longer have and actually they're with a family. So, you know, credit to the families, all I keep saying is, come forward and that's what the beauty of foster care for fortnight is. It promotes it, encourages people to think about it. And nobody wakes up and says, I'd like to have more children in my household through fostering. This is a long process that people have thought about. I've often sometimes over many years. And all I would say is, take that next step and, you know, build an inquiry form and find out what it's all about. A Kent Beach has been transformed into a memorial to mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day. Silhouettes of soldiers have been marked into the sand at Stone Bay in Broadstairs ahead of June 6th. You can see pictures of the display at Kent Online. And while you're on our website, you can see pictures of a rare phenomenon spotted off the Kent coast by a luminescence could be seen at Warden Point, Botany Bay and Recover. It's most common in the Caribbean, but the warmer weather has meant it's been visible here. Kent Online Sports football and jilling and manager Mark Bono says there'll be an aggressive approach to recruitment this summer. The new boss will have some time to build a squad for next season after releasing eight players making four available for transfer. He says he wants to create a team that everybody loves watching. That's all from us today. Thanks ever so much for listening. Don't forget you can follow us on Facebook, X, Instagram, TikTok and threads. You can also get details on the top stories. Direct to your email each morning via the briefing to sign up. Just head to kentonline.co.uk. News you can trust. This is the Kent Online podcast. It's nearly time for fun at Causington Park Sports Centre. The family-friendly inclusive pool and sports centre from Medway, opening on Wednesday the 17th of July with a brand new fun pool, weight machine and flume, four-lane swimming pool and splash pool for little ones, multi-purpose dance and fitness studio with children's party area and their state-of-the-art gym. The countdown is on. Sign up to a membership and find out more at medway.gov.uk/ UK/Cosington Park
