A Sittingbourne teacher who had a cocaine addiction and posted about his drug use on socials has been banned from the profession.
Austin Whiting was the head of Year 13 at Borden Grammar School and taught geography.
As election campaigning continues, Nigel Farage has been in Dover to announce the town's Reform candidate.
We've also been finding out what people in the town want from the next government.
And, a farmer from Maidstone has been telling the podcast what he would like to see from whoever is leading the country.
A Kent dog welfare charity have revealed some of the cruel techniques owners are using to get their dogs to behave.
A study from the Dogs Trust shows people are pinning their pets to the ground and growling, pinching their ears or rolling them onto their backs.
Rag 'n' Bone Man's been on our sister radio station, kmfm, to tell us all about his new single.
And in sport, Gillingham have launched a commemorative away kit to mark the 25th anniversary of a famous victory at Wembley.
They've recreated the yellow strip worn by players in their 3-2 Division 2 play-off final win over Wigan in 2000.
This is the Kent Online Podcast, Nicola Everett. Hello, hope you're okay on Wednesday. May 29th, thanks so much for downloading today's podcast and our top story today is that a sitting-born teacher who had a cocaine addiction and posted about his drug use on socials has been banned from the profession. Lucy joins me now with more on this story. While Austin Whiting was the head of year 13 at Borden Grammar School and talk geography, the 46-year-old joined the school in 2004 but resigned last March. A misconduct panel heard he also had an inappropriate conversation with a pupil while working his notice period. So how did his drug use come to light? Well, concerns were raised about posts on Snapchat that had been seen by some current students. They included how he planned to write a book called "The Man Who Sniffed a House Up His Nose." He admitted to using cocaine between March and May last year, but denied allegations he'd taken it on the school site or had it in his car. A report said that while the Snapchat posts weren't encouraging drug use, they had the potential to bring the school into disrepute. And what did the panel say? They noted Mr Whiting had acted in a way that fell far short of what was expected by teachers who would be considered as role models. They also heard from colleagues who confirmed he'd been a good teacher for more than 17 years. However, they decided a ban was appropriate and proportionate. The ban can be reviewed after two years. Lucy, thank you ever so much Borden Grammar School has been approached for a comment. Kent Online News Other top stories for you today and two people have been jailed after beating a vulnerable man with a baseball bat and setting fire to his flat in Canterbury. 35-year-old Will Crump targeted his neighbor in French and close, knowing that he'd received his benefits money. The victim was left in a smoke-filled room before being found and taken to hospital. Lawrence Cole, who's 35 and from the avenue in Hurston, was also part of the attack. The men have been locked up for a total of four years. A man has been arrested on suspicion of drink driving after a police car crash near Sittingborne while responding to an urgent call. It was involved in a collision with a white Ford Focus on the A2 London Road in Tenum early on Sunday. A 39-year-old local man who was driving the Focus was arrested and bailed, pending further investigation. A man's demand has been ordered to pay back just one pound after 10 kilos of cocaine was found in a banana shipment at Sheines Docks. Sean Burke is thought to have received almost £100,000 for his role in the scheme, which earned him seven and a half years in prison. A 35-year-old was said to have no assets and so the judge made the nominal £1 order. Now, as election campaigning continues, Nigel Farage has been in Dover to announce the town's reform candidate. Fair fuel UK founder Howard Cox will represent the party on July 4th, and Mr Farage used his speech to criticise the government's Rwanda policy. I am absolutely convinced that the overriding reason for calling a snap early general election is because he knows those planes in July, as he promised, would not be going to Rwanda. They weren't going to go. Rishi can't stop the boats and he can't stop the boats for the very same reason that the first aeroplane that was on the tarmac and ready to go was stopped if you remember by a judgment from a single so-called judge. I say so called because most of the judges in the European call of human rights haven't actually been legally trained. They're jurists, which is a very odd European concept, at least to us. And he knows that it won't happen. He knows that despite everything that they put in the legislation, which disapplies articles two and three of the Human Rights Act 1998, he knows that an international treaty goes over above and beyond that. And planes not going to Rwanda would see the failure of what he believes to be his flagship policy. And that's where the other r comes in. That's where the reform votes he feared would have gone a lot higher. So I genuinely believe that's the reason why we've got this early general election. Well, our colleagues from KMTV have been out and about finding out what voters in Dover want from the next government. Who do you think you'll be voting for in the election? Without enthusiasm, I'll be voting Labour. I hope they can improve things. Things are very bad. I hope they can at least make things a little better. There's a part of me which wants to vote for a count-bin face and it's slow and it's time to put out the trash. What do you want changed in donor? The first thing is to recognise how deep the whole we're in and it would just be good if we could get the NHS working again properly, if we could get the schools working against properly. I've been speaking to a couple of people today. The thing people raise a lot is the channel crossings. It just seems to be something that we're supposed to care about when actually I care far more about the NHS or simply about normal everyday matters. I don't know if anybody is going to be able to make our lives any better. At the moment, if Labour get in, they've got to clear up the mess that the Tories have got. People in Dover, the places full of food banks, people are suffering, it's the economy and there are people that are homeless on the streets, the rents arrest have been drawn astronomic and we need to get rid of these zero-hour contracts. I'm going to vote for Labour. Why is it your voting Labour? We have been a lifelong supporter of Labour and I'm very disappointed in the way the Tories have managed the economy in the past 12 years. What do you want changed in Dover as you'll also be electing an MP? Well, a lot of things, really. I want the numbers of people coming across the channel to go down drastically, whatever needs to be done and I want something done about the traffic which seem to have already tightened up. Do you know who you'll be voting for in the general election? Yes, I do. Do you mind saying it? Conservative. I just couldn't vote Labour. I'm concerned with difficult luck to answer for but yeah, I will stick with them at the moment. Quite a few conservative MPs have stood down and quite a lot of people seem to be losing faith in the party but you're still sticking with them. Yes, I'm not happy with what they're doing but you know, I just think that they would be able to do more for us, I would think, when they get sorted out. I haven't read much about the reform so I might do a little bit of homework on that. I've always been concerned over Labour's economic policies because I've financially, to me, they've been inept over the last few years but then again, you've got conservatives who are in a completeness. Overall, we need to be looking at everything from welfare state. I'm a school governor and one of the things that really annoys me is all the government's treat education as a soft touch of drawing money out. They should consider it as an investment. After all, those the up-and-coming children, students and so on are going to be paying for everything in the future, everything that we do. So to actually use this as soft touch to keep money back, they're underfunded. All schools are underfunded. I mean that some of the buildings are falling down and one of our problems with the governments as well is our basic country infrastructure is falling to pieces and it costs more to put it right retrospectively than do it as a continual basis and that's another thing. You know, potholes, as you see how many, I've got four new wheels on my car because of the damage from the potholes. Today, Labour leader Sakeer Starmer is promising to cut NHS waiting lists from day one if Labour wins the general election, which is soon I'll be looking to appeal to younger voters with his promise to create 100,000 apprenticeships a year and the Liberal Democrats are due to set out a rescue plan for farmers. Now, it wants to see £1 billion in extra funding for the agriculture budget and to address worker shortages. We've been speaking to James Smith who runs a fruit farm near Maidstone. Our availability of Labour has been greatly limited since we let the EU and even though the government have extended the seasonal agricultural workers scheme, it really doesn't go very far. It's not particularly put for purpose and doesn't meet the need of horticulture. There's a small number of people on it. Bees is available for poultry as well as into the poultry industry, but it's nowhere near the numbers that the industry requires and that we used to have access to when we had freedom of movement of people within the European Union. So, but the fruit growing, nearly all of the harvest work is is done by hand and it's essential that we can harvest crops at the right time when the quality is perfect in order to meet the needs of the customers, whichever customers they might be. So, that as well as the government's insistence on the UK becoming a high-skilled, high-wage economy and they're actively driving up the cost of labour but whilst actively keeping the cost of food down or attempting to promote cheap food, we need the energy issue being addressed. Genuine support on the ground. I also think that we need to have access to labour as in seasonal workers. My absolute preference would be that we have freedom of movement for people. I think there's tends to be this complete confusion between seasonal workers, people moving between countries to work and contribute versus illegal immigration. So, we see our access to labour as tied up with an immigration issue and they're separate, completely separate things. So, I'd love to just see some political foresight that actually sees through some of these issues. Stop beating the drum up, we're going to deal with migration and then use an easy thing like migrant labour for all different industries in the UK. And the Conservatives have chosen their election candidate for Chatham and Ailesford, after Tracey Crouch announced she's standing down. Nathan Gamester will be hoping to retain the seat for the Tories in July's vote. He's currently managing director at the Centre for Social Justice Foundation, which works with charities. Kent Online reports. A Kent dad has said he was horrified after his daughter dug up a blade in a sand pit along Dover seafront. The 11-year-old found the razor sharp blade, which is feared to have been maliciously buried in the play area at Granville Sands. It's been reported to police and the council, who are searching CCTV footage to find those responsible. Council bosses in Swale have apologised to thousands of residents who are having issues with their bin collections. A new contractor took over the service two months ago and delays have been so bad some people have paid private companies to take away their rubbish. The local authority say the level of inconvenience is greater than expected and making improvements is their top priority. Drivers by the Kent coast say they'll stop using a carpark in warmer if local bosses introduce parking charges. Borrow pit, carpark is currently free but the council will consider bringing in fees later this year as part of their parking strategy. Those who use it now say charges will only drive visitors away and block up local streets. Now, the Kent Online podcast has been hearing from a Kent dog welfare charity about some of the cruel techniques owners are using to get their dogs to behave. A study from the dog's trust shows people are pinning their dogs to the ground and growling, pinching their ears or rolling them onto their backs. It comes as data shows some of the most common behavioural complaints are barking and reactions to other people and their pets. Well, Kate has been speaking to Maria Murray from The Trust who explained some of the most common reasons dog owners reach out for help. With most behaviour issues there will be dogs will have genetic dispositions for certain behaviours and that could be their genetics, you know, parentage and some breed traits as well. But on the whole we encourage people to try and prevent problems from happening in the first place. So with separation anxiety for example the most common reason we will see a dog have separation anxieties because an owner hasn't built time up away from their dog slowly over time in a way they're comfortable with really from the day they get the dog home. So a lot of people will take an extended period of time off with their new puppy for example and then suddenly go back to work from time and that's something that a dog can't cope with. Or as we saw during the pandemic lots of people getting dogs we were at home all the time for the first couple of years even of their life and then suddenly we've gone to leaving them. So most of the time we see something that could be prevented in the first place but certainly in the case of separation anxiety can be incredibly difficult to overcome once that behaviour is in place. I read in the press release as well some people are resorting to sort of it seems really cruel quite drastic measures to try and get this behaviour under control themselves before they reach out. Can you talk me through some of those things that people are trying at home? Yeah you know I really feel for people that are having a behaviour problem with their dog. The main issue is that most people will go to Google right to try and find some support and there's just a plethora of information so people really don't know the right path to take and actually people aren't instinctively dog behaviours or trainers so often people take advice or they've watched TV programs where these are instant fixes and when I say that we talk about something called the dominance theory and that's something that's some very infamous trainers that are out on the TV and out in the media use and that's doing things like rolling their dogs onto their bats, pinning them down, squeezing their ears to kind of imitate biting from other dogs but actually what we know is we call that punishment and actually dogs that receive punishment it can just make problem behaviours worse in the long term so we encourage owners to always use positive reinforcements so that's really positive stuff when a dog does something we want them to do and encourage more of that behaviour. To be honest in the case where you've got something like separation anxiety or reactivity with other dogs you really do want to be speaking to a qualified behaviourist you're going to struggle to find any information on the internet for example that's going to help you because the most important thing is we understand why the dog is exhibiting those behaviours and that can be different in every dog so we need to get that bit first and then we can help establish like these are the ways that you can go about hoping that dog was that issue and that's why the behaviours port line is so amazing because it's this free resource where people can get really they know they're getting the best advice that's out there. You touched on a little bit there if you do use the the dominance theory and sort of negative reinforcement to try and get the behaviour under control it can lead to worse behavioural problems can it also trigger other behavioural issues that weren't present in the first place? Absolutely because all you're doing is you're actually asking a dog to suppress its feelings and how it feels and what that can do is just escalate it so a dog in the first instance for example and another issue that we see a lot is resource guarding so that's where a dog loves its toys or its treats and doesn't want to give them up and actually we say that's okay a dog doesn't have to give that thing up for you and we teach people to swap so we give them something even more valuable that they'll give that thing up for me but what a lot of people do will pin their dogs forcibly take that thing off the dog so actually what that encourages is the next time someone tries to take something really nice away from that dog is actually I'm going to escalate the behaviour so I might nip you I might buy you and so it's really important that we don't kind of push our dogs any more than you know when they're showing worried behaviour already. Maria is also encouraging dog owners in Kent to take part in the National Dog Survey so they can get a snapshot of behaviour in the county. Ken's online reports plans to build almost 300 homes in tenant have been pushed back due to concerns over a lack of doctors services the Frognell Lane development which included 298 homes sports pitches and a community allotment have already received planning permission in principle but counsellors fear residents wouldn't have access to a GP as they're currently none in the village. There are plans to knock down a former secondary school in Chatham to make way for nearly 140 new homes. St John Fisher Catholic comprehensive went on the market last year after pupils moved to a new building on Cityway. Developers have put in an application for 77 houses and 62 apartments. As in Coles opened up on a road in Canterbury for the third time in a month. Part of St Peter's Street in the city centre has been closed since last Friday morning. The same area was shut for four days at the beginning of May just days after reopening following three weeks of work. Southern Water say they're investigating. That'll be closures on the 8249 tonight so work can continue on the multi-million pound junction improvement scheme. It'll be shut northbound between the stopry roundabout and the key street roundabout between 8 p.m. and 5 a.m. tomorrow. And Regan Beaumand has been on our sister radio station K.M. FM to tell us about his new single. What do you believe in? It's from his upcoming album and he says it's got a different vibe from his previous work. It was on breakfast with Gary and Chelsea. Tell us about the new song and the new album as well. It's kind of different vibes. You've been talking about family time and stuff and I believe it's more about that but you tell us. Oh it's meant to be... I went into this album process with a very clear motivation to make something that made people feel good and I wanted it to be hopeful. I wanted it to be all about love and about just... I just wanted to uplift people really and for me as an artist it's quite easy to go for those A minor chords all the time and do something that's quite sad or whatever. That feels like a very comfortable place and I was like I'm thinking about the way I feel on stage and how I want to portray my music to people and how I feel currently in my life and I need to I need the album to be a representation of who I am right now and who I am right now is very happy and positive about life so I feel like the record and this single particularly that's perfect being perfectly represents how I feel and who I am as a person right now. Yeah absolutely. With like being at home and that kind of stuff and these songs being about your family life as well as you know your internal life and everything else. Do you then have a bit of... Do you run the songs by the family? Do you sort of see how they respond to it if it's more about them and life with them or do they just you know chip in with a bit of a review what they like what they don't like and if so does it have any effect on you? I mean I usually play the songs to my missus because a lot of them are about her and she likes that. She knows she's my muse and like she's you know she's always like is this like this is a happy one right and I'm like yeah and like I do I do play my songs to my kids my little ones are only six and seven so they're really like they'll take on board the sound of a song rather than lyrics but most of the time their their attention span is like 30 seconds and if they're not really loving it then they'll just walk away. Ken's online sports. For ball and Gillingham have launched a commemorative away kit to mark the 25th anniversary of a famous victory at Wembley. They've recreated the yellow stripe worn by players in their 3-2 Division 2 playoff final over Wigan in 2000. It was their first time in Division 1 which is now the championship but that's all from us for today. Thanks ever so much for listening. Don't forget you can follow us on Facebook at x Instagram tick tock and threads plus you can get details on the top stories direct to your email each morning via the briefing to sign up to that. You just need to head to kentonline.co.uk. News you can trust. This is the Kent Online Podcast. Do you love antiques and vintage? Then don't miss our amazing antiques and vintage fare. This coming Saturday and Sunday at the Deathling Showground near Maidstone with over 400 inside and outside sellers there'll be thousands of antique and vintage treasures for you to explore from furniture to jewelry to home and garden vintage. There's so much for you to browse and buy. There's free parking, refreshments and children enter for free. Dogs are welcome too. For more details visit lovefares.com. [BLANK_AUDIO]
