We are unable to verify the facts surrounding the recent claims regarding recruitment practices of Tesco. While we trust our writers and they trust their sources sometimes miscommunication can happen. We are currently rechecking our facts in regard to the "Tesco and Sainsbury's recruiting before planning permission is granted" story.

Matt assures us that he was certain he had understood the information he had been shown but also admits that it seems pretty unlikely. As he cannot assert that what has been written is true with his usual level of confidence we have chosen to point out that we may have been in error and will publish a further update when we have more information.

We would also like to point out that there is nothing "wrong" with a company confidently getting staff recruitment under way early beyond appearing a touch presumptive perhaps. It's a free world after all.

Guest column by Bill Furness, Executive member of Thanet Liberal Democrats

Guest writer Bill Furness gives a political point of view on the coming year.

With the start of a new year with Xmas over and the credit card payments yet to be made, those that are fortunate to have a job look in trepidation at the way that the economy is going here at home and in Europe and how it may affect the labour market here in Thanet.

At least we can all look forward this year to the Queen's Diamond Jubilee celebrations, the Olympic Games and, importantly for all the people of pensionable age who are set to benefit after Liberal Democrats in Government delivered the biggest pension rise in history.

From this April the basic state pension will rise by £5.30 per week, this is more than it has ever increased before, making the new rate £107.45 per week for a single person. a stark contrast to the last Labour government which insulted pensioners with a miserly 75p increase!

» Continue reading: A Liberal Democrat view on the new year

Clearly owing money
Just 500 years ago the idea of lending money for profit (usury) was considered a sin. Clearly owing money can act like a chain that forces us to work long hours. Longer than many of us might have otherwise have liked to.

I am reliably informed that the word mortgage comes from French word "mort" meaning death and another (I forget the exact word) meaning grip. A home loan, to politically correct the word can for some be a death grip that makes us beholden to the materials economy and effectively surfs with a far lessor degree of benefits than our ancestors might have enjoyed. This "death grip" is a reality for many whose home is currently at risk o 2negative equity" which is a nice way of saying that it is now worth less than was paid for it using borrowed money.

One might go so far as to suggest that with so many of us slaves to debt innovation that might otherwise save our economy is suppressed as many great ideas are simply too risky when our home, our family and our ability to put food on the table is at risk.

But debt does of course cover more than the money we owe.

What about the debt we owe to those who have laid down their lives defending our country or the debt we owe to the inventors and scientists of the past whose work has changed the way we live our lives. Would it be going to far to say we owe a debt to the men and women who dedicate their lives (or pats of them anyway) to daring to stand as councillors - a mostly thankless task where one can expect to be widely criticised by all and sundry.

Such debts demand in their own way that we repay them first with gratitude but also by paying it forward and by doing so making the world a slightly better place.

So I ask you: What is debt?

Thanks to the sponsorship of Hiltons World Wide Ltd Thanet News Network will continue to exist.

Despite some Christmas humbug that will hopefully be resolved soon Christmas continued anyway and it was indeed a day of goodwill to all men (and websites). I have been asked to say that cash customers can pick up a 15% discount by mentioning the advert.

So if you happen to be passing make sure you pop in and mention you saw the advert on Thanet News Network.

Hiltons continue to show great faith in Margate long after many other shops have abandoned the high street. Margate does indeed have a whole host of problems as I am starting to learn. I'd like to take this opportunity to encourage all readers to show the high street some love and support generally.

You can find Hiltons World Wide Ltd at 82 High Street opposite Carphone Warehouse.

Normally I (Matt) am the one that pays the server bill for the hosting of Thanet News Network.

Sadly things have got really hairy for me and I am facing a cashless Christmas. I am short by £70 of the amount needed to keep all sites (this and a few others) on line. There is very little I can do about this.

If you want to read what exactly has happened visit this blog page. Otherwise a big thanks from me to everyone who wrote here and a massive thanks to those that helped keep the lights on before.

Thank you to you for reading too.

Did Thanet District Council council go into denial over The Queen's visit?

According to Thanet Online the council (TDC) seem to have misplaced all details of the royal visit (see below). Any mention of Her Royal Highness' visit failed to appear until some serious time later. Of course it does seem as if the council are keeping their head down and pretending this did not happen

In celebration of this truly stupendous royal gaff I have created a line of memorabilia featuring what one might imagine is the line of reasoning in use here.

According to a press release (found for a long time only here) Margate Old Town and the Turner Contemporary are to be included on the route that The Queen and The Duke of Edinburgh will be taking on their historic visit to Margate on Friday 11 November.

Leader of the Council, Cllr. Bob Bayford, has, according to the press release, said: I am both delighted and honoured that Her Majesty The Queen and His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh will be visiting Margate. The Queen last visited the town in 1993 and so this is a great opportunity to show the nation the regeneration that the town is undergoing. This has been a year of achievements marked by the opening of the Turner Contemporary and this visit celebrates the culmination of many years of hard work by Thanet District Council, its partners, local residents and businesses. As a community we should be very proud that Her Majesty is joining us to see this transformation and I hope that Thanet residents will make the Royal party very welcome.

Everyone is welcome to come along to Margate, support the town and join in with the celebrations on this momentous occasion. Crowds are asked to observe the Armistice Day two minutes silence, the start of which will be signalled by the RNLI who will release the traditional maroon at 11.00am. The Armistice observation this year will take place in the Market Place, rather than at Regal Walk.

This week saw the arrival of a number of new features on Thanet News Network.

All members will now have their own page which they can start to customise themselves. As we develop things further all users will be able to add additional information, share more and embed headlines from their own blog(s) on their profile pages.

If you would rather not share this information you can set it to private or friends only. The friendship system is something that we will be rolling out in the next few weeks.

Those that have been invited to be part of a news team will see their news stories appear on their profile pages. Also once the My News feature is ready every user will be able to report the news that matters to them and it will appear on their profile page. Members that have been invited to be part of a news team will be able to select stories that people have written and promote them to the front page.

Later we will be implementing a method whereby you can vote on each other's news stories with those receiving the most votes also being added to the front page. As we begin to find sponsors who are willing to support Thanet News Network those whose stories feature on the front page will be given a share of the advert revenue.

Yeah, you read that right - we want to pay our best members for being so amazing!

New features are generally provided to our members first and on the whole existing account holders are more likely to be invited to join a news team. Talking of news teams one of our future plans is to allow highly active members to create their own news teams and specialist news centres within the site.

Right now you can create your own account by visiting this page.

The failure of the KM Group to acquire titles from rival Northcliffe could spell the end of the road for both companies according to Ofcom

freelancemarket.co.nz is reporting that it has now emerged that in a local media assessment carried out prior to the decision, Ofcom warned that blocking the deal could lead to both KMG and KRNM ceasing to operate altogether.

The possibility that Thanet might loose it's newspapers due not so much to finical issues but to poor adaptability was first raised over three years ago. If this is the case then the importance of news sites such as Thanet News Network and a number of leading Thanet blogs may significantly increase. This importance will not only be to provide local people with local news but to create a forum where local businesses can promote their services.

As such seeing at least some form of ongoing reporting may be vital to Thanet's recovery. That is where Thanet News Network (TNN) comes in. TNN is a community funded project whose first full month was fully paid for by the you the reader. Of course we still need to see this month paid for and we welcome contributions.

Sites like this are becoming all the more important in reporting local news that matters. Soon we could be all that's left.

If you want to see local news reporting continue in Thanet then you should not only use the buttons below each article to share them but also Donate today.

Don't forget that we get an extra hour in bed tomorrow morning.

British summer time has officially come to an end which means that it is time to wind the old little hand back one notch.

What will you do with the "extra" hour?

Have you ever forgotten to put the clocks back and been early for anything?

Top developer Matt Brown has been working silently on the Thanet News Network design to give it a face-lift.

The new design is almost identical to the old but it has been styled much more artistically. The background image was sourced from anaru at flickR and is the first of many background designs.

Being the super geek that he is Matt told us This first background is pretty cool but we're not done yet. The next stage will be to create a collection of iconic Thanet related images and set them in random rotation. My aim in this redesign was to make the website itself a work of art.

Matt continued Thanet News Network is pushing towards the time when it is more completely the news reported by the community itself. I'm not going to stop developing until every person in Thanet is able to contribute the news that matters most to them.