Portsmouth November 2020 review – An illuminated city remembers the fallen

At the start of the month, Portsmouth was shocked as a senior doctor was jailed for a staggering £1.3 fraud that took NHS cash to fund his online gambling habit, with a reporter from The News present to capture all the details.

Crooked Dr Rumi Chhapia, an appointed director of the Portsmouth Primary Care Alliance Limited, was locked up for three years and four months after he siphoned the cash from a group of 16 GP surgeries which provide out-of-hours care across the city.

But better news helped usher in the month, as Portsmouth City Council unveiled a multi-million pound plan to regenerate part of the city centre.

The plans would see a large green space open to all and form the linchpin for a whole new community, called City Centre North.

The council hopes the plan will ‘completely change the dynamic of the area’ around the former Sainsbury’s site, according to Council leader Councillor Gerald Vernon-Jackson.

November marked the 100th anniversary of the poppy appeal, and The News spoke to a resident who survived a Nazi labour camp to help explain what the act of remembrance means to those who have seen the worst of war and conflict.

Magdalena Shrimpton, who was born in Poland 99 years ago and now lives in the Blue Water Care Home in Kingston Road, sent a powerful message about the importance of Remembrance Day, saying that it honours ‘the freedom of all our nations and the great will to live through hard times, and of course all of the brave people who gave their lives for us.’

And on Remembrance Sunday, applause rang out in Guildhall Square as service personnel and youth organisations led by the Band of Her Majesty’s Royal Marines formed a parade to honour the fallen.

The lord-lieutenant of Hampshire, the Lord Mayor of Portsmouth, the leader of Portsmouth City Council, and Portsmouth MPs and senior armed forces representatives attended the event.

Gosport resident Phillip Thorley wore his grandad’s air force medals to the service to the service, proclaiming that he came every year: ‘To throw a service like this, it is something that the UK comes out for.’

Also drawing a huge crowds was a city-wide festival of light that helped illuminate three otherwise gloomy winter nights.

We Shine Portsmouth saw more than 80,000 visits made to its light and art installations, including ‘The Ship Of The Gods’, a 3D projection of a giant ship in St Mary’s Church, Fratton, and ‘The Rainbow In The Dark’, a nighttime rainbow created using mist sprays in Victoria Park.

An annual lantern parade through Fratton change its usual day to join the festival, parading down to St Mary’s.

A spokesman from Portsmouth Creates, the volunteer-led arts group who organised the event, said the organisation was ‘utterly delighted’ with the response of from the city’s residents – with talks underway to bring back the festival next year.

But a shadow fell across the city at the month’s end, as it lost a huge character in community.

Much-loved barmaid Dee Skelton’s death saw her former haunt The Lady Hamilton in The Hard adorned with floral tributes, as her family struggle to come to terms with her mysterious passing, with the 49-year-old fearing she had been spiked on a night out shortly before her death.

The News spoke to a victim of spiking amid growing concerns about the crime, with pubs and bars joining a new app-based alert system to keep women safe across the city.

A message from the Editor, Mark Waldron

Subscribe here for unlimited access to all our coverage, including Pompey, for just 26p a day.